“Villa Morelli, Florence, April 14,1865.
“After the affecting picture Skene drew of you over one of my inscrutable MSS., I set the governess to work to copy out a chapter of ‘Sir B.,’ which I now send; the remainder of the No. for July I shall despatch to-morrow or next day at farthest. That done, I shall rest and do no more for a little while, as my story needs digestion.
“I have asked for a short leave. I am not sure the answer may not be, ‘You are never at your post, and your request is mere surplusage, and nobody knows or cares where you are,’ &c. If, however, ‘My Lord’ should not have read ‘The Rope Trick,’ and if he should be courteously disposed to accord me my few weeks of absence, and if I should go,—it will be at once, as I am anxious to be in town when the world of Parliament is there, when there are men to talk to and to listen to. I want greatly to see you: I’m not sure that it is not one of my primest objects in my journey.
“All this, however, must depend on F. O., which, to say truth, owes me very little favour or civility. I have been idle latterly—not from choice indeed; but my wife has been very poorly, and there is nothing so entirely and hopelessly disables me as a sick house: the very silence appals me.”
To Mr John Blackwood,
“Villa Morelli, April 23,1865.
“I send you a short story. I have made it O’Dowdish, but you shall yourself decide if it would be better unconnected with O’D. It would not make a bad farce; and Buckstone as ‘Joel,’ and Paul Bedford as ‘Victor Emanuel,’ would make what the Cockneys call a ‘screamer.’
“I have not yet heard anything of my leave, but if I get it at once, and am forced to utilise it immediately, my plan would be to go over to Ireland (where I am obliged to go on business), finish all I have to do there, and be back by the 20th to meet you in London. I cannot say how delighted I should be to go down to you in Scotland. I’d like to see you with your natural background,—a man is always best with his own accessories,—but it mauna be. I can’t manage the time. Going, as I do, from home with my poor wife such a sufferer is very anxious work, and though I have deferred it for the last five years, I go now—if I do go—with great fear and uneasiness. It requires no small self-restraint to say ‘No’ to so pleasant a project, and for God’s sake don’t try and tempt me any more!”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Villa Morelli, May 6,1865.