The Irish novelist readily adapted himself to life in “the very commercial but very profligate city of Florence” (as Father Prout describes it). He even went so far as to continue some of those _outré_ displayings which had given offence to the inhabitants of another grand-duchy: he drove his piebald cattle along the crowded avenue of Le Cascine; and it was stated by unamiable people that he was at first taken to be a circus proprietor.
He was soon well known in fashionable circles. Florentine clubs and palaces extended their hospitality graciously; he was _persona grata_ at the British Embassy, where his old friend, Sir George Seymour, held sway; he attended receptions at the brilliant court of the Grand Duke of Tuscany. Lever describes the Grand Duke Leopold as one of the most amiable of men and one of the weakest of sovereigns, able to keep possession of his throne only by avowing his willingness to abandon it.
Florence was the gayest of Italian cities when Lever established himself in the Palazzo Standish. The Cascine had special attractions for him. Florence, he declares, was to the world of Society what the Bourse is to the world of Trade. “Scandal here,” he goes on to say, “holds its festival, and the misdeeds of every capital of Europe are discussed. The higher themes of politics occupy but few; the interests of literature attract still less: it is essentially the world of talk.” And as Lever enjoyed conversation more than any other art or pastime, he revelled in Florentine life.
Notwithstanding the negligent attitude of Florence towards the interests of literature or its professors, many goodly British literary folk were denizens of the beautiful city of “magnificently stern and sombre streets.” Amongst these were Robert Browning and his wife, the vivacious and prying Mrs Trollope, and the once famous scientist, Mrs Somerville.
“....Except the most miserable piece of depressing twaddle, yclept ‘Horace Templeton,’ the fruit of gloomy reveries and dreary brain-wanderings, I have nothing _sur le tapis_, but I’ll try to set to work once that our affair Curry is settled.”
“Palazzo Standish, Florence, _Feb_. 4, 1848.
“I have this day received yours of the 25th asking respecting the insertion of ‘Hinton’ in ‘The Dublin University Magazine.’ This was done with my permission though manifestly against my interest, as the sale was thus rendered by so much less than we might reasonably have looked for in the No. form. Of course, however, we cannot now complain that we made a bad bargain; and as for the Currys, they will never allude to a matter whose discussion would tell against themselves. The Magazine history is this: When I was living in Brussels I received a letter from M’Glashan saying that if I liked to come to Ireland to take the editorship of the Magazine (which I had already expressed a strong wish to do), they would guarantee me at least £2000 for the first year, and after such a rate of remuneration as increased sales, &c, might warrant. I came, and then, to my great disappointment, discovered that they included the whole sum I had already contracted to receive for ‘Jack Hinton’ in that same £2000 (viz., £1300), leaving me not £2000 but £700 for the editorship and authorship of the papers I wrote for ‘The Dublin University Magazine.’ It was, however, too late to retract. I had given up my profession, my station as attaché to the Embassy; my friends had ceased to regard me as a doctor, and so I was in for it. If I bore up tolerably well against this piece of trickery, it was really because I had resolved, come what would, not to lose courage,--and so I did continue for the very miserable three years I stayed in Ireland. I tell this now--I believe I never did tell it to you before,--not that it may in any way be of use or influence in the present conjuncture, but simply as a circumstance to show that I have never been _exigeant_ or exacting in my dealings with other folks. Nor when I had (as I still have) a written pledge in my hands did I think its enforcement a matter of legal redress.