[2] A severe attack of fever, combined with other circumstances, induced him to spend the winter of 1824–1825 and the spring of 1825 in Rome, Naples and Sicily.
He then returned to Scotland, and, after spending a summer at Castle Toward, Argyllshire, went to Edinburgh, where he passed his examination in civil law at the university, with a view to being called to the Scottish bar.
He took part in the unsuccessful operations of Lord Cochrane and Sir Richard Church for the attempted relief of Athens in 1827.
When independence had been secured in 1829 he bought a landed estate in Attica, but all his efforts for the introduction of a better system of agriculture ended in failure, and he devoted himself to the literary work which occupied the rest of his life,[2] and for many years, he acted as the special correspondent of the London Times.
His History of Greece, produced in sections between 1843 and 1861, did not at first receive the recognition which its merits deserved, but it has since been given by scholars in all countries, and specially in Germany, a place among works of permanent value, alike for its literary style and the depth and insight of its historical views.