He failed the examination for the Royal College of Surgeons but received his bachelor of medicine degree in 1831; he did not go on for the M.D.When a cholera epidemic broke out in 1832, Lever worked for the Board of Health in Country Clare for four months. He was extremely popular with his patients and probably saved many of their lives more by raising their spirits with his humorous anecdotes than by his medical skills.
Soon thereafter, Lever received an appointment to a dispensary at Portstewart, a resort town in Country Derry, Ulster; he annoyed his superiors by taking on several other medical jobs in nearby towns in an effort to earn enough money to support his extravagant habits. He married his childhood sweetheart, Kate Butler, on 16 November 1831; the couple eventually had three daughters and a son. Lever's financial problems were eased slightly at the beginning of 1832, when his parents died and he received a legacy of £250 a year.
In the summer of 1835, Lever met the Reverend William Hamilton Maxwell in Portstewart. Maxwell was an author who contributed to the Dublin University Magazine; his influence inspired Lever to take up writing again.
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