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diff --git a/old/34930.txt b/old/34930.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2bb93c0 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/34930.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6641 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Thomas Moore, by Stephen Gwynn + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Thomas Moore + +Author: Stephen Gwynn + +Release Date: January 12, 2011 [EBook #34930] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THOMAS MOORE *** + + + + +Produced by Andrea Ball and Marc D'Hooghe at +http://www.freeliterature.org + + + + + +THOMAS MOORE + +By + +STEPHEN GWYNN + + +ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS + + +LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., Ltd. + +1905 + + + + +CONTENTS + + +CHAPTER I--Boyhood and Early Poems + +CHAPTER II--Early Manhood and Marriage + +CHAPTER III--"Lalla Rookh" + +CHAPTER IV--Period of Residence Abroad + +CHAPTER V--Work as Biographer and Controversialist + +CHAPTER VI--The Decline of Life + +CHAPTER VII--General Appreciation + +APPENDIX + +INDEX + + + + +THOMAS MOORE + + + + +CHAPTER I + +BOYHOOD AND EARLY POEMS + + +Sudden fame, acquired with little difficulty, suffers generally a period +of obscuration after the compelling power which attaches to a man's +living personality has been removed; and from this darkness it does not +always emerge. Of such splendour and subsequent eclipse, Moore's fate +might be cited as the capital example. + +The son of a petty Dublin tradesman, he found himself, almost from his +first entry on the world, courted by a brilliant society; each year +added to his friendships among the men who stood highest in literature +and statesmanship; and his reputation on the Continent was surpassed +only by that of Scott and Byron. He did not live to see a reaction. Lord +John Russell could write boldly in 1853, a year after his friend's +death, that "of English lyrical poets, Moore is surely the greatest." +There is perhaps no need to criticise either this attitude of excessive +admiration, or that which in many cases has replaced it, of tolerant +contempt. But it is as well to emphasise at the outset the fact that +even to-day, more than a century after he began to publish, Moore is +still one of the poets most popular and widely known throughout the +English-speaking world. His effect on his own race at least has been +durable; and if it be a fair test of a poet's vitality to ask how much +of his work could be recovered from oral tradition, there are not many +who would stand it better than the singer of the Irish Melodies. At +least the older generation of Irishmen and Irishwomen now living have +his poetry by heart. + +The purpose of this book is to give, if possible, a just estimate of the +man's character and of his work as a poet. The problem, so far as the +biographical part is concerned, is not to discover new material but to +select from masses already in print. The Memoirs of his Life, edited by +Lord John Russell, fill eight volumes, though the life with which they +deal was neither long nor specially eventful. In addition we have +allusions to Moore, as a widely known social personage, in almost every +memoir of that time; and newspaper references by thousands have been +collected. These extraneous sources, however, add very little to the +impression which is gained by a careful reading of the correspondence +and of the long diaries in which Moore's nature, singularly unsecretive, +displays itself with perfect frankness. Whether one's aim be to justify +Moore or to condemn him, the most effective means are provided by his +own words; and for nearly everything that I have to allege in the +narrative part of this work, Moore, himself is the authority. Nor is the +critical estimate which has to be put forward, though remote from that +of Moore's official biographer, at all unlike that which the poet +himself seems to have formed of his work. + +Thomas Moore was born in Dublin on the 28th of May 1779, at No. 12 +Aungier Street, where his father, a native of Kerry, kept a grocer's +shop. His mother, Anastasia Clodd, was the daughter of a small provision +merchant in Wexford. Moore was their eldest child, and of the brothers +and sisters whom he mentions, only two girls, his sisters Katherine and +Ellen, appear to have grown up or to have played any part in his life. +His parents were evidently prosperous people, devoted to their clever +boy and ambitious to secure him social promotion by giving scope to the +talents which he showed from his early schooldays. The memoir of his +youth, which Moore wrote in middle life, notes the special pleasure +which his mother took in the friendship of a certain Miss Dodd, an +elderly maiden lady moving in "a class of society somewhat of a higher +level than ours"; and it is easy enough to understand why the precocious +imp of a boy found favour with this distinguished person and her guests. +He had all the gifts of an actor and a mimic, and they were encouraged +in him first at home, and then at the boarding-school to which he was +sent. Samuel Whyte, its head master, had been the teacher of Sheridan, +and though he discovered none of Sheridan's abilities, the connection +with the Sheridan family, added to his own tastes, had brought him into +close touch with the stage. He was the author of a didactic poem on "The +Theatre," a great director of private theatricals, and a teacher of +elocution. Such a man was not likely to neglect the gifts of the clever +small boy entrusted to him, and Master Moore, at the age of eleven, +already figured on the playbill of some important private theatricals as +reciting the Epilogue. He was encouraged also in the habit of rhyming, a +habit that reached back as far as he could remember; and before his +fifteenth year was far gone, he attained to the honours of print in a +creditable magazine, the _Anthologia Hibernica_. The first of his +contributions was an amatory address to a Miss Hannah Byrne, herself, it +appears, a poetess. The lines, "To Zelia on her charging the Author with +writing too much on love," need not be quoted (though the subject is +characteristic), nor the "Pastoral Ballad" which followed in the number +for October 1793. It is worth noting, however, that in 1794 we find +Moore paraphrasing Anacreon's Fifth Ode; and further that in March of +the same year he is acknowledging his debt to Mr. Samuel Whyte with +verses beginning + + "Hail heaven-taught votary of the laurel'd Nine" + +--an unusual form of address from a schoolboy to his pedagogue. + +Briefly, one gathers the impression that Moore's schooldays were +enlivened by many small gaieties, while his holidays abounded with the +same distractions. The family was sent down to Sandymount, now a suburb, +but then a seaside village on Dublin Bay, and there, in addition to +sea-bathing, they had their fill of mild play-acting. Moore reproduces +some lines from an epilogue written for one of these occasions when the +return to school was imminent:-- + + "Our Pantaloon that did so aged look + Must now resume his youth, his task, his book; + Our Harlequin who skipp'd, leap'd, danced, and died, + Must now stand trembling by his tutor's side." + +And he notes genially how the pathos of his farewell nearly moved him to +tears as he recited the closing words--doubtless with a thrilling +tremble in his accents. Moore was always [greek: _artidakrous_]. But he +was a healthy, active youngster, and we read that he emulated Harlequin +in jumping talents, as well as in the command of tears and laughter; and +practised over the rail of a tent-bed till he could at last "perform the +headforemost leap of his hero most successfully." + +School made little break in these pleasures; for while the family were +at the seaside, his indulgent father provided the boy with a pony on +which he rode down every Saturday to stay over the Sunday; "and at the +hour when I was expected, there generally came my sister with a number +of young girls to meet me, and full of smiles and welcomes, walked by +the side of my pony into the town." Never was a boy more petted. About +this time, too, his musical gifts began to be discovered; for Mrs. Moore +insisted that her daughter Katherine should be taught not only the +harpsichord, but also the piano, and that a piano should be bought. On +this instrument Moore taught himself to play; and since his mother had a +pleasant voice and a talent for giving gay little supper-parties, +musical people used to come to the house, and the boy had plenty of +chances for showing off his accomplishments, accompanying himself, and +developing already his uncanny knack of dramatic singing. + +A young gentleman thus brought up was, one would say, in a fair way to +be spoiled, and Moore, looking back, is quick to recognise the danger. +Yet he is fully justified in the comment which closes his narrative of +the triumphant entries into Sandymount with schoolgirls escorting his +pony:-- + + "There is far more of what is called vanity in my now reporting the + tribute, than I felt then in receiving it; and I attribute very + much to the cheerful and kindly circumstances which thus surrounded + my childhood, that spirit of enjoyment and, I may venture to add, + good temper, which has never, thank God, failed me to the present + time (July 1833)." + +Moreover, if his parents were interested in his pleasures, they were no +less concerned about his work. His mother, he writes, examined him daily +in his studies; sometimes even, when kept out late at a party, she would +wake the boy out of his sleep in the small hours of morning, and bid him +sit up and repeat over his lessons. Her affectionate care met with that +return from her son which was continued to the end of her life. There +was nothing in his power that Moore would not do to please his mother. + +Nevertheless, touching as the relation was, it had its weak side, and +Moore in time realised it. In a notable passage of his diary, which +describes the pleasant days spent by him at Abbotsford in 1825, we read +how he congratulated Scott on the advantages of his upbringing--the +open-air life, field sports, and free intercourse with the peasantry. + + "I said that the want of this manly training showed itself in my + poetry, which would perhaps have had a far more vigorous character, + if it had not been for the sort of _boudoir_ education I had + received." ("The only thing, indeed," he adds, "that conduced to + brace and invigorate my mind was the strong political feelings that + were stirring round me when I was a boy, and in which I took a deep + and most ardent interest.") + +Part of this stirring manifested itself in a secret association under +John Moore's own roof; for the son had organised his father's two clerks +into a debating and literary society, of which he constituted himself +president. The meetings took place after the common meal of the +household was over, when the clerks retired to their bedroom, and Master +Thomas to his own apartment--a corner of the same bedroom, but boarded +off, fitted with a table, chest of drawers, and book-case, and decorated +by its owner with inscriptions of his own composition "in the manner, as +I flattered myself, of Shenstone at the Leasowes." The secret society +met at dead of night in a closet beyond the large bedroom, once or twice +a week; and each member was bound to produce a riddle or rebus in verse, +which the others were set to solve. And in addition to this more +literary part of the proceedings, the members discussed politics--Tom +Ennis, the senior clerk, being a strong nationalist. + +Politics certainly played a great part in moulding Moore's feelings and +imagination, and it should be observed that his nonage almost coincided +with the duration of Ireland's independent Parliament. He was three +years old when the Volunteers established the freedom of the legislature +in College Green, and twenty-one when Pitt and Castlereagh purchased its +extinction. His father, as a Catholic, had naturally a keen interest in +the great question of reform and Catholic enfranchisement, and Moore +remembered being taken by him to a dinner in honour of Napper Tandy, +when the hero of the evening noticed the small boy. The Latin usher at +Whyte's school too, Mr. Donovan, was an ardent patriot, and in the hours +of special instruction which he devoted to the young scholar--for Moore +had early outstripped his class-fellows in Latin and Greek--he taught +his pupil more than the classics. But these influences bred at most a +predisposition. It was Trinity College that made Moore a rebel--or as +nearly a rebel as he ever became. + +The measure of partial enfranchisement passed in 1793 admitted Catholics +to study in the University of Dublin, though its emoluments were denied +them. A curious point should be noted here. The entry under June 2, +1794, reads: "Thomas Moore, P. Prot," _i.e._ Commoner (pensionarius), +Protestant. Now Moore himself states that it was for a while debated in +the family circle whether he should be entered as a Protestant to +qualify him for scholarship, fellowship and the rest; he does not seem +to know that a preliminary step was actually taken, quite possibly by +his school-master. John Moore's political friends were mostly Protestant +("the Catholics," his son writes, "being still too timorous to come +forward openly in their own cause"); the atmosphere into which the +student entered was strongly Protestant, the friends whom he made were +of the dominant religion. But neither then nor at any time was Moore +prepared to change creeds for material advantage. This is the more +remarkable because the family's religion was none of the strictest. +Moore notes that while at college he abandoned the practice of +confession, his mother, after some protest, "very wisely consenting." + +Whether owing to the lack of incentive, or because he had no taste for +science, then a necessary part of any honours course, Moore troubled +little about academic successes, and, after gaining a single premium in +his first year, decided to "confine himself to such parts of the course +as fell within his own tastes and pursuits." Incidentally he earned +distinction for a composition in English verse sent in instead of the +prescribed Latin prose; and, needless to say, was busy with less +authorised verse-writing. He did, however, in his third year, 1797, +present himself for the scholarship examination and was (he says) placed +on the list of successful candidates, though his religion disqualified +him for enjoyment of the privileges. Records show that on Tuesday, 13th +June of that year, thirteen exhibitions were given, supplementary to the +list of scholars published on Trinity Monday (the 12th), and on this +list Moore stands first. The award was presumably a solatium. + +But the serious and lasting part of his university education was gained, +as so often happens, not from his tutors but from his associates. The +recall of Lord Fitzwilliam in March 1795--"that fatal turning-point in +Irish history," as Mr. Lecky calls it--had shattered the hopes of Irish +Catholics and made civil war a result to be eagerly urged by extremists +on both sides. "The political ferment soon found its way within the +walls of our university," writes Moore; and among his personal friends +was a young man destined to tragic fame. + + "This youth was Robert Emmet, whose brilliant success in his + college studies, and more particularly in the scientific portion of + them, had crowned his career, as far as he had gone, with all the + honours of the course; while his powers of oratory displayed at a + debating society, of which, about this time (1796-7), I became a + member, were beginning to excite universal attention, as well from + the eloquence as the political boldness of his displays. He was, I + rather think, by two classes, my senior, though it might have been + only by one. But there was, at all events, such an interval between + our standings as, at that time of life, makes a material + difference; and when I became a member of the debating society, I + found him in full fame, not only for his scientific attainments + but also for the blamelessness of his life and the grave suavity of + his manners." + +In the beginning of 1797 this debating club came to an end, and Emmet as +well as Moore transferred his energies to the more important Historical +Society. Here Moore, by his own account, distinguished himself only as +the author of "a burlesque poem called an 'Ode upon Nothing, with Notes +by Trismegistus Rustifustius,'" which earned first a medal by general +acclamation, and then a vote of censure by reason of the broad licence +of certain passages. Emmet, however, was a member of a different kind, +and the speeches delivered by him attracted so much attention that a +senior man was detailed by the governing Board to attend meetings and +answer the young orator. About the same time a paper called _The Press_ +was set up by Emmet's elder brother, Thomas Addis Emmet, and other +leaders of the United Irishmen; and in this Moore published anonymously +a "Letter to the Students of Trinity College." The letter was, by +Moore's account of it, treasonable enough, and when, according to +custom, he read out the paper to his father and mother at home, they +pronounced it to be "very bold." Next day a friend called and made some +veiled allusion to the matter, which Moore's mother caught at, and she, +says Moore, "most earnestly entreated of me never again to venture on so +dangerous a step." Her son promised, and a few days later Emmet's +influence was added to the mother's. Moore's account of the circumstance +is so characteristic that it must be quoted. + + "A few days after, in the course of one of those strolls into the + country which Emmet and I used often to take together, our + conversation turned upon this letter, and I gave him to understand + it was mine; when, with that almost feminine gentleness of manner + which he possessed, and which is so often found in such determined + spirits, he owned to me that on reading the letter, though pleased + with its contents, he could not help regretting that the public + attention had been thus drawn to the politics of the University, as + it might have the effect of awakening the vigilance of the college + authorities, and frustrate the progress of the good work (as we + both considered it) which was going on there so quietly. Even then, + boyish as my own mind was, I could not help being struck with the + manliness of the view which I saw he took of what men ought to do + in such times and circumstances, namely, not to _talk_ or _write_ + about their intentions, but to _act_. He had never before, I think, + in conversation with me, alluded to the existence of the United + Irish societies in college, nor did he now, or at any subsequent + time, make any proposition to me to join in them, a forbearance + which I attribute a good deal to his knowledge of the watchful + anxiety about me which prevailed at home, and his foreseeing the + difficulty which I should experience--from being, as the phrase is, + constantly 'tied to my mother's apron-strings'--in attending the + meetings of the society without being discovered." + +It will be seen that Moore makes no claim for heroic conduct. One may +assume with great certainty that in such a matter Emmet would not have +obeyed a mother's injunctions. But although Moore's parents desired that +their son should not go out of his way to incur risks, they were by no +means of opinion that he should seek safety at any price. In 1797, on +the eve of the rebellion, an inquisition was held within Trinity by Lord +Chancellor FitzGibbon. On the first day of the tribunal's sitting, one +of Emmet's friends, named Hamilton, refused to answer certain questions, +and was sent down with the sentence of banishment from the University, +carrying with it exclusion from all the learned professions. Moore went +home and discussed the situation that evening. + + "The deliberate conclusion which my dear, honest father and mother + came to was that, overwhelming as the consequences were to all + their prospects and hopes for me, yet if the questions leading to + the crimination of others which had been put to almost all examined + on that day, and which poor Dacre Hamilton alone refused to answer, + should be put also to me, I must in the same manner and at all + risks return a similar refusal." + +Next day Moore was called, and, after objecting to the oath, took it +with the express reservation that he should refuse to answer any +question which might criminate his associates. No such question was +asked, and his fortitude was not put to the proof, nor does it seem that +after this Moore dabbled in rebellion. Five years later, in 1803, when +Emmet's abortive rising was nipped in the bud and the young leader went +to his death, Moore was in London, preparing to depart for Bermuda. None +of the letters preserved from that time contain any reference to this +tragedy; but Moore's writings show again and again that the capacity for +hero-worship was evoked in him by this friend of boyhood as by no other +figure of his time. In the first number of the _Irish Melodies_, +published in 1808, an early place is given to the lyric:-- + + "O breathe not his name, let it sleep in the shade, + Where cold and unhonoured his ashes are laid; + Sad, silent, and dark be the tears that we shed, + As the night-dew that falls on the grass o'er his head. + + "But the night-dew that falls, though in silence it weeps, + Shall brighten with verdure the grave where he sleeps; + And the tear that we shed, though in secret it rolls, + Shall long keep his memory green in our souls." + +Every one, in Ireland at least, who read these lines heard in them an +echo of the closing passage in Emmet's speech from the dock:-- + + "I have but one request to ask at my departure from this world. It + is the charity of its silence. Let no man write my epitaph. When my + country shall have taken her place among the nations of the earth, + then, and not till then, let my epitaph be written." + +Emmet's words are established among the scriptures of the Irish people; +but it may well be allowed that their fame would be less had not Moore +caught up and amplified their thought with all his habitual felicity and +more than his habitual passion. Nor is this all. "The Fire Worshippers" +is the most characteristic of the four long poems set in the framework +of _Lalla Rookh_, and "The Fire Worshippers" is a glorification of +rebellion, which is merely made explicit in the following fine +passage:-- + + "Rebellion! foul, dishonouring word, + Whose wrongful blight so oft has stain'd + The holiest cause that tongue or sword + Of mortal ever lost or gain'd, + How many a spirit, born to bless, + Hath sunk beneath that withering name, + Whom but a day's, an hour's success, + Had wafted to eternal fame!" + +More than that, the rebels glorified are men like Emmet, who take up +arms as a supreme protest, almost without hope of success. + + "Who, though they know the strife is vain, + Who, though they know the riven chain + Snaps but to enter in the heart + Of him who rends its links apart, + Yet dare the issue,--blest to be + Even for one bleeding moment free, + And die in pangs of liberty!" + +The affinity is not only between Emmet and the rebel hero Hafed. Hinda, +the beloved of Hafed, has many traits that recall Emmet's betrothed, the +beautiful and most unhappy Sarah Curran. For although John Philpot +Curran was a leading supporter of Grattan's principles, yet no man more +bitterly denounced Emmet's attempt; and Al Hassan himself, the fierce +Moslem chief, could not have dealt more harshly with Hinda, had he +detected her love for the Gheber, than did Curran when he was confronted +with the proofs that his daughter continued her affection to a declared +rebel. It is not hard to guess of whom Moore thought when he wrote the +moving and beautiful lines which describe Hinda's passion in the days +after her lover had been revealed to her for the foe of her father's +arms:-- + + "Ah! not the love that should have bless'd + So young, so innocent a breast; + Not the pure, open, prosperous love, + That, pledged on earth and seal'd above, + Grows in the world's approving eyes, + In friendship's smile and home's caress, + Collecting all the heart's sweet ties + Into one knot of happiness! + No, Hinda, no--thy fatal flame + Is nursed in silence, sorrow, shame.-- + A passion, without hope or pleasure, + In thy soul's darkness buried deep, + It lies, like some ill-gotten treasure,-- + Some idol, without shrine or name, + O'er which its pale-eyed votaries keep + Unholy watch, while others sleep!" + +Hafed and Hinda are lovers who find themselves united by all the +attraction of their natures, yet separated irretrievably by external +circumstances which are, in no small part, of the hero's making. The man +is resolute to forfeit, not only life, but the fruition of declared +love, sooner than abandon a national cause, even when that cause is most +desperate;--the girl sees herself with "a divided duty," torn away by +imperious love from all her natural loyalties;--and such lovers also, in +Moore's own youth, were Robert Emmet and Sarah Curran. I have quoted the +famous lyric in which he consecrates the memory of the man who died for +the faith that was in him. Not less famous, and still more beautiful, is +the melody which preserves the memory of the surviving lover, and the +sad moods of retrospect which were evident in her broken life. Here, +more than perhaps in any other poem, Moore has fixed in his words that +plangent quality of voice, by which a hundred times he moved listeners +to tears. + + "She is far from the land where her young hero sleeps, + And lovers are round her sighing; + But coldly she turns from their gaze, and weeps, + For her heart in his grave is lying. + + "She sings the wild song of her dear native plains, + Every note which he loved awaking:-- + Ah! little they think, who delight in her strains, + How the heart of the Minstrel is breaking. + + "He had lived for his love, for his country he died, + They were all that to life had entwin'd him; + Nor soon shall the tears of his country be dried, + Nor long will his love stay behind him. + + "Oh! make her a grave where the sunbeams rest + When they promise a glorious morrow; + They'll shine o'er her sleep, like a smile from the West, + From her own loved island of sorrow." + +With the terrible events of 1798 Moore had no personal concern. His +memoir notes that he was ill in bed when the long-expected revolt broke +out, and when folks in Dublin were scared by the going out of all the +street lamps on the night fixed for an attempt on the metropolis. Yet it +is strange how little trace is left in his writings by that bloodstained +year. Even in his Life of Lord Edward Fitzgerald, we seem to find the +result of subsequent reading and inquiry, rather than the narrative of +one who was almost a man grown when Lord Edward's tragic end moved pity +throughout the whole kingdom. + +And in truth, though politics were always well to the front among +Moore's interests, they never dominated his life. The memoir of his +youth notes that even among his political associates other enthusiasms +were cultivated. Edward Hudson, one of the Committee of United Irishmen, +seized just before the rebellion broke out, was, Moore says, +"passionately devoted to Irish music," and had "collected and +transcribed all our most beautiful airs." To intercourse with him in +these days the poet ascribed much of his own early acquaintance with the +chief source of his inspiration. Further, Moore formally completed his +education by graduating in 1798, and before this time he had been +entered at the Middle Temple by the father of his friend Beresford +Burston, a young man of good family and of sporting tastes. But, while +still an undergraduate, he had already commenced the composition whose +success was to turn him from all serious thoughts of the bar. + +The interest of another friend had procured him admission at all seasons +to Marsh's Library, and here he plunged deep in miscellaneous reading. +We read in the preface to his early volume, _Poetical Works of the late +Thomas Little_, that "Mr. Little" (the supposititious author) "gave much +of his time to the study of the amatory writers"; and it is safe to +conclude that Mr. Little's original read, in the fine library founded by +Archbishop Marsh, whatever the Latin and Greek writers had to say on the +subject of gallantry. Here also it is probable that he made acquaintance +with what the same preface calls "the graceful levity, the _grata +protervitas_ of a Rochester and a Sedley," and there probably he +acquired that knowledge of Olympia Fulvia Morata, Alessandra Scala, and +the other "Latin _blues_," which, long after, gave him the rare +opportunity "to show off to Macaulay all such reading as _he_ never +read." Moore was always a surprising devourer of books, and his parents +had profited by the presence of French emigres to add a good knowledge +of modern tongues to his store of classics; a fine memory completed his +equipment for the academic side of literature. + +Oddly enough, the desire for academic recognition seems to have prompted +his first undertaking. Given a young man possessing a good supply of +Greek and Latin, a large fund of miscellaneous knowledge, a strong taste +for the amatory poets, and a remarkably neat turn with verse, it was +natural enough that he should turn to translation of the classics. +Anacreon, who had engaged his attention in schooldays, still held it: +and about the time of his graduating, Moore went to the Provost of +Trinity, Dr. Kearney, with a good handful of renderings from that poet, +and suggested that his industry should be recognised by "some honour or +reward." Dr. Kearney was sympathetic and flattering, but at the same +time "expressed his doubts whether the Board could properly confer any +public reward upon the translation of a work so amatory and convivial as +the Odes of Anacreon." Nevertheless, he strongly advised publication, +adding, with an agreeable touch of nature, "The young people will like +it." It may be added that, when publication came to be arranged, Dr. +Kearney was one of the only two subscribers found among "the monks of +Trinity," as Moore contemptuously called them; and further, that he +appears to have lent to the young poet his copy of Spaletti's +edition--one of two sent from the Pope to Trinity College by the +intermediacy of the Catholic Archbishop Troy. + +This, however, is to anticipate. It was in the spring of April 1799 that +Mr. Thomas Moore set out to eat his first dinner at the Middle Temple. +The proceeds of the little grocery business--of which Moore never was +ashamed, and which never seems to have been a hindrance to him in +society--were now to be sharply taxed. Mrs. Moore had long been hoarding +against the journey to London, to gather the guineas which she now sewed +up in the waistband of the adventurer's pantaloons. In some other part +of the garments, "unknown to me" (Moore writes), "she had stitched in a +scapular, a small piece of cloth blessed by the priest, which a fond +superstition inclined her to believe would keep the wearer of it from +harm." The journey was accomplished successfully, and quarters were +found for the traveller at 44 George Street, Portman Square, by some +Irish acquaintances. Except for his Irish connections, most of them +people in a small way of life, apothecaries and the like, Moore was +rather friendless in town. The custom of the Temple obliging each +novice, as part of the form of initiation, to give a dinner to some +brother Templars, embarrassed him at first, since he did not know a +soul; and he was only relieved "by a young fellow, who, addressing me +very politely, offered to collect for me the number of diners generally +used on such occasions." It seems that he felt despondent, and a letter +to his father suggests that he wrote querulously, asking leave to return +home and give up the game. It is certain that he was immeasurably +homesick, and each one of his letters to "my dearest father" and "my +darling mother" teems with expressions of eagerness for the sight of +them. + +Nevertheless he was making his way, and, before a month was over, could +write, "I need never be out of company if I chose it." He had formed +also one of the two or three connections which dominated his life. +Joseph Atkinson, secretary in Ireland to the Ordnance Board, who had +made friends with the young singer in Dublin, gave him an introduction +to Lord Moira (afterwards the second Marquis of Hastings). Moore, a few +days after arriving, called on the great man, and was invited to dinner; +the acquaintance must have progressed rapidly, for in the same year he +was invited to pay a visit to Donington Park, Lord Moira's country seat, +on his way back from spending the summer vacation in Ireland. + + "This was of course at that time," Moore observes with that + good-humoured candour which is a characteristic of him, "a great + event in my life, and among the most vivid of my early English + recollections is that of my first night at Donington, when Lord + Moira, with that high courtesy for which he was remarkable, lighted + me himself to my bedroom; and there was this stately personage + stalking on before through the long lighted gallery, bearing in his + hand my bed-candle which he delivered to me at the door of my + apartment. I thought it all exceedingly fine and grand, but at the + same time most uncomfortable, and little I foresaw how much at home + and at my ease I should one day find myself in that great house." + +After this visit, negotiations with a publisher for the issue of the +_Anacreon_, which had been begun during Moore's first sojourn in London, +were resumed, and probably the name of friendship with Lord Moira did no +harm. At all events the business was conducted to a successful issue by +Moore's friend, Dr. Hume; and on December 19, 1799, the new poet writes +rapturously of getting a good number of names for the subscription, +adding that he has "received two hard guineas already from Mr. Campbell +and Mr. Tinker, which I hope will be lucky. They are the only guineas I +ever kissed, and I have locked them up religiously." Dr. Lawrence, a +scholar of repute, reported favourably of the translation. Mrs. +Fitzherbert was added to the list of subscribers; and finally, to crown +all, Moore wrote-- + + "My dear Mother, I have got the Prince's name and his permission + that I should dedicate _Anacreon_ to him. Hurra! Hurra!" + +And before the translator returned to the home where he was so eagerly +expected, he had been duly presented to "his Royal Highness, George +Prince of Wales." "He is beyond doubt a man of very fascinating +manners," the letter goes on (dated August 4, 1800); and indeed the +Prince's remarks, as Moore reports them, were vastly civil:-- + + "The honour was entirely _his_ in being allowed to put his name 'to + a work of such merit.' He then said that he hoped when he returned + to town in the winter, we should have many opportunities of + _enjoying each other's society_; that he was passionately fond of + music and had long heard of my talents in that way. Is not all this + very fine?" + +Very fine indeed. "But, my dearest mother, it has cost me a new coat. +By-the-bye, I am still in my other tailor's debt." There one has in a +nutshell the epitome of Moore's life, if the life were to be written +from a hostile point of view. On the other hand, considered candidly, +there is nothing more surprising than the small degree of harm done to +Moore by his disproportionate success. For the son of a small Irish +tradesman to find himself at the age of one-and-twenty flattered by the +heir-apparent--at a time too when the heir-apparent was the +all-conquering leader of society--was indeed a dazzling promotion. And +from that day onwards, Moore never lost ground. He had through life his +choice of whatever was most brilliant in social intercourse, and his +choice showed a steadily growing sanity of judgment. Moreover, although +his intimates were always people set on a pinnacle, he never for an +instant wavered in his fidelity to the home where he had been brought up +with so much love. The end of the letter which describes his +introduction to the Prince deserves to be quoted for its natural +warmth:-- + + "Do not let any one read this letter but yourselves; none but a + father and a mother can bear such egotising vanity; but I know who + I am writing to--that they are interested in what is said of me, + and that they are too partial not to tolerate my speaking of + myself." + +It is easy to see that Moore's success was mainly social at first rather +than literary. Throughout life he exercised an irresistible charm. An +infectious gaiety, joined to copious but never ill-natured wit, made his +company desired by all; and his physical presence, though not striking, +was always agreeable. Diminutive in size, and plain of feature, he +gained something approaching beauty by the constant play of expression +centred in his vivacious eyes and the mobile and beautiful mouth. More +distinctive still, in youth at least, was his hair, which curled in long +tendrils over his head. But the special charm which he exercised,--and +it was doubtless of greater importance in youth, before his powers as a +talker had matured--lay in a gift for singing, which appears to have +been something peculiar to himself. He sang always to his own +accompaniment, and the performance by all accounts approached +declamation rather than ordinary song. Moore is the only poet of modern +times who, like the ancient bards, lent to his own verses the added +charm of musical expression. Poet first, musician afterwards, he gave +the words for all they were worth, and he seems always to have counted +it a failure, if there were no wet eyes among his hearers. + +To this gift, nearer the actor's than either the musician's or the +poet's, he owed probably the suddenness of his fame. It called attention +to his literature; but the attention was well deserved, for this boyish +production was notable, coming when it did. + +In 1800, when the _Odes of Anacreon_ appeared, Wordsworth and Coleridge +had, it is true, published _Lyrical Ballads_. The revolution in taste +had begun. Yet these fighters in the van beat heavily upon an armed +opposition; and for the moment the tradition of Pope, as modified in +different directions by Gray and Goldsmith, was passionately upheld +against them. Burns, indeed, had already made a great breach in the +solid academic phalanx, and had won through to acceptance. But +newcomers, who preached such doctrines as were set out in the preface to +_Lyrical Ballads_, roused fierce hostility; they came with their mouths +full of arguments. Moore, on the other hand, troubled no man with +controversy, yet was hardly more academic than they. Like them, he +boldly discarded the eighteenth-century manner, still flourishing in the +hands of Crabbe. "The early poets of our language," says the preface to +Little's Poems, "were the models which Mr. Little selected for +imitation." A glance at the _Anacreon_ will show the truth of this +observation. Take the third ode-- + + Listen to the Muse's lyre, + Master of the pencil's fire! + Sketch'd in painting's bold display, + Many a city first portray, + Many a city revelling free, + Warm with loose festivity. + Picture then a rosy train, + Bacchants straying o'er the plain, + Piping, as they roam along, + Roundelay or shepherd-song. + Paint me next, if painting may + Such a theme as this portray, + All the happy heaven of love + Which these blessed mortals prove. + +Here the suggestion, if not of Fletcher's manner, at least of some +manner contemporary with Fletcher, is unmistakable. But since the verses +were put forward without comment, no one thought of objecting. It is +like the fable of the Wind and the Sun: Moore's genial example relaxed +the bonds of 'correctness' by far more quickly than Wordsworth's austere +theorising. + +The easy way is seldom so good as the hard way, and no one would put +Moore's early work into comparison with the wonderful volume that was +the fruit of the years spent by Wordsworth and Coleridge at Nether +Stowey. Yet it is only just to emphasise the fact that Moore was the +first to bring back to English that note of song, natural even in its +artificiality, which is heard all through the sixteenth and seventeenth +centuries, but, except by Blake, was never sounded during the +eighteenth. One can readily imagine the delight with which a generation, +nursed on Cowper and Crabbe, turned to these facile yet not vulgar +harmonies. And the work, though seemingly so easy, was wrought with +delicate care; Lord Moira noted, and Moore gratefully recorded the +praise, that few among the best poets had been so strictly grammatical! +Always a careful craftsman, Moore never worked harder than on this first +attempt. But his labour detracted nothing from the flush of youth, the +zest for enjoyment, which pervades the lines. 'The young people will +like it,' probably in any generation, whenever they chance to read it. + +Moore, however, could never reconcile himself to effacing altogether the +traces of his study. _Lalla Rookh_ testifies to his passion for +footnotes, and the same unfortunate itch displays itself already in the +_Anacreon_. We find him quoting, not only Ronsard and Lessing--a wide +range for one-and-twenty--but commentators and authors by far more +recondite--Cornelius de Pauw, the poetess Veronica Cambara, the Epistles +of Alciphron, together with Aulus Gellius and Angerianus. One must +remember, however, that Moore's age had a taste for what we should +dismiss as pedantry--witness the polyglot jesting of Father Prout; and +he doubtless obeyed a wise instinct when he opened his prefatory remarks +in a manner worthy of the gentleman whom Dr. Primrose met in jail:-- + + "There is but little known with certainty of the life of Anacreon. + Chamaeleon Heracleotes, who wrote upon the subject, has been lost in + the general wreck of ancient literature." + +In the next publication, which followed rapidly upon the success of the +first, Moore dispensed with erudition. Censorious people shook their +heads over the _Poetical Works of the late Thomas Little, Esq._, and it +must be allowed that the censure had some justification. In the remarks +upon _Anacreon_, Moore had praised that poet because "his descriptions +are warm; but the warmth is in the ideas not the words." There is +certainly no grossness in the words of Mr. Thomas Little, but there is +considerable warmth in his ideas--and indeed what could be more natural? +Moore was an exceedingly healthy normal young man, strongly attracted +towards the other sex, but exempt from any vehemences of passion. The +tone of these lyrics is rather that of the Restoration poets than of the +earlier Caroline school; there is prettiness, elegance, gaiety, rather +than beauty; and, as in all his models, there is preoccupation rather +with a sex than an individual. It is amatory poetry, not love-poetry; +but in its own kind, it is as good as can be found. What could be better +than + + "Still the question I must parry, + Still a wayward truant prove, + Where I love I cannot marry, + Where I marry cannot love." + +No other poet for a hundred years had got such elasticity and gaiety out +of English rhythms as were to be found in these two early volumes. One +need not claim high rank for this sort of poetry, but it would be +ignorant to overlook the service which Moore was doing to all who after +him came to handle English metre. + +So much for his successes. The second volume is also interesting with +records of his failures. The "Fragments of College Exercises" show a +futile attempt to wield the heroic couplet with sonorous rhetoric. And +in two other poems, _Reuben and Rose and The Ring_, we find Moore +wandering off after the fashion of the German spectral ballad:-- + + "'Twas Reuben, but ah! he was deathly and cold, + And fleeted away like the spell of a dream." + +And so on, with cold carcases and other properties of this form of +composition, to which the poet never returned--wisely recognising that +it was not for him to make readers' flesh creep. + +In the meantime, while the _Anacreon_ was passing into its second +edition, and Little's Poems were making their appearance, Moore stayed +in England, and his connection with Lord Moira grew closer. A great +part of the year 1801 seems to have been spent by him at Donington, +sometimes alone, when he worked hard in the library, shot rooks, +repaired his complexion and slept sweetly, "not dreaming of ambition, +though under the roof of an earl." In 1802 he had hopes of Lord Moira's +coming into administration. But Lord Moira did not come in, and though +considerable sums were earned by the Poems, Moore was obliged to borrow +from his mother's brother. In the early part of 1803 a proposal was made +to him, by Wickham, then Chief Secretary for Ireland, on behalf of the +Irish Government. An Irish laureateship was to be established, with the +same salary as the English, for the young Irish poet; the movers in this +matter were Lord Moira and the always friendly Joe Atkinson. Our most +definite record of the transaction is a letter from Moore to his mother, +which makes it clear that he himself was prepared to accept the "paltry +and degrading stipend," but was deterred by a letter from his father, +which unfortunately we do not possess. The motive which he alleges was +"the _urging_ apprehension that my dears at home wanted it"; but since +he was reassured that they stood in no instant necessity, he declined +the offer. The letter however makes it perfectly clear that he looked +forward at this time to a post provided by Government: legal studies in +the meantime having lapsed. + +These expectations were not wholly disappointed. In August Lord Moira's +interest secured for him a place as registrar of a naval prize-court at +Bermuda--an employment whose profits depended upon an active state of +war in and about the West Indies. + +The idea of so complete a separation from his home distressed him, and +he tried to keep the facts from his mother as long as +possible--discussing the project only by letters to his father and +uncle. But on August 16th, John Moore--wrote to his son an admirable +epistle (the only one from his pen that is preserved),--which deprecated +the attempt to keep Mrs. Moore in the dark:-- + + "There could be no such deception carried on with her where you, or + indeed any one of her family, were concerned, for she seems to know + everything respecting them by instinct. It would not be doing her + the justice she well deserves to exclude her from such + confidence.... For my particular part, I think with you, that there + is a singular chance, as well as a special interference of + Providence, in your getting so honourable a situation at this very + critical time.[1] I am sure no one living can possibly feel more + sensibly than your poor mother and me do, at losing that comfort we + so long enjoyed, of at least hearing from you once every week of + your life that you were absent from us; for surely no parents had + ever such happiness in a child; and much as we regret the wide + separation which this situation of yours will for some time cause + between us, we give you our full concurrence, and may the Almighty + God spare and prosper you as you deserve." + +Preparations went through quickly, and on September 22, 1803, Moore +wrote, from Portsmouth, his "heart's farewell to the dear darlings at +home." Carpenter, the publisher, had made advances which rendered +departure possible, and so + + "now all is smooth for my progress, and Hope sings in the shrouds + of the ship that is to carry me. Good-by. God bless you all, dears + of my heart." + + +[1] This was just after Emmet's rising. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +EARLY MANHOOD AND MARRIAGE + + +The _Phaeton_ frigate, on which Moore had procured a passage, left +Spithead on September 25th, and on November 5th we find him writing to +his mother from Norfolk in Virginia. The voyage, though rather rough, +had been a pleasant experience, and, after his fashion, Moore had made +friends with everybody on board. Thirty years later he was delighted +with a passage in the _Naval Recollections_ of Captain Scott, who had +sailed as midshipman on the _Phaeton_. Scott's observation was, that he +knew at that time nothing about Moore's poetry, but that the poet +"appeared the life and soul of the company, and the loss of his +fascinating society was frequently and loudly lamented by the officers +long after he had quitted us in America." Moore was justifiably proud of +having "left such an impression upon honest hearty unaffected fellows +like those of the gun-room of the _Phaeton_," who would naturally--as he +freely admits--have been prejudiced in the other sense. "I remember," he +notes, "the first lieutenant saying to me after we had become intimate, +'I thought you the first day you came aboard, the damnedest conceited +little fellow I ever saw, with your glass cocked up to your eye'; and +then he mimicked the manner in which I made my first appearance." The +first lieutenant's phrase is worth remembering as a frank piece of +description. + +Till the end of 1803 Moore was delayed in Virginia, waiting for a ship, +and in the meanwhile writing long letters home full of the warmest +affection, and of "longing for news of all his dears." In January he was +lucky enough to get passage on another ship of war, the _Driver_, and +reached Bermuda after seven days' sail in very heavy weather. His +parting from Norfolk had been attended with the usual regrets; Mrs. +Hamilton, wife of the British Consul, in whose home Moore had been most +hospitably entertained, "cried, and said she never parted from any one +so reluctantly," and her husband wrote him all possible letters of +introduction. + +Bermuda itself seemed, at the first view, a kind of fairyland, as he has +recorded in the Epistle to Lady Donegal:-- + + "The morn was lovely, every wave was still, + When the first perfume of a cedar-hill + Sweetly awaked us, and, with smiling charms, + The fairy harbour woo'd us to its arms. + Gently we stole, before the languid wind, + Through plantain shades, that like an awning twined + And kiss'd on either side the wanton sails, + Breathing our welcome to these vernal vales; + While, far reflected o'er the wave serene, + Each wooded island shed so soft a green, + That the enamour'd keel, with whispering play, + Through liquid herbage seem'd to steal its way! + Never did weary bark more sweetly glide, + Or rest its anchor in a lovelier tide! + Along the margin, many a shining dome, + White as the palace of a Lapland gnome, + Brighten'd the wave;--in every myrtle grove + Secluded, bashful, like a shrine of love, + Some elfin mansion sparkled through the shade; + And, while the foliage interposing play'd, + Wreathing the structure into various grace, + Fancy would love, in glimpses vague, to trace + The flowery capital, the shaft, the porch, + And dream of temples, till her kindling torch + Lighted me back to all the glorious days + Of Attic genius; and I seem'd to gaze + On marble, from the rich Pentelic mount, + Gracing the umbrage of some Naiad's fount." + +The letter which sketches his first impressions adds a touch of +disenchantment, which Moore, remote always from realism, was careful to +exclude from his verse:-- + + "These little islands are thickly covered with cedar groves, + through the vistas of which you catch a few pretty white houses, + which my poetical short-sightedness always transforms into temples; + and I often expect to see Nymphs and Graces come tripping from + them, when I find, to my great disappointment, that a few miserable + negroes is all 'the bloomy flush of life' it has to boast of." + +What was more serious, the prospects of income also disenchanted him of +his dream which was to make in Bermuda a home for himself and his +family. So many prize-courts had been established, and so few causes +were referred to his in Bermuda, that nothing but a Spanish war could +hold out a prospect of large fees. Even that did not promise an income +worth staying for, and Moore's decision was immediate--to finish the +work he was engaged on for Carpenter, and then set out for home. + +The precise nature of this engagement is not clear. He had from his +first year in London been writing songs which were set to music by John +Stevenson and others. In 1803 the poem from _Anacreon_, "Give me the +Harp of Epic Song," had been arranged by Stevenson as a glee, and its +performance by the Irish Harmonic Club so pleased Lord Hardwicke, then +Viceroy, that he conferred a knighthood on the composer. Moore's last +letter on leaving England contained directions for collecting his songs +to be published together, and the letters from Bermuda made constant +reference to this project, which, however, was never executed. In the +meantime, as his work testifies, he was busy writing verses; even aboard +ship, he had not been idle. And, as usual, his verse writing was largely +amatory. Later in life, he records with some amusement that a lady in +Bermuda was pointed out as the original "Nea" to whom several poems are +addressed, and he wonders if they had hit on the right person, adding +that there were at least _two_ who had a claim. + +Festivities, as a matter of course, surrounded him, and he was happy as +a king, but for one lack. Up till March 19th, no letter had reached him +from Ireland. + + "Oh darling mother," he cries, "six months now and I know as little + of _home_ as of things most remote from my heart and + recollection.... The signal post which announces when any vessels + are in sight of the island is directly before my window, and often + do I look to it with a heart sick 'from hope deferred.'" + +In the end of April he left his post, having, in an evil hour, appointed +a deputy to discharge its duties and share the profits. The _Boston_ +frigate took him to New York, and its captain, John Douglas, afterwards +admiral, formed a friendship with the poet of which proofs were given +again and again. In 1811, he met Moore in London, after five years had +passed without a word or a letter exchanged. Douglas had just come into +a legacy of ten thousand pounds, and was going to sea with seven hundred +pounds standing to his name in Coutts's. + + "Now, my dear little fellow," he said, "here is a blank check, + which you may fill up while I am away, for as much of that as you + may want." + +Moore, who declined the offer, as he declined many others of like +nature, might well comment on a man's "bringing back the warmth of +friendship so unchilled after an absence of five years." Nor was that +the end of it. In 1814 Douglas, then Admiral on the Jamaica Station, +offered Moore the Secretaryship, "in case of war a sure fortune," with a +house and land to be at the poet's disposal; and, as Moore notes, the +offer was not only friendly but courageous, for Douglas owed his +appointment to Court interest, and at that moment the Whig satirist was +in the worst odour with the Regent and all his surroundings. + +The immediate boon, gladly accepted, of the passage from Bermuda to +America, and thence to England, was the more important, as it enabled +Moore to devote the money, which had been set aside for his passage, to +seeing the New World. He sailed from New York to Norfolk, and thence set +out for Baltimore; and the journey in American stage coaches appears to +have shaken out of him whatever remained of his early illusions about +the "land of the free." America at that time was beyond dispute +inchoate, amorphous, and ugly in all senses, and Moore's instincts were +anything but democratic. At Philadelphia, "the only place in America +which can boast of any literary society," he found his writings well +known, and met with a flattering reception, which pleased him; a Mrs. +Hopkinson in particular showed him attentions which elicited the poem, +"Alone by the Schuylkill a wanderer roved." Returning to New York, he +found that the _Boston_ must go to Halifax, and could not sail before +August. This offered an opportunity of journeying to Canada overland, +and accordingly he sailed up the Hudson River, through "the most +bewildering succession of romantic objects that I could ever have +conceived." The Oneida Indians charmed him by their courtesy, the rivers +and virgin forests wrought upon his sensibilities, and when he came +within hearing of the roar of Niagara, it seemed to him dreadful that +"any heart born for sublimities should be doomed to breathe away its +hours amidst the miniature productions of this world without seeing what +shapes Nature can assume, what wonders God _can_ give birth to." + +The sight, not so much of the falls as of "the mighty flow descending +with calm magnificence" towards them, moved him passionately; and the +journey, "seventeen hundred miles of rattling and tossing, through +woods, lakes, rivers, etc.," did him good. He reached Quebec much +gratified by many kindnesses. The captain of the vessel which carried +him across Lake Ontario refused to take money from the poet, and a poor +watchmaker at Niagara insisted that a job done should be accepted "as +the only mark of respect he could pay to one he had heard so much of but +never expected to meet with." At Halifax more proofs of what, later in +life, he called, with great justice, his "friendly fame," greeted him, +in the shape of courtesies from the Governors of Lower Canada and of +Nova Scotia. It is Moore's great distinction that he gave real pleasure +to all sorts and conditions of men; and they showed it by treating him +as if he had conferred obligations on them. The feeling which is to-day +so widespread among his countrymen animated in his lifetime all the +English-speaking world. Yet it is surprising to read such instances of +widespread celebrity when we remember that at this time he was the +author only of translations from a pseudo-classic, and of a small volume +of verses, not explicitly acknowledged, and by no means wholly decorous. + +His American experiences ended about a year after he left Europe, and on +November 12, 1804, he dated his letter rapturously "Plymouth, Old +England once more." "Oh dear," he goes on, "to think that in ten days I +may see a letter from home, written but a day or two before, warm from +your hands, and with your very breath almost upon it, instead of +lingering out month after month without a gleam of intelligence, without +anything but dreams." + +Nevertheless, a good many months elapsed before the returned exile could +make his way home. London held out open arms to him; the Prince was very +friendly; "every one I ever knew in this big city seems delighted to see +me back in it." And so, although in January 1805 he was hoping that six +weeks would see the end of his labours on the forthcoming volume that +was to clear off all obligations, August found him still urging the +necessity of finishing his work without any avoidable delay. It seems +that he went home to Dublin in the autumn, and Lord Moira, then +Commander-in-Chief in Scotland, wrote a letter accepting the dedication +of the forthcoming _Epistles and Odes_, in the most honorific language. + +The next year, 1806, saw the formation of the Ministry of "All the +Talents," and for a moment it seemed as if Moira would be included. His +protege's hopes ran high, but they were dashed. A small appointment was +offered to Moore, but refused by him on the ground that it would be +"better to wait till something worthier both of his generosity and my +ambition should occur"; and at the same time the young man suggested +that it would be a simpler matter to find an appointment for his father, +and that such a favour would earn even more gratitude. Lord Moira at +once acted on the suggestion, and John Moore was appointed to a +barrack-mastership in Dublin. But Moore by no means relinquished hopes +of the Irish commissionership which still dangled before his eyes, and +the letters to his most intimate friends of this period, Lady Donegal +and her sister, Miss Godfrey, abound with references to his +expectations. Nevertheless, he had fully made up his mind, once the new +poems were fairly launched, to return to Ireland and leave his interests +in Lord Moira's care, when an unforeseen event led to one of the +best-known passages in his life. + +It arose from the publication in 1806 of the new volume, _Epistles, +Odes, and other Poems_. Carpenter evidently laid out money on the +production of this quarto, with its frontispiece representing the +_Phaeton_ under sail off the peak of the Azores; and his expectations +were not disappointed. The Epistles contained in the volume, nine in +number, were impressions of travel on shipboard and on land; the best +is certainly that to Lady Donegal (already quoted), which describes the +arrival at Bermuda; and perhaps the best known is that to Atkinson, from +which a few lines may be given:-- + + "'Twas thus, by the shade of the Calabash Tree, + With a few, who could feel and remember like me, + The charm, that to sweeten my goblet I threw, + Was a tear to the past and a blessing on you! + + "Oh! say, do you thus, in the luminous hour + Of wine and of wit, when the heart is in flower, + And shoots from the lip, under Bacchus's dew, + In blossoms of thought ever springing and new-- + Do you sometimes remember, and hallow the brim + Of your cup with a sigh, as you crown it to him + Who is lonely and sad in these valleys so fair, + And would pine in elysium, if friends were not there?" + +More immediate notice than was bestowed on these passages of mingled +description and sentiment fell to the three epistles in which Moore for +the first time tried his hand at satire,--moved to it by the corruptions +of the young Republic, where he found + + "All youth's transgression with all age's chill + The apathy of wrong, the bosom's ice, + A slow and cold stagnation into vice." + +These experiments in satire of the accepted type, written in Pope's +metre, have, however, no more permanent value than the two odes, equally +academic--one upon the "Fall of Hebe" and one described as a "Fragment +of a Mythological Hymn to Love." It is safe to say that the book owed +its very wide popularity to the songs and shorter lyrics. Two of the +songs had an immense vogue--"The Woodpecker" and the still popular +"Canadian Boat-song" ("Faintly as tolls the evening chime"), written to +an air suggested to Moore by the chant of his oarsmen as he travelled +down the St. Lawrence. + +In addition to these were a number of amatory verses, some of them at +least as well calculated to scandalise as anything in the posthumous +works of Mr. Little. It is true that, read to-day, these do not seem to +call for any extreme censure. They are glorifications expressly of +fugitive loves, dwelling rather on pleasure than on passion, and one +might argue whether they were the more or the less dangerous on that +account. But there is no doubt that Moore maintained the reputation +which he had earned for licentious poetry. Those who wished to rebuke +Byron's first indiscretions called him "a young Moore." It is, +therefore, not to be wondered at that the _Edinburgh Review_, in its +character of _censor morum_, having passed over the _Anacreon_ and +Little's Poems, should come heavily down upon this renewed +offence--describing Moore as "the most licentious of modern versifiers, +and the most poetical of those who in our time have devoted their +talents to the propagation of immorality." But the second paragraph of +the article went beyond fair bounds when it attributed to Moore "a +cold-blooded attempt to corrupt the purity of unknown and unsuspecting +readers." Jeffrey had a right to say that the poet blended mere +sensuality with the language "of exalted feeling and tender emotion"; +but no critic can endorse the offensive passage in which he describes +Moore as "stimulating his jaded fancy for new images of impurity." The +best apology for whatever in the book needs excuse, is that Moore gave +in his verse too ready an outlet to the ordinary exuberances of a +pleasure-loving young man's temperament, and that he seldom pretended to +conceal the transitory nature of his feelings. + +And, in the sequel, Jeffrey admitted in writing that he had been too +severe. A good deal, however, had happened first. Moore's first impulse +does not seem to have been belligerent, and as the purpose of calling +Jeffrey out dawned on him, there dawned also a difficulty. Jeffrey was +probably in Scotland (a letter from Moore to George Thomson, editor of +_Select Scottish Airs_, etc., contains an inquiry as to his +whereabouts), and this seemed to involve a journey to Edinburgh for +which "the actual but too customary state of my finances" (Moore writes +in the memoir of this transaction) "seriously disabled me." But, on +coming to London, he learnt from Rogers that Jeffrey was also in town, +and on ascertaining the fact, immediately went to look for a second. The +friend to whom he first addressed himself having counselled delay, the +affair was entrusted to Dr. Hume, and a cartel was written in such terms +that there could be only one answer. Jeffrey referred Hume to Horner, +and a meeting was fixed for the next morning at Chalk Farm. But neither +combatant possessed pistols, and it was left for Moore to borrow them +from a friend. Moreover, on reaching the ground, Hume found that +Jeffrey's second knew nothing of firearms, and the task of loading both +pistols was entrusted to him; while in the meantime the two principals, +left together, walked up and down, conversing very agreeably. Presently +the seconds returned and placed their men; but, as the pistols were +raised, police officers jumped from an ambush. The lender of the pistols +had been indiscreet and revealed the secret over-night at Lord +Fincastle's dinner-table; Lord Fincastle had immediately communicated +with Bow Street, with the result that early next morning the poet and +his critic found themselves in durance till bail was given. + +So far, nothing very remarkable had happened. But Moore, after going +away, remembered that he had left the pistols behind, and returned to +get them. The officer, however, refused to give them up, and made the +disagreeable explanation that foul play was suspected; a bullet having +been found in Moore's pistol, but none in that taken from Jeffrey. To +make matters worse, a report in the newspapers substituted the word +"pellet" for "bullet," and pleasantries were rife about author and +critic fighting with pellets of paper. Moore was furious, and persuaded +Horner to draw up an account of the matter, to be signed by the two +seconds, but Hume "took fright at the ridicule brought upon us by the +transaction" and refused to have any more to do with it. More than +thirty years elapsed before Moore was reconciled to the friend who thus +failed him, and his wrath was not unreasonable, since the explanation +published by himself in the _Times_ naturally carried little weight. Yet +it afterwards gave him ground for challenging Byron. Thus closely +connected are Moore's two attempts at duelling; and there is nothing +more characteristic of his life than the fact that in each case his +challenge was only the introduction to a friendship of the sincerest and +most honourable kind. + + * * * * * + +After the close of this episode Moore returned to Dublin,--some hackwork +for Carpenter on Sallust defraying his expenses--and remained there +till the spring of 1807, reading daily in Marsh's library for about +three hours and a half. "I have written nothing since I came here," he +tells Miss Godfrey--dating his letter Dublin, February 23rd--"except one +song which everybody says is the best I have ever composed." The +exception is notable, for this song may have been one of the first of +the _Irish Melodies_. + +The inception of Moore's most famous work was due to a publisher's +suggestion. In 1797 (or perhaps a year earlier), Bunting's collection of +Irish Airs had been issued, and Moore tells us that his interest in them +was encouraged by his friend Edward Hudson. Even before his departure +for Bermuda the young Irish poet had shown his skill in fitting words +for singing; and songs by him had been issued by Carpenter, by Rhames of +Dublin, and by other firms. When he returned home after an absence which +extended from the summer of 1803 to the autumn of 1806, he returned with +fame greatly augmented by his latest volume, and presumably the vogue of +his singing was not less in Dublin than elsewhere. What the song was +that he refers to in his letter to Miss Godfrey, we do not know; but it +is exceedingly likely to have been the lines on Emmet, which occupied a +prominent place in the first number of the _Melodies_. One can very well +believe that the fame of some song by Moore on an Irish theme may have +suggested to William Power, owner of a music warehouse in Dublin, the +proposal which he made--namely, that Moore should collaborate with Sir +John Stevenson in producing a series of Irish Melodies. + +The following prefatory letter, addressed by Moore to Stevenson, was +issued by the publisher in his preliminary announcement to the first and +second numbers:-- + + "I feel very anxious that a work of this kind should be undertaken. + We have too long neglected the only talent for which our English + neighbours ever deigned to allow us any credit. Our National Music + has never been properly collected; and while the composers of the + Continent have enriched their Operas and Sonatas with Melodies + borrowed from Ireland--very often without even the honesty of + acknowledgment--we have left these treasures, in a great degree, + unclaimed and fugitive. Thus our Airs, like too many of our + countrymen, have, for want of protection at home, passed into the + service of foreigners. But we are come, I hope, to a better period + of both Politics and Music; and how much they are connected, in + Ireland at least, appears too plainly in the tone of sorrow and + depression which characterizes most of our early Songs. + + "The task which you propose to me, of adapting words to these airs, + is by no means easy. The Poet, who would follow the various + sentiments which they express, must feel and understand that rapid + fluctuation of spirits, that unaccountable mixture of gloom and + levity, which composes the character of my countrymen, and has + deeply tinged their Music. Even in their liveliest strains we find + some melancholy note intrude--some minor Third or flat + Seventh--which throws its shade as it passes, and makes even mirth + interesting. If Burns had been an Irishman (and I would willingly + give up all our claims upon Ossian for him), his heart would have + been proud of such music, and his genius would have made it + immortal. + + "Another difficulty (which is, however, purely mechanical) arises + from the irregular structure of many of those airs, and the lawless + kind of metre which it will in consequence be necessary to adapt to + them. In these instances, the Poet must write, not to the eye, but + to the ear; and must be content to have his verses of that + description which Cicero mentions, _'Quos si cantu spoliaveris nuda + remanebit oratio.'_ That beautiful Air, 'The Twisting of the + Rope,' which has all the romantic character of the Swiss _Ranz des + Vaches_, is one of those wild and sentimental rakes which it will + not be very easy to tie down in sober wedlock with Poetry. However, + notwithstanding all these difficulties, and the very moderate + portion of talent which I can bring to surmount them, the design + appears to me so truly National, that I shall feel much pleasure in + giving it all the assistance in my power." + + Leicestershire, _Feb._ 1807. + +The date is curious. Moore, writing to Miss Godfrey on February 23rd +from Dublin, made no mention of this project. He certainly crossed in +the end of February, and took up his abode (as was now his recognised +privilege) in solitary state at Donington. From there he wrote to his +mother for a copy of Bunting's _Airs_, and also of Miss Owenson's--to be +got from Power. In April he sends her "an inclosure for Power" to be +forwarded immediately--and this was probably the prefatory letter. For +Mr. Andrew Gibson's researches have discovered in the _Belfast +Commercial Chronicle_ of May 28, 1807, a paragraph relating to Power's +projected "Collection of the best Original Irish Melodies," which +concludes by citing a portion of Moore's prefatory letter, and the date +affixed is "Leicestershire, _April_ 1807." + +For what reason the month should be given as February in all published +editions of the _Melodies_, it is hard to conceive. But the result has +been a widespread bibliographical error, since the publication is always +assigned to 1807. Mr. Gibson, however, has unearthed various +announcements in the _Freeman's Journal_, of which two speak in October +of the work as "shortly to be published," and another, on April 8th, +1808, as "just published." The latter advertisement invited subscribers +for "the succeeding numbers"; names were to be given to the publisher, +William Power, in Dublin, or in London to his brother James Power, who +had recently established a similar place of business in the Strand. + +Under the original scheme, Moore was only to have been one of "several +distinguished Literary Characters" from whom "Power has had promises of +assistance." But his success precluded all competition. The twenty-four +songs comprised in the first two numbers include some of his very best +and much of his most popular work, and it is interesting to note that +almost the whole of them must have been written in Ireland. His stay at +Donington lasted till June, and during the earlier part of it he was +certainly engaged on poetry. But except for an excursion to Tunbridge, +to visit Lady Donegal and her sister, he went nowhere else in England, +and he was back in Dublin by the end of August. In the remaining months +of that summer he paid the visit to the Vale of Ovoca which gave +occasion to his lyric, "The Meeting of the Waters." A footnote to the +first edition of the first number explains that-- + + "'The Meeting of the Waters' forms a part of that beautiful scenery + which lies between Rathdrum and Arklow in the County of Wicklow, + and these lines were suggested to me by a visit to this romantic + spot in the summer of the present year (1807)." + +It appears also, from a letter to Miss Godfrey, that in May 1807 his +solitude at Donington was interrupted by the advent of a large +house-party, and one may fairly say that, except for what he may have +done in the space of about three months, the whole of the lyrics of the +first two numbers were composed in the country where the airs themselves +had their origin. + +Moreover, during his stay at Donington, other work than the _Melodies_ +engaged him. He tells Lady Donegal, "to God's pleasure and both our +comforts," that he is not writing love verses. + + "I begin at last to find out that _politics_ is the only thing + minded in this country, and that it is better even to rebel against + government than to have nothing to do with it; so I am writing + politics." + +The result of this determination was seen in the publication which +appeared towards the end of 1808--_Corruption and Intolerance_, two more +satirical essays in the Popian manner. These productions were issued by +Carpenter in a thin octavo, eked out with a vast deal of notes. Moore +had not yet arrived at his characteristic manner of expression in +satire, and neither poem deserves much notice. Yet there was talent and +to spare in lines like these:-- + + "Hence the rich oil, that from the Treasury steals, + Drips smooth o'er all the Constitution's wheels, + Giving the old machine such pliant play, + That Court and Commons jog one joltless way, + While Wisdom trembles for the crazy car, + So gilt, so rotten, carrying fools so far." + +And at the close of the poem there is a note of unaccustomed fierceness +in the reference to Castlereagh: + + "See yon smooth lord, whom nature's plastic pains + Would seem to've fashion'd for those Eastern reigns + When eunuchs flourish'd, and such nerveless things + As men rejected were the chosen of Kings." + +The lines on Intolerance were described as fragmentary--"the imperfect +beginning of a long series of Essays upon the same important subject"; +and the political attitude of the whole was sufficiently described on +the title-page, where the lines were described as "Addressed to an +Englishman by an Irishman." + +Moore disclaimed in the preface any attachment to either English party, +and the publication was, at least formally, anonymous. Yet we find him +admitting that he had projected a journey to London to arrange for the +republication of these poems, reinforced by others in the same kind, "in +the hope that I _might_ catch the eye of some of our patriotic +politicians, and thus be enabled to serve both _myself_ and the +_principles_ which I cherish." Carpenter, however, threw cold water on +the scheme, and the rebuff touched the poet's susceptibilities so +sharply, that he determined not to trust himself again in London +"without the means of commanding a supply." For this, his past successes +were no resource, since it was always Moore's imprudent habit to sell +work outright. Little's Poems were being constantly reprinted, with no +benefit to their author; and as for the songs, he writes in August 1808, +"I quite threw away the Melodies. They will make that little, smooth +fellow's fortune." + +In 1809 another thin octavo, called _The Sceptic_, and signed by "The +Author of Corruption and Intolerance," was issued by Carpenter: Rogers +(who from this period onward ranks high among Moore's advisers) +protesting against his continuance with this publisher. But the book +attracted little notice; and the lack of success which attended these +attempts in serious satire very naturally turned Moore back into the +work where his triumph had been most gratifying. In January 1810 he +published, with a dedication to Lady Donegal, the third instalment of +his _Irish Melodies_, and it bears the stamp of its birthplace. The +political passion is by far more openly declared than before, and in two +or three of the lyrics--notably "After the Battle" and "The Irish +Peasant to his Mistress"--it attains as high a pitch of poetry as is +reached anywhere in its author's work. Part of the former may be quoted, +if only to show the similarity between its motive and the central idea +of "The Fire Worshippers." + + "Night closed around the conqueror's way, + And lightnings showed the distant hill, + Where those who lost that dreadful day + Stood few and faint, but fearless still! + The soldier's hope, the patriot's zeal, + For ever dimmed, for ever crossed-- + Oh! who shall say what heroes feel, + When all but life and honour's lost? + + "The last sad hour of freedom's dream, + And valour's task, moved slowly by, + While mute they watched till morning's beam + Should rise and give them light to die." + +The twelve lyrics of this number, together with the thin brochure of +_The Sceptic_, are all that Moore had to show for the months from July +or August 1808 to December 1810, which make up the only long continuous +period of his adult life spent in Ireland. We have little record of his +doings during that time, and the most significant part of it is to be +found in a little quarto, privately printed, which details the +performances of the Kilkenny Theatre. Published in 1825, this little +book was made the subject by Moore of an article in the _Edinburgh +Review_ for October 1827. Its preface sketches briefly the history of a +craze for private theatricals which pervaded Ireland in the years from +1760 onwards. But nowhere else does the passion appear to have +established itself so strongly as on the banks of the Nore, where a +company was got together in 1802 under the auspices of a local +gentleman, Mr. Richard Power. Originally the performances lasted for a +week, but soon the programme was arranged for a fortnight, and in one +case for three weeks. The event was annual till 1819, when the Kilkenny +Theatre was closed for ever--marking, as Moore says in his review, the +end of the social period in Ireland. + +Moore, as we have seen, returned to Ireland in August 1808, and on the +10th of October following he made his _debut_ at Kilkenny; not alone, +for Mr. Power in that year obtained two notable recruits. Isaac Corry, +one of Moore's most lasting and agreeable friends, joined the troupe, +and remained faithful for years; moreover, the genial Joe Atkinson, who, +we may guess, introduced these new actors, wrote the prologue. Moore was +only at this time a tentative member of the company, and played three +days out of the twelve. We find the _Leinster Journal_ (whose +exceedingly well-written notices of the performances are regularly +quoted in the volume) noting, to begin with, that "the Theatrical +Company have been favoured with the presence of Anacreon Moore." But on +the 22nd October the new recruit made his first appearance in the small +part of David in _The Rivals_, and "kept the audience in a roar by his +Yorkshire dialect and rustic simplicity." The success was renewed by +him as Mungo in _The Padlock_, and as Spado (a singing part) in _A +Castle of Andalusia_. Next year a list of plays that ran from the 2nd to +the 21st of October was produced, and we read that "the delight and +darling of the Kilkenny audience appears to be Anacreon Moore," who +wrote the prologue for the occasion, and "spoke it in his own bewitching +manner." "The vivacity and _naivete_ of his manner, the ease and +archness of his humour, and the natural sweetness of his voice have +quite enamoured us." In the solid Shaksperian part of the programme--for +Mr. Power and his men did not shrink before _Macbeth_ and +_Othello_--this actor took no part. What he did play in was the farce +_Peeping Tom of Coventry_--and, let it be carefully observed, the Lady +Godiva was Miss E. Dyke. Miss E. Dyke was a beautiful girl, then aged +fourteen; her sister, Miss H. Dyke, had appeared the year before, and +both, it seems, were professional actresses. Of their talents the +recorder in the _Leinster Journal_ makes no mention, but he is eloquent +again and again on the successes of Mr. Moore, and the performances of +1809 appear to have marked an epoch. In 1810 Moore was again (and for +the last time) a performer. The critic inclines to cavil at the +slightness of the part given to this favourite, and emphasises Moore's +cleverness with enthusiasm. But, indeed, on two of the evenings Moore +had the stage entirely to himself, when, between the plays, he sat down +to a piano and spoke his _Melologue upon National Music_, verses which +he had written to be declaimed by Miss Smith at the Dublin Theatre for a +benefit night, and which were afterwards published in pamphlet form. + +All this pleasant gaiety had two consequences, of which the less +important may be first noted. In January 1809, three months after +Moore's first appearance at Kilkenny, Rogers writes: "I am delighted +with your intention to make your debut on the stage--as an author I +mean. Of your fame as an actor, I have had many reverberations." Nothing +more came of the intention at the moment, but in December 1810 Moore +returned to London after a two years' absence, and writes of many visits +"from booksellers, musicsellers, managers, etc., with offers for books, +songs, and plays. I rather think," he adds, "I may give something to +Covent Garden." The result was that sometime in the following summer he +was trembling upon a manager's verdict, and on September 4th, 1811, saw +with no pleasurable feelings, the production of his opera, _M.P. or The +Blue Stocking_, at the English Opera House. The piece was a failure, +despite a friendly press; and the songs from it, all that Moore cared to +preserve, are by no means good examples of his work. For many years +afterwards the stage tempted him, as a means of earning money, but he +never returned to the charge. + +The other sequel of the Kilkenny theatricals was of very different +character. In the end of 1808 Rogers, answering a letter, remarks, "Your +sketch of Ireland is most gloomy." Twelve months later, and after Miss +E. Dyke's first appearance in Mr. Power's company, Rogers writes, "I am +rejoiced to think you are happy, which indeed you cannot fail to be +while you are making others so; but don't let the Graces supplant the +Muses." It is hardly rash to infer that Moore had written a cheerful +account of the 1809 festival at Kilkenny. October 1810 saw the last +appearance in the Kilkenny bills of Mr. Moore and Miss E. Dyke. Early in +December Moore ran back to London to interview "booksellers, +musicsellers, managers, etc." In January he returned to Dublin for a few +weeks. February saw him in town again; and in March it appears that he +has "at last got a little bedroom about two miles from town where I +shall try now and then for a morning's work." On March 25th he was +married to Miss Dyke at St. Martin's Church; but the marriage was kept a +secret from his parents till the month of May following. + +On the face of it, nothing could have seemed less promising than this +alliance. Moore had to live by his wits; he was now in his thirty-second +year, he had lived with people of expensive habits and, in a sense, +lived fast. Allowing for some rhetoric, one may take as a fair account +the description of his feelings which he wrote to Lady Donegal in the +summer preceding the last bout of theatricals at Kilkenny--when, +presumably, his fate was settled. + + "I wish," he says, "I could give you even a tolerable account of + what I have done; but I don't know how it is, both my mind and + heart appear to have lain for some time completely fallow, and even + the usual crop of _wild oats_ has not been forthcoming. What is the + reason of this? I believe there is in every man's life (at least in + every man who has lived as if he knew how to live) one blank + interval, which takes place at that period when the gay desires of + youth are just gone off, and he has not yet made up his mind as to + the feelings or pursuits that succeed them--when the last blossom + has fallen away, and yet the fruit continues to look harsh and + unpromising--a kind of _interregnum_ which takes place upon the + demise of love, before ambition and worldliness have seated + themselves upon the vacant throne." + +One can easily imagine a gentleman who writes in this strain making, +some few months later, a match with a penniless and beautiful girl of +sixteen, whose situation had so little to recommend it that he kept the +whole affair dark even from his parents. It would not have been so +likely a guess that he would make her the most affectionate of husbands, +or that she would turn out to be the most helpful of wives. There are +few things more significant in a man's history than his choice of a +consort, and stress must be laid on this marriage. In the first place, +it should be remarked that Moore, with an equipment for the business +which might have made any fortune-hunter envious, never showed the least +inclination to marry for money. Secondly, although himself among the +most brilliant of talkers, finding his chief enjoyment in such talk as +was heard, for instance, at Holland House, he married a girl who +probably had little education and certainly possessed only the +intelligence of the heart. He married, doubtless, for beauty; but +probably not without discerning that this girl of sixteen had qualities +of prudence, order, and courage which amply justified his choice. She +must have possessed also a great charm, for the most difficult to please +among Moore's friends were immediately subjugated. Rogers, who had a +sincere and lifelong affection for the young poet, took her from the +first into his good graces, and his letters all contain some pleasant +word of remembrance to Psyche, as he christened her. In a later day, +Psyche and her babies were the guests of that rigidly celibate old +bachelor, and did not lack invitation to return. Miss Godfrey, another +shrewd and loyal well-wisher, wrote six months after the marriage:-- + + "Be very sure, my dear Moore, that if you have got an amiable, + sensible wife, extremely attached to you, as I am certain you have, + it is only in the long run of life that you can know the full value + of the treasure you possess. If you did but see, as I see with + bitter regret in a very near connection of my own, the miserable + effects of marrying a vain fool devoted to fashion, you would bless + your stars night and day for your good fortune, and, to say the + truth, you were as likely a gentleman to get into a scrape that way + as any that I know. You were always the slave of beauty, say what + you please; it covered a multitude of sins in your eyes, and I + never can cease wondering at your good luck after all is said and + done." + +Certainly, Bessy Moore was as little of the "vain fool devoted to +fashion" as could be found. The two lived together, in Bury Street, for +a year, till after the birth of their first child,--Barbara--born in +February 1812. Soon after this, a parliamentary crisis raised Moore's +hopes of Lord Moira's advancement, and his own depending on it, to fever +height. They were soon dashed. Lord Moira was a staunch supporter of the +Catholic claims, and the ministry had decided to do nothing for the +Catholics. For the moment at least Moore took the defeat as final and +wrote with some bitterness to Lady Donegal:-- + + "In Lord Moira's exclusion from all chances of power, I see an end + to the long hope of my life; and my intention is to go far away + into the country, there to devote the remainder of my life to the + dear circle I am forming around me, to the quiet pursuit of + literature, and, I hope, of goodness." + +Whatever spleen is to be traced in this letter soon vanished. On March +6, a letter to Miss Godfrey marks Moore's definitive breaking with his +old habit of precarious reliance upon the prospect of patronage. +Literary earnings, which he had hitherto regarded as a mere temporary +means of meeting embarrassments, were now to become the sole support of +himself and his family; and he bids good-bye with a cheerful courage to +"all the hope and suspense in which the prospect of Lord Moira's +advancement" had kept him for so many years. + + "It has been a sort of _Will o' the Wisp_ to me all my life, and + the only thing I regret is, that it was not extinguished sooner, + for it has led me a sad dance." + +Retirement from town was necessary, for the general curiosity "to see +Moore's wife" threatened to become ruinous; and one may be very sure +that if Bessy refused invitations "to the three most splendid assemblies +in town," it was her doing and not her husband's. In the choice of a +neighbourhood, access to a library had to be considered, and Moore +naturally enough looked for a home near Donington Park. It was +accordingly at Kegworth, a few miles from Lord Moira's seat, that he +installed himself; but the proximity was unfortunate, for the cabinet +crisis continued, and the Prince Regent's personal reliance on Lord +Moira sustained Moore's hopes. In the autumn came news that Moira was to +be Governor-General of India, and Moore's friends immediately settled it +that the poet would accompany him as secretary. The remaining months of +1812 were embittered by hope deferred, which some expressions let fall +by Lord Moira helped to quicken. But the great man and his household +came and went, making it clear to Moore that he could count on nothing +but continued good-will. The suggestion of an exchange of patronage made +by Lord Moira was fortunately put aside; Moore replying that he would +"rather struggle on as he was than take anything that would have the +effect of tying up his tongue under such a system as the present." + +Thus, in January 1813, with Moira's departure for India, the long +relation between the patron and client ended, not without mutual +embarrassment. Yet Moore was grateful for the kindly attentions heaped +upon himself and his Bessy, who was then in a state to need them. Her +second confinement, again of a daughter, Olivia, took place in March; +and, as soon as she could be moved, Moore and she accepted willingly the +invitation of a cordial friend, one Mrs. Ready, and settled into her +house, Oakhanger Hall, for the summer. It had been decided to give up +the Kegworth cottage, and look out for some pleasanter home; and a plan +had also been arranged which made Moore glad to leave his wife in +friendly company during the months of the London season. + +In 1811, a fourth number of the _Irish Melodies_ had been published, and +Moore's cumulative success as a song-writer had tempted the brothers +Power to make an offer which ensured to him and his at least a +livelihood for the term of the agreement. They were to pay L500 a year +for the monopoly of Moore's musical compositions.[1] The arrangement +thus entered into lasted for over twenty years, and was financially +Moore's backbone. But both Moore himself and the Powers recognised that +the vogue of these songs was largely due to Moore's own singing of them, +and it was consequently settled at Kegworth, that the singer should go +up to town alone for the month of May. Bessy was naturally reluctant at +first; "indeed," Moore wrote to Power, "it was only on my representing +to her that my songs would all remain a dead letter with you, if I did +not go up in the gay time of the year, and give them life by singing +them about, that she agreed to my leaving her." The practice, once +fixed, became habitual. For the next thirty years Moore was never long +enough absent from town to lose touch with the society which never +ceased to welcome him; while Bessy remained at home, minding the babies +and keeping down the bills. Few women, even without her beauty, would +have consented to the situation; but she accepted it cheerfully, and +regretted only the absences of her husband. She had her reward. Lord +John Russell writes in his introduction, concerning Moore's regard for +his wife:-- + + "From 1811, the year of his marriage, to 1852, that of his death, + this excellent and beautiful person received from him the homage of + a lover enhanced by all the gratitude, all the confidence, which + the daily and hourly happiness he enjoyed were sure to inspire. + Thus, whatever amusement he might find in society, whatever + literary resources he might seek elsewhere, he always returned to + his home with a fresh feeling of delight. The time he had been + absent had been a time of exertion and exile; his return restored + him to tranquillity and to peace. Keen as was his natural sense of + enjoyment, he never balanced between pleasure and happiness. His + letters and his journal bear abundant trace of these natural and + deep-seated affections." + +It is, indeed, true that few men of whom one reads appear to have got +more pleasure out of their home than Moore, and the first home where he +really settled down to quiet domesticity was at Mayfield Cottage, "near +the pretty town of Ashbourne," "a little nutshell of a thing, yet with a +room to spare for a friend." The early letters abound in descriptive +touches, one of which shows Bessy busy superintending workmen, while the +head of the family and his little Barbara rolled in the hay outside. The +neighbourhood, too, was full of welcome and small gaieties. Bessy +appeared at a local ball and excited a great sensation by her beauty. + + "She wore a turban that night to please me, and she looks better in + it than anything else; for it strikes almost everybody that sees + her, how like the form and expression of her face are to + Catalani's, and a turban is the thing for that sort of character." + +It is as well to remember that this prudent little dame was then aged +eighteen--in spite of her two babies; and Moore, though getting up in +years by comparison, was youthful enough in spirits. + + "You would have laughed to see Bessy and me going to dinner," he + writes to his mother. "We found in the middle of our walk, that we + were near half an hour too early, so we set to practising country + dances in the middle of a retired green lane, till the time was + expired." + + +[1] From this, however, deduction was made for part of the payments to +Sir John Stevenson, and afterwards to Henry Bishop. Moore's method (if +it could be called a method) was to draw on Power for what he wanted; +and these deductions amounted to much more than he supposed. The natural +result was a quarrel when in the long run accounts were made up. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +_LALLA ROOKH_ + + +There was scarcely a period in Moore's life when prospects looked +brighter for him than just after his settlement at Mayfield Cottage. He +had clearly decided on living in seclusion till he should have finished +the important work on which he had been engaged already, off and on, +during a full year. In the summer of 1812, enough of _Lalla Rookh_ +existed to be shown to Rogers, when he and Moore took a tour together +through the Peak country; and Rogers's criticism left the poet rather +out of conceit with his work. Next year found him again dispirited, for +the _Giaour_ had appeared, and Moore writes:-- + + "Never was anything more unlucky for me than Byron's invasion of + this region, which, when I entered it, was yet untrodden, and whose + chief charm consisted in the gloss and novelty of its features; but + it will now be overrun with clumsy adventurers, and, when I make my + appearance, instead of being a leader, as I looked to be, I must + dwindle into a humble follower--a Byronian. This is disheartening, + and I sometimes doubt whether I shall publish it at all; though at + the same time, if I may trust my own judgment, I never wrote so + well before." + +Things went from bad to worse. On August 28, 1813, Byron wrote to him, +"Stick to the East;--the oracle, Stael, told me it was the only +poetical policy." But the letter went on to announce Byron's project of +a story grafted on to the amours of a Peri and a mortal. Now, Moore had +already in his long-delayed work made the daughter of a Peri the heroine +of one of his tales, and spent much pains in "detailing the love +adventures of her aerial parent in an episode." He wrote at once, asking +only for fair warning, and Byron immediately disclaimed all commerce +with Peris; but, having done so, set to work upon the _Bride of Abydos_. +It is easy to judge of Moore's feelings when he read the new poem and +found that Byron had again, by pure accident, anticipated his friend. +One of the stories intended for insertion in _Lalla Rookh_ had been +carried some way, but it contained, says Moore, such singular +coincidences with the _Bride_, "not only in locality and costume, but in +plot and characters," that there was nothing for it but to give up. + +The whole thing was pure and simple bad luck, and Byron's very sincere +correspondence is mainly directed to chiding his friend for the "strange +diffidence of your own powers which I cannot account for." But the blow +was heavy. + +There is no doubt as to Moore's priority of idea. On September 11th, +1811, we find him writing to Miss Godfrey, after the failure of his +operetta, _M.P._: "I shall now take to my poem and do something, I hope, +that will place me above the vulgar herd both of worldlings and critics; +but you shall hear from me again when I get among the maids of Cashmere, +the sparkling springs of Rochabad, and the fragrant banquets of the +Peris." And Rogers, in the same month, refers to the projected epic: +"Are you now in a pavilion on the banks of the Tigris?" But Moore, for +all his apparent facility, was a slow and fastidious writer, and it +seems that, even in 1813, not a great deal was accomplished. + +He was, however, resolute that nothing should divert him from his task, +and the proposal made by Murray through Byron, to establish him as +"editor of a review like the _Edinburgh_ and the _Quarterly_," was set +aside; as was also the suggestion from Power for an opera, which would +bring in money both from theatre and bookshops. His determination was +the more remarkable, because already his account with Power was +forestalled. So long as he could earn money, Moore refused persistently +to be indebted to any man (except Rogers, and that only in two +instances) for a loan; but with equal regularity he anticipated by long +periods all his earnings from publishers. His house-moving had involved +him in unlooked-for expenses, and, to meet these, he had exhausted the +supply from a first success in one of the two branches of literature +which he was to make peculiarly his own. + +In March 1813 was published for Carpenter (through an understrapper in +the Row) _Intercepted Letters; or the Twopenny Postbag_. The preface +explained that the letters in question came from a bag dropped by a +Twopenny Postman, which had been picked up by an agent of the Society +for the Suppression of Vice, but abandoned, when it became clear that +the discoveries of profligacy which it indicated lay too high up to be +handled. The letters--eight in all--were attributed to correspondents +whose names were transparently disguised by initials, and who for the +most part belonged to the Prince Regent's circle. A supplementary group +of epigrams and occasional verses, reprinted from the _Morning +Chronicle_, eked out the thin volume. Thin as it was, it sold for a high +price, and it sold prodigiously; a year later Moore wrote a preface for +the fourteenth edition, which Carpenter now openly adopted. Moore, +however, did not write in his own name. The nominal author of the +preface, as of the book, was "Thomas Brown the younger." But the +authorship was never for a moment in doubt, as many of the squibs +reprinted had been correctly assigned on their first appearance in the +_Chronicle_; and Moore showed his certitude that the disguise would be +only formal by inserting, in the dedication to Woolriche, an assurance +that "doggerel is not my _only_ occupation." The preface to the later +edition contains some biographical matter of interest. It begins by +denying the rumour of collaboration or joint-authorship; and then passes +to what was a virtual avowal of identity. + + "To the charge of being an Irishman, poor Mr. Brown pleads guilty; + and I believe it must also be acknowledged that he comes of a Roman + Catholic family.... But from all this it does not necessarily + follow that Mr. Brown is a Papist; and indeed I have the strongest + reasons for suspecting that they who say so are somewhat + mistaken.... All I profess to know of his orthodoxy is that he has + a Protestant wife and two or three little Protestant children, and + that he has been seen at church every Sunday, for a whole year + together, listening to the sermons of his truly reverend and + amiable friend, Dr. ----"[1] + +Moore by no means conceived of tolerance only as a virtue to be +practised by Protestants for the benefit of Catholics. Long before his +marriage--indeed, when his Bessy was in very short frocks--he had +written, as an exhortation to Protestants:-- + + "From the heretic girl of my soul shall I fly + To find somewhere else a more orthodox kiss?" + +And later, from the Catholic side of the question, he practised his own +doctrine conscientiously, when it came to falling in love, for Bessy +Moore was a Protestant. In spite of the phrase "it does not necessarily +follow that Mr. Brown is a Papist," there is no reason to suppose that +Moore ever meditated a change of religion. Later in life, his sister +Katherine did so, and he advised her to follow his example and remain +quietly a Catholic. But he said openly to her, and records it in his +diary: "My having married a Protestant wife gave me an opportunity of +choosing a religion at least for my children, and if my marriage had no +other advantage, I should think _this_ quite sufficient to be grateful +for." + +But while in these respects he showed himself a Catholic of the least +rigid order, he was, naturally, all the keener in his hostility to +Protestant bigotry. And, having discarded the sonorous denunciation of +Corruption and Intolerance in heavy Popian couplets, he now, as Mr. +Thomas Brown the younger, attacked Addington, Eldon, Castlereagh and the +rest, in a spirited light gallop of verse. The occasion of the opening +epistle was afforded by a present of ponies which Lady Barbara Ashley +had given to the Princess Charlotte of Wales. Lady Barbara being a +Catholic, keen noses smelt Popery in the gift; and the letter attributed +to "the Pr----ss Ch----e of W---s," recounts a supposed Cabinet Council, +at which the crisis is discussed. A few lines may serve as an example +of this clever _jeu d'esprit_. + + "'If the Pr-nc-ss _will_ keep them,' says Lord + C-stl-r--gh, + 'To make them quite harmless, the only true way + Is (as certain Chief Justices do with their wives) + To flog them within half an inch of their lives; + If they've any bad Irish Mood lurking about, + This (he knew by experience) would soon draw it out.' + Or--if this be thought cruel--his Lordship proposes + 'The new _Veto_ snaffle to hind down their noses-- + A pretty contrivance, made out of old chains, + Which appears to indulge, while it doubly restrains; + Which, however high-mettled, their gamesomeness checks,' + Adds his Lordship, humanely, 'or else breaks their necks!'" + +The bulk of the satire was, however, social rather than political, and +largely aimed at the Prince Regent--from whom Moore and all his friends +were now completely estranged. In the second Letter, some capital lines +describe-- + + "That awful hour or two + Of grave tonsorial preparation, + Which, to a fond, admiring nation, + Sends forth, announced by trump and drum, + The best-wigg'd P----e in Christendom!" + +Even better work was to be found in the reprints than in the Letters. +The "Anacreontic to a Plumassier" is a very delicate piece of verse, +fluffy and feathery. Almost as good was the version, or perversion, of +Horace II. 11, "freely translated by the Pr--ce R-g--t":-- + + "Brisk let us revel, while revel we may; + For the gay bloom of fifty soon passes away, + And then people get fat + And infirm and all that, + And a wig (I confess it) so clumsily sits + That it frightens the little loves out of their wits." + +Taking them as a whole, it would be hard to find better examples of +light-hearted satire. Moore had little of the _soeva indignatio_; his +touch was on the ridiculous rather than the disgusting; and even the +Prince of Wales could take fun out of the chaff directed against his fat +pretensions to comeliness. Probably no one was much the worse, or the +better, for Moore's satire, and it abounds so in topical allusion, of +the most ephemeral kind, that to-day the interest has evaporated. But +the reader can easily understand its immediate popularity, and it is +distressing to think that Carpenter should have reaped the lion's share +of the profit. From this onward Moore very wisely sought another +publisher. + +His residence at Ashbourne lasted till March 1817, and the years spent +there were the most fertile of his existence. The period was terminated +by a move to the neighbourhood of London to supervise the publication of +_Lalla Rookh_, and virtually the whole of this poem may be said to have +been composed in Mayfield Cottage. In the same period, Moore produced +the sixth number of the _Irish Melodies_ and the first number of his +_Sacred Songs_, which rank next in importance to the _Melodies_ among +his poetical works. If he had never written a line after 1817, his +reputation as a poet would stand no less high than it does at present. + +The volume of the _Melodies_ which Power issued in 1815 contains several +poems which throw an interesting light on the poet's state of feeling +towards politics, and especially towards his own country. One of the +most successful songs in the number (as indeed it deserved to be) was +the lyric in which the reproach of Catholic Ireland to the Prince who +had gone back on his early protestations is put as the complaint of a +forsaken woman:-- + + "When first I met thee, warm and young, + There shone such truth about thee, + And on thy lip such promise hung, + I did not dare to doubt thee. + I saw thee change, yet still relied, + Still clung with hope the fonder, + And thought, though false to all beside, + From me thou couldst not wander. + But go, deceiver! go,-- + The heart, whose hopes could make it + Trust one so false, so low, + Deserves that thou shouldst break it." + +And the closing refrain has a real energy:-- + + "Go--go--'tis vain to curse, + 'Tis weakness to upbraid thee; + Hate cannot wish thee worse + Than guilt and shame have made thee." + +Moore wrote to Power in the early part of 1815, after a visit to +Chatsworth, where he had spent his days in a whirl of fine company:-- + + "You cannot imagine what a sensation the Prince's song created. It + was in vain to guard your property; they had it sung and repeated + over so often that they all took copies of it, and I dare say in + the course of next week there will not be a Whig lord or lady in + England who will not be in possession of it." + +The other notable number is the poem to the tune Savourneen Deelish, +which begins:-- + + "'Tis gone, and for ever, the light we saw breaking, + Like Heaven's first dawn o'er the sleep of the dead-- + When Man, from the slumber of ages awaking, + Look'd upward, and bless'd the pure ray, ere it fled. + 'Tis gone, and the gleams it has left of its burning + But deepen the long night of bondage and mourning, + That dark o'er the kingdoms of earth is returning, + And darkest of all, hapless Erin, o'er thee." + +Moore wrote this after Napoleon had been sequestered in Elba, when the +Holy Alliance were left masters of the field. He was well pleased with +the verses, and his comment to Power is extremely typical of his +attitude at this period:--"It is bold enough; but the strong blow I have +aimed at the French in the last stanza makes up for everything." The +lines referred to are these:-- + + "But shame on those tyrants who envied the blessing! + And shame on the light race unworthy its good, + Who, at Death's reeking altar, like furies caressing + The young hope of Freedom, baptized it in blood!" + +The same desire to conciliate English public opinion is shown by another +song which represents Erin as drying her tears:-- + + "When after whole pages of sorrow and shame + She saw History write, + With a pencil of light + That illumed the whole volume, her Wellington's name." + +In one of the prefaces which Moore wrote, with ebbing faculties, for the +collected edition of his works, readers will find him claiming for this +lyric the spirit of prophecy, because Wellington ultimately +"recommended to the throne the great measure of Catholic Emancipation." +If indeed at last the Duke heeded the singer's closing injunction-- + + "Go, plead for the land that first cradled thy fame," + +it was with no good-will: and there is far more sincerity in Moore's +note somewhere in the journals that his song had been wholly wasted on +the recipient of the homage. Still, there is no good ground for bringing +against the poet a reproach of time-serving. His state of mind, if one +endeavours to realise it, must have been strangely complicated. In the +victories of Wellington, so largely won by the bravery of Irish +soldiers, he felt, no doubt, as did most Irishmen, a kind of proprietary +gratification; but the dethronement of Napoleon caused him no unmixed +joy. Like Byron, and many another man of that day, he had a fascinated +admiration for this prodigious master of legions; and moreover, +Napoleon's ruin meant the establishment of the Holy Alliance, and, as +one of many corollaries, the perpetuation of helotry in Ireland. Ireland +had reason to bless the movement towards liberty which came from France, +and not less to execrate the excesses which strengthened the hands of +liberty's opponents. There is nothing in the poem that requires defence; +what requires either apology or condemnation is Moore's attempt to +flavour with abuse of England's detested opponent an expression of his +own convictions--involving, as they did, a condemnation of English rule. + +The truth is that the business of adapting Irish nationalist sentiment +to the taste of English drawing-rooms was perilous to sincerity; and, +in this period of his life, Moore was steadily losing touch with +Ireland. The number of the Melodies under discussion closed with the +beautiful lyric in which the singer bade farewell to this way of +poetry:-- + + "Dear Harp of my Country! farewell to thy numbers, + This sweet wreath of song is the last we shall twine." + +The farewell, as it proved, was only temporary, but it indicates that +Moore felt the inspiration failing him; and, as a matter of fact, the +four later numbers of the Melodies are by far inferior to their +predecessors. Their inferiority, however, was due to no lack of +sympathy; it indicates only that the artist's instinct was right, and +that Moore's thought about Ireland, in later days, took naturally other +forms of expression. + +But in 1815 he had been absent from his country for four long years, +during which his life had been engrossed with other things; and the +Catholic cause, which had always been foremost in his mind, was now +losing its attraction, for two reasons, sufficiently indicated in his +correspondence with Lady Donegal. + +In the spring of 1815, his third child, a little girl, aged only a few +months, died at Mayfield; and, in hopes to soothe the mother by change +of scene, Moore decided to hasten on a long-projected visit to Ireland. +Lady Donegal wrote that she heard this with regret, "for it is not a +safe residence for you in any way"; and she pressed on him warnings +against the "Irish democrats." Moore replied, certainly with sufficient +emphasis:-- + + "If there is anything in the world that I have been detesting and + despising more than another for this long time past, it has been + those very Dublin politicians whom you so fear I should associate + with. I do not think a good cause was ever ruined by a more + bigoted, brawling, and disgusting set of demagogues; and, though it + be the religion of my fathers, I must say that much of this vile, + vulgar spirit is to be traced to that wretched faith, which is + again polluting Europe with Jesuitism and Inquisitions, and which + of all the humbugs that have stultified mankind is the most + narrow-minded and mischievous; so much for the danger of my joining + Messrs. O'Connel, O'Donnel, etc." + +That was written in March, after the escape from Elba. A month after +Waterloo, Moore put sharply enough, to the same correspondent, his +detestation for the Bourbons, and his general dissent from Lady +Donegal's Toryism. But, although written from Ireland, the letter +expresses the sentiments rather of an English Whig than an Irish +Nationalist:-- + + "Reprobate as I am, I am sure you will give credit to my prudence + and good taste in declining the grand public dinner that was about + to be given me upon my arrival in Dublin. I found there were, too + many of your favourites, the Catholic orators, at the bottom of the + design--that the fountain of honour was too much of a _holywater_ + fount for me to dabble in it with either safety or pleasure; and + though I should have liked mightily the opportunity of making a + treasonable speech or two after dinner, I thought the wisest thing + I could do was to decline the honour. Being thus disappointed in + me, they have given a grand public dinner to an eminent + toll-gatherer, whose patriotic and _elegant_ method of collecting + the tolls entitles him, I have no doubt, to the glory of such a + celebration. Alas! alas! it must be confessed that our poor country + altogether is a most wretched concern; and as for the Catholics (as + I have just said in a letter written within these five minutes), + one would heartily wish them all in their own Purgatory, if it were + not for their adversaries, whom one wishes _still further_." + +Following that is a letter to Rogers, in which Moore writes of a visit +to the "foggy, boggy regions of Tipperary." + + "The only thing," he goes on, "I could match you[2] in, is + _banditti_; and if you can imagine groups of ragged Shanavests (as + they are called) going about in noonday, armed and painted over + like Catabaw Indians, to murder tithe-proctors, land-valuers, etc., + you have the most stimulant specimen of the sublime that Tipperary + affords. The country, indeed, is in a frightful state, and rational + remedies have been delayed so long that nothing but the sword will + answer now." + +Very similar views would have been expressed by any member of the Whig +aristocracy, whose detestation of the Holy Alliance would certainly have +extended itself to the Holy Water fount, and who would have shared +Moore's fastidious dislike of O'Connell's method of raising party funds. +It must, however, be remembered that these passages represent Moore's +immature opinions; and against the description of the Shanavests as +murderous savages must be set the _Memoirs of Captain Rock_, which give +the natural history of agrarian crime, denouncing, not the Shanavests or +Whiteboys, but the circumstances which bred such crime, as naturally and +as regularly as filth breeds fever. For Moore wrote _Captain Rock_ after +reading Irish history and making something of an exhaustive tour through +the south of Ireland, while in 1815 his sense of Irish grievances was +largely theoretical. "I love Ireland," he wrote to his friend Corry, +"but I hate Dublin"; and it is not very cynical to say that when he +wrote this, Dublin was all he knew of Ireland. The influence of his +early association with Emmet and others, renewed periodically by his +visits to his home, was mainly an affair of sentiment, and spent itself +during his long sojourn away from contact with Irish minds. It revived +in him later, and it was nourished, by reading Irish history, into a +steady conviction. But the first impulse that revived in Moore the +enthusiasm for his own country was, I think, gratitude for its +recognition of his services; and one may not unfairly trace something of +his temporary alienation, if not from Ireland, at least from Irish +Nationalists, to his feeling that his merits were not adequately valued +among his own people. When he is blaspheming against the "low, +illiberal, puddle-headed, and gross-hearted herd of Dublin," it is +because his _Melologue_ "never drew a soul to the theatres in Dublin." + +In England, during these years, his reputation was at its height. Byron +in 1814 dedicated _The Corsair_ to "the poet of all circles and the idol +of his own." Leigh Hunt the same year admitted, in his "Feast of the +Poets," only four to dine with Apollo, and Moore, with Scott, Southey, +Campbell, made the company. Stray pieces, such as the lines on +Sheridan's death--Moore's finest piece of satire--caught like wildfire; +and the _Edinburgh_, in reviewing the sixth number of _Irish Melodies_, +made ample amends for its earlier onslaught. More than that, Jeffrey +approached Moore, in the most honorific manner, through Rogers, to +enlist him as a contributor, and a contributor Moore accordingly became. + +His first article, a review of Lord Thurlow's poems, was simply a light +piece of amusing criticism; but his second choice of subject astonished +Jeffrey. Taking for a peg Boyd's translation of Select Passages from +the patristic writings, Moore proceeded to hang upon it his views of the +Fathers and their works generally. These views are perhaps a little +remarkable as coming from a Catholic, and the tone of the article may be +fairly inferred from a passage:-- + + "At a time when the Inquisition is re-established by our 'beloved + Ferdinand'; when the Pope again brandishes the keys of St. Peter + with an air worthy of the successor of the Hildebrands and + Perettis; when canonisation is about to be inflicted on another + Louis, and little silver models of embryo princes are gravely vowed + at the shrine of the Virgin;--in times like these, it is not too + much to expect that such enlightened authors as St. Jerome and + Tertullian may become the classics of most of the Continental + Courts." + +Nevertheless, even those who respect the Fathers most, will hardly deny +the wit of Moore's comment: indeed, few things enable us so well to +guess at the nature of his admitted brilliancy in conversation as these +early articles, coming from his unjaded pen. Another quotation may be +given:-- + + "St. Justin, the Martyr, is usually considered as the well-spring + of most of those strange errors which flowed so abundantly through + the early ages of the Church, and spread around them in their + course with such luxuriance of absurdity. The most amiable, and + therefore the least contagious, of his heterodoxies was that which + led him to patronise the souls of Socrates and other Pagans, in + consideration of those glimmerings of the divine Logos which his + fancy discovered through the dark night of Heathenism. The absurd + part of this opinion remained, while the tolerant spirit + evaporated. And while these Pagans were allowed to have known + something of the Trinity, they were yet damned for not knowing + more, with most unrelenting orthodoxy." + +In any case, most readers will be of the same mind as Jeffrey, who wrote +that he "was far from suspecting" Moore's "familiarity with these +recondite subjects." But it must be remembered that Moore was always a +bookish man, a poet who derived his inspiration largely from +out-of-the-way literature--and this article contains references in which +we see the germinal ideas of his _Loves of the Angels_. I have noted a +touch of pedantry, oddly associated with exuberant youth, in his version +of _Anacreon_; and something of the same combination is to be found in +the _magnum opus_ which, for a while at all events, set the seal upon +his fame. + +Nothing could more practically show Moore's position in the literary +world of his day than the negotiations for the copyright of _Lalla +Rookh_. In 1814 Murray offered two thousand guineas for it, but Moore's +friends thought he should have more, and, going to Longman, they claimed +that Mr. Moore should receive no less than the highest price ever paid +for a poem. "That," said Longman, "was three thousand pounds paid for +_Rokeby_." On this basis they treated, and Longman was inclined to +stipulate for a preliminary perusal. Moore, however, refused, and the +agreement was finally worded:--"That upon your giving into our hands a +poem of the length of _Rokeby_ you shall receive from us the sum of +L3000." This was in December 1814. The poem was ready for publication in +1816, but that year (in the confusion after Waterloo) being very adverse +to publishers, Moore generously offered the Longmans the chance to +postpone or rescind their bargain; and postponed it accordingly was till +May 1817. + +It is worth noting that in the January of that year Moore writes to ask +Power if he can "muster me up a few pounds (five or six), as I am almost +without a shilling." A heavy blow had also fallen upon him, as the +retrenchments then proceeding had occasioned John Moore's removal from +the barrack-mastership in Dublin, with a consequent reduction of his +income from L350 to L200. But the publication of _Lalla Rookh_ set all +right for the moment. A thousand pounds was drawn to discharge all +Moore's liabilities; the other two thousand was to remain in the +publishers' hands, and they undertook to pay Moore's father a hundred +pounds a year as interest on it. Moore himself and his family moved up +to a new house at Hornsey in Middlesex, much more expensive than his +Derbyshire cottage; and here for two months he was busy with the proofs, +and naturally anxious. By May 30th he was clear of all scruples as to +the publisher's pockets, and with justice. A quarter of a century later +Longman still looked on _Lalla Rookh_ as "the cream of the copyrights." + +One may take this moment for the height of Moore's prosperity. His +success was emphasised by many flattering offers, one of which was to +conduct a paper for the Opposition--a suggestion which Moore set aside, +partly on the ground that he had lost his taste for living in London. In +the middle of the first flourish of eulogy, Rogers, to whom _Lalla_ had +been dedicated, and who in June was housing Bessy and her young ones, +carried off the poet for a trip to Paris. Moore wrote in raptures with +the French capital; but that was the end of his good time. + +Bad news recalled him: Barbara, the eldest little girl, was dangerously +ill from the effects of a fall, and a month after his return she died. +The loss fell heaviest on the mother, and it is noticeable that Moore +was then the one to assume control. This seems natural enough, when one +remembers that his wife was only three and twenty; but in later days, +the relation was very different. The family moved for a while to Lady +Donegal's house, 56 Davies Street, Berkeley Square, and thence Moore +made an excursion to look for a new home. A great Whig peer, the Marquis +of Lansdowne, had suggested that the poet's residence should be fixed +near Bowood and its library; and three houses were offered for his +inspection. Only one proved to be at all within the reach of his means, +a little thatched cottage with a pretty garden. Bessy went down a week +later, escorted by Power, to look at it, and returned delighted--very +probably with its cheapness, for it was offered to them furnished at L40 +a year. Under these rather sad circumstances, Moore and his wife moved +into their definitive home. On November 19th, 1817, Moore wrote to Power +from "Sloperton, Devizes," to say that they were in possession, and that +he himself was just sallying out for his walk in the garden, with his +head full of words for the Melodies. + +It was always his habit to compose out of doors, and pilgrims to +Sloperton are still shown a little gravelled path round the garden, +which keeps the name of Poet's Walk. Such pilgrims can easily enough +imagine the house as Moore first knew it. The thatched roof has been +replaced by slates, probably when the addition was built on for Moore's +accommodation. This addition consisted of two rooms, a good-sized +sitting-room with windows opening on to the green lawn and garden, and +over it a bedroom to match--the room in which Moore died, and which, +according to tradition, his ghost still inhabits. This addition has an +ordinary sloping roof, joined on to the original front, which consists +of three gables. All about are great elms and chestnut trees, and the +whole countryside is rich in the beauty that Moore delighted +in--"sunniness and leanness," to quote his own happy phrase. The quiet +little country town of Devizes is three miles off to the north, and in +that direction Bromham, the hamlet which gives its name to the parish, +nestles among trees across a small valley. A roughly paved lane, deep +sunk between profuse hedges, leads from Sloperton to the lovely +fifteenth-century church in whose grave-yard Moore lies with his wife +and children, among generations of squires and yokels of a race not his +own. + +From this valley the ground rises gently, and the road from Devizes to +Chippenham has to crest a hill or swelling ridge. Astride of the ridge +is Lord Lansdowne's demesne, and from Moore's house to the nearest entry +to the park, the distance must be something over a mile. Thence it is +another mile's walking through glades and lawns to the great +house--"dear Bowood," as Miss Edgeworth called it, famous in those days +for its hospitality to men and women of letters. Altogether the +neighbourhood was as pleasant as could be found, but at first Bessy +Moore was uncomfortable in it. She wanted "some near and plain +neighbours to make intimacy with and enjoy a little tea-drinking now and +then." The Lansdownes had every wish to be kind, but they and their +friends belonged to a set of which Moore had for years been a +privileged member, and if Bessy entered it, she found herself, as Moore +said, "a perfect stranger in the midst of people who are all intimate." +She consoled herself however with works of charity, visiting the poor +about her, and helping them with her clever fingers. In the meantime +Moore was busy with another collection of light verse--_The Fudge Family +in Paris_, for which his visit to Paris with Rogers had given the +suggestion; and a seventh edition of _Lalla Rookh_ was printing within +less than a year after publication. Thus all omens seemed hopeful, when +suddenly a bolt from the blue came down. + +Moore's deputy in Bermuda had proved thoroughly untrustworthy, repeated +letters having elicited no accounts from him for the last year of the +war. It appeared now that he had embezzled the proceeds of a ship and +cargo--representing a sum of L6000, which had been deposited with him, +pending an appeal to the Court at home. Moore was fully liable, and his +only hope lay in the conscience of a certain merchant, uncle of the +defaulter, who had recommended his nephew to Moore, and might therefore +feel bound in honour to make good the defalcation. Moore bore himself, +however, cheerfully enough, though anticipating sequestration in a +debtor's prison. The advice of business men in London reassured him +somewhat, and the _Fudges_ came out at the right moment with great +eclat, bringing in L350 to the author within the first fortnight. +Consolation of another kind was administered, when, in May of the same +year (1818), the poet ran over to Dublin, and for a fortnight lived in a +bustle of acclamation. A great public dinner was organised in his +honour, and when he appeared in the theatre, he was called repeatedly +during the performance to make his bow from the front of the box. All +this, he said, "was scarcely more delightful to me on my own account +than as a proof of the strong spirit of nationality of my countrymen." + +Another great exultation helped to dispel the gloom of his Bermuda +prospects, for in October Bessy became at last the mother of a son. +Little comfort as this child proved to be in the long run, he was for +years the apple of Moore's eye. The god-parents were, as usual, a +strange and interesting assortment--Miss Godfrey, the shrewd and tried +friend of so many years, Lord Lansdowne, and old Dr. Parr, the famous +Grecian. This last was a recent acquaintance, sprung out of the work on +which, during the year, Moore had been engaged--a new literary departure +marking the incipient change in him from poet to man of letters. + +His lines on the death of Sheridan showed plainly the hold which the one +brilliant Irishman had on the other's imagination, and Murray suggested +in 1817 that Moore should be Sheridan's biographer. By August 1818, +Moore was at work, visiting Sheridan's sister, Mrs. Le Fanu, in Bath; +and at her house he first met Dr. Parr, who warmed to the scholar in +Moore. They talked together of Erasmus, the Wolfian theory of Homer, and +such like things; hobnobbing generously the while. + +Material in plenty for the Memoir was forthcoming, from a diversity of +sources, but difficulties arose as to the share in the prospective +profits claimed by the Sheridan family, and Moore occupied himself with +other researches: reading _Boxiana_, visiting Jackson the pugilist, and +studying other repositories of "flash" dialect, in order to fit himself +for the task of writing his new squib _Tom Crib's Memorial to Congress_, +in which a professional boxer, Crib, was the spokesman. It appeared in +the spring of 1819; the seventh number of _Irish Melodies_ had been +issued in the preceding year, so that it will appear that Moore's +industry was constant. Work on the _Sheridan_ continued briskly, as we +find by entries in his diary, it having been settled that Murray was to +be the publisher and to pay 1000 guineas for the book. In the meantime +Moore was turning over subjects for another poetical _opus magnum_, and +something in his omnivorous reading suggested a story drawn from ancient +Egypt--a first hint of the material which he ultimately wrought into his +prose romance, _The Epicurean_. + +In the summer he made his usual visit to town, and Bessy with the +children went off by boat to Edinburgh to visit her mother and sisters. +The Dyke family appear to have dropped pretty completely out of Moore's +existence, but occasional references show that they continued to keep in +touch at least with Bessy, and to receive small sums. Moore's cause was +now at last up for hearing, and his sanguine nature had led him to hope +for a dismissal of it: but on July 10th the blow fell. He learnt that in +two months an attachment would be put in force against his person, and +therefore there was nothing left for it but to decide on a place of +retreat. The Liberties of Holyrood were suggested, and Moore had all but +decided on going there, when Lord John Russell--most unfortunately, as +he came to think--urged the alternative of a visit to the Continent in +his company, with a view to final settlement in Paris. The Longmans +backed the suggestion by saying that a few poetical epistles from places +of note would pay all expenses; and accordingly in the beginning of +September 1819, Moore set off for Dover in Lord John's coach. + +This break-up of so pleasant a home was distressing, and friends were +eager to prevent the necessity. Promptest of them was Jeffrey, who, +immediately the report of the calamity came, made excuse for writing a +letter on business of the _Edinburgh_, and then went on: + + "I cannot from my heart resist adding another word. I have heard of + your misfortunes and of the noble way you bear them. Is it very + impertinent to say that I have L500 entirely at four service, which + you may repay when you please; and as much more, which I can + advance upon any reasonable security of repayment in seven years? + + "Perhaps it is very unpardonable in me to say this; but upon my + honour, I would not _make_ you the offer, if I did not feel that I + would _accept_ it without scruple from you." + +Nothing could be more honourable to both men than such an offer, and +Moore long afterwards referred to it in his Memoir with deep feeling. It +was only one of a shoal of similar tributes. Leigh Hunt, then editor of +the _Examiner_, wrote to Perry of the _Chronicle_ to urge the opening of +a public subscription. Rogers pressed L500 of his own on Moore, as a +beginning towards some such fund: Lord Lansdowne offered security for +the whole; Lord John Russell proposed to set aside all future profits +from his _Life of Lord Russell_, just published, and forwarded inquiries +from his brother Lord Tavistock as to whether anything was doing to save +Moore from imprisonment. "I am very poor," Lord Tavistock wrote, "but I +have always had such a strong admiration for Moore's independence of +mind that I would willingly sacrifice something to be of use to him." +Moore recorded all this with legitimate pride, in his diary, but +continued steadfast in his determination to rely on no one but his +publishers; and the Longmans expressed the fullest readiness to advance +in the way of business any reasonable sum, to which he might, by +compromise, reduce the claims on him. + +Nothing could more strongly indicate the general respect in which Moore +was held than this practical testimony. It is necessary to emphasise +that Moore impressed those in contact with him by no quality so much as +by his high-mindedness. Old Dr. Parr expressed the feeling of many, when +he left by his will a ring to Thomas Moore, "who stands high in my +estimation for original genius, for his exquisite sensibility, for his +independent spirit and incorruptible integrity." Men who saw how Moore +lived felt no doubt the greatness of the temptations to which he was +exposed. Private liberality was pressed upon him repeatedly; and if his +pride revolted from that, he had more than a common chance of public +rewards. Those anxious to serve the poet were by no means only of one +political colour; no man had more aptitude to conciliate, or stronger +motives for doing so. Early in his married life, at a time when his +professed patron, Lord Moira, took office under a government opposed to +the Catholic cause, which he, like Moore, had always supported, the poet +might easily have waived something of his scruples; and Miss Godfrey +insisted upon the reasons for his doing so, in language which would +probably have been endorsed by most of his Whig friends. + + "As to your political opinions, it was very fine to indulge in them + and act up to them while there was a distant perspective in so + doing of fame or emolument, and at the same time a feeling that the + triumph of such opinions, and the success of the party you belonged + to, might be conducive to the prosperity of your country. But now, + when those opinions have less and less influence, and that party + less and less consideration--when your family is increasing and + your wants, of course, increasing with it--don't you think prudence + should have its turn? Would not your love for your wife and anxiety + for the welfare of your children reconcile you to some little + sacrifice of political opinions?" + +The same line of argument was used to Moore at many junctures in his +life and he always had the same answer. "More mean things," he told +Rogers, "have been done in this world under the shelter of wife and +children than under any pretext that worldly-mindedness can resort to." + +The fact that the argument was so often used indicates that he lived +always in the range of temptation; and many would blame him because he +never had the inclination to sever himself from the connections which +made it almost impossible for him to live frugally. Yet, apart from the +argument that he helped the popularity of his music by singing his songs +as no one else could sing them, it is clear that for much of his +work--for all the satirical side of it--close touch with society was +essential. Hardly less essential was it for the work of which his +_Sheridan_ was only the first instalment--his contribution to the +literature of memoirs. On the other hand, it is clear that as the +satirist, the observer, the historian, and the politician strengthened +in him, they crowded out the poet. Life near Bowood meant life in +contact with the leading politicians and thinkers of the day: Sloperton +was very different from the seclusion of Mayfield. The question +naturally arises, whether Moore, by encouraging his interest in +contemporary events, and, generally speaking, in the prose side of life, +stifled a higher gift, or whether he simply obeyed a sound and healthy +impulse. The answer cannot be given without some detailed consideration +of the work by which he took rank in his own generation--his equivalent +for Scott's lays and Byron's romances. + +Like them, Moore relied upon the charm of an exciting narrative, laid in +unfamiliar scenes, and furnished with highly-coloured descriptive +passages. But, whereas Scott wrote of the Border where he had been bred, +and Byron of the East where he had travelled in days when the traveller +was obliged to become a real part of every scene in which he moved, +Moore laid his stories in a country known to him only through books, and +he derived them from a literature remote and alien from all European +sympathies. The natural consequence is that, whereas Scott's and Byron's +descriptions savour of actual experience, Moore's reek of the lamp; and, +with astonishing lack of judgment, he spoilt whatever illusion might +exist, by the constant interposition of footnotes to explain the +fragments of Eastern custom, tradition, or natural history, which he had +laboriously wrought in. Nothing could more strongly stamp the artificial +character of the whole. The truth, which Moore unhappily did not +realise, is that poetry should be made, not out of things new but of +things old; out of the familiar, not the unfamiliar. His research for +novelty of subject was fatal to him; the attractions which he sought to +give his work are those which poetry in the true sense must dispense +with. Scott handled material wrought over a hundred times in Border +ballads. Byron indeed made poetry from the novel, the strange, the +obviously picturesque. But what keeps Byron's poetry alive is the +element of personal emotion which Byron contributed to the subject. In +so far as anything survives of _Lalla Rookh_, the same is true of Moore. + +The introductory pages prefixed to _Lalla Rookh_ in the 1841 edition of +Moore's poems bear out this view. Moore relates his difficulties--his +many attempts, begun and thrown aside. In one of these rejected stories, +and only one, he writes, "had I yet ventured to involve that most +homefelt of all my inspirations which has lent to the story of 'The Fire +Worshippers' its main attraction and interest"--that half-veiled +reference to Irish history and Irish aspirations, of which mention has +already been made. Moore shrewdly observes that the absence of this sort +of feeling in the other preliminary sketches-- + + "was the reason doubtless, though hardly known at the time to + myself, that, finding my subjects so slow in touching my + sympathies, I began to despair of their ever touching the hearts of + others.... But at last--fortunately, as it proved--the thought + occurred to me of founding a story on the fierce struggle so long + maintained between the Ghebers, or ancient Fire Worshippers of + Persia, and their haughty Moslem masters. From that moment a new + and deep interest in my whole task took possession of me. The cause + of tolerance was again my inspiring theme; and the spirit that had + spoken in the melodies of Ireland soon found itself at home in the + East." + +It found itself about as much at home, I should say, as is the ordinary +European in oriental costume at a masked ball. To wear Eastern clothes +like an Eastern is possible, for one who has assimilated the Eastern way +of life; otherwise, incongruities reveal themselves with every gesture. +Byron, happier than Moore in his choice, wrote of an East that touches +the West, of the clash between Frank and Moslem. + +Worse still, Moore was an amatory poet, he had made successes by writing +about love; and accordingly, he determined to rely in his poems--as +Scott, wiser than he, had not done--on the love interest. He +misunderstood his own temperament. Love poetry of the serious order +demands passion, and Moore is the poet of dalliance, not of passion. The +passion--if it can be called a passion--of pity, the passion of +political enthusiasm, he had; but the violence of exclusive desire, +whether lasting or temporary, which Byron so often rendered, was a chord +outside of Moore's range. + +The poets of Moore's own day, who knew and liked Moore, never cared for +_Lalla_; and Leigh Hunt, an excellent critic, spoke the truth about it. +Condemning the poem gently as "too florid in its general style," though +allowing to it exquisite passages, he goes on:-- + + "You are so truly, by birth, a poetical animal, out of the pale of + book-associations and a free inhabitant of the most Elysian parts + of nature, that the more you resolved to speak and to feel out of + the sincerity of your own impulses, without thinking it necessary + to search for ideas, the more to your advantage I am persuaded it + would be. You are a born poet and have only to claim your + inheritance--not to be heaping up a multitude of anxious proofs + which, though mistaken by some for ostentation, are in reality + evidences of a diffidence of pretension which you ought not to + feel." + +No man could give better advice. Moore had written narrative poetry, one +may safely say, because the fashion of the day was for narrative. He had +caught at Rogers's suggestion of poetry on an Eastern theme, which was +to give him a new field. As he worked on, he felt his theme alien, and +tried to make himself at home in it by taking into the subject what +really belonged to another atmosphere; and further, he decided that "he +must try to make up for his deficiencies in _dash_ and vigour by +versatility and polish." Not in this way is poetry written; the poet who +tries to accommodate himself to the taste of the public is destroying +his art. + +Moore had earned his fame by writings, amatory, political, and +satirical, which it came natural to him to produce, because he was "a +poetical animal"; _Lalla Rookh_ was, in great measure, work done against +the grain, and relying for its success on the secondary qualities of +elaborate finish, profusion of ornament, and variety of interest. These +qualities, however, were present in no common degree, and the poem's +success is not to be wondered at. The dose of novelty in style was just +sufficient to attract, without offending by its revolt against "the +Popish sing-song." It was indeed so perfectly in the fashion of its +time, as to be inevitably demoded after a lapse of years. The florid +loops and curves of the Regency period in decorative art have their +equivalent in Moore's profuse and lengthily elaborated metaphors. +Certain features of the work must be unreservedly condemned. The prose +narrative in which the four poems are set is deplorable--sprightly +beyond endurance; and in the _Veiled Prophet_ Moore tears one passion +after another to tatters in bursts of sheer rhetoric. Yet even here good +lines are plenty, though they are all in metaphors, or some other +excrescence; for instance-- + + "Hundreds of banners to the sunbeam spread + Waved, like the wings of the white birds that fan + The flying throne of star-taught Soliman." + +In _Paradise and the Peri_ we have a production more within the poet's +range. A prettier example of an _Arabian Nights Tale_, done into +springing, easy verse, it would be difficult to find. The idea, neat and +graceful, could have been treated within the compass of a song, which +should tell how the exiled Peri was promised admittance if she brought +"the gift that is most dear to Heaven"; how she tried first the patriot +hero's life-blood--(shed in vain); then the last sigh of the maiden who +chose to share the death of her true love; and, last of all, how she won +home with the tear of repentance from a Byronic sinner. All through the +poem there is the suggestion of singing, and, as Scott said, "Moore +beats us all at a song." + +From "The Fire Worshippers" I have quoted already the best passages, +those which express most fully the germinal idea. One may add an +energetic denunciation, which had its full application, for instance, to +Leonard McNally, Emmet's advocate, who defended most of the Irish +political prisoners during a long period of time, and regularly sold the +secrets of his defence to the Government. + + "Oh, for a tongue to curse the slave, + Whose treason, like a deadly blight, + Comes o'er the councils of the brave, + And blasts them in their hour of might! + May life's unblessed cup for him + Be drugg'd with treacheries to the brim,-- + With hopes, that but allure to fly, + With joys, that vanish while he sips, + Like Dead-Sea fruits, that tempt the eye, + But turn to ashes on the lips! + His country's curse, his children's shame, + Outcast of virtue, peace, and fame, + May he, at last, with lips of flame, + On the parch'd desert thirsting die,-- + While lakes, that shone in mockery nigh, + Are fading off, untouch'd, untasted, + Like the once glorious hopes he blasted! + And, when from earth his spirit flies, + Just Prophet, let the damn'd-one dwell + Full in the sight of Paradise, + Beholding heaven, and feeling hell!" + +Last of all, and most lavishly decorated, is the story of the Feast of +Roses at Cashmere. The opening passage is a good example of Moore's +high-wrought effort after Eastern local colour:-- + + "Who has not heard of the Vale of Cashmere, + With its roses the brightest that earth ever gave, + Its temples, and grottos, and fountains as clear + As the love-lighted eyes that hang over their wave? + + "Oh I to see it at sunset,--when warm o'er the Lake + Its splendour at parting a summer eve throws, + Like a bride, full of blushes, when ling'ring to take + A last look of her mirror at night ere she goes!-- + When the shrines through the foliage are gleaming half-shown, + And each hallows the hour by some rites of its own. + Here the music of prayer from a minaret swells, + Here the Magian his urn full of perfume is swinging, + And here, at the altar, a zone of sweet bells + Round the waist of some fair Indian dancer is ringing. + Or to see it by moonlight,--when mellowly shines + The light o'er its palaces, gardens, and shrines; + When the waterfalls gleam like a quick fall of stars, + And the nightingale's hymn from the Isle of Chenars + Is broken by laughs and light echoes of feet + From the cool, shining walks where the young people meet.-- + Or at morn, when the magic of daylight awakes + A new wonder each minute, as slowly it breaks, + Hills, cupolas, fountains, call'd forth every one + Out of darkness, as they were just horn of the sun, + When the Spirit of Fragrance is up with the day, + From his harem of night-flowers stealing away; + And the wind, full of wantonness, wooes like a lover + The young aspen-trees till they tremble all over. + When the East is as warm as the light of first hopes, + And Day, with his banner of radiance unfurl'd, + Shines in through the mountainous portal that opes, + Sublime, from that Valley of bliss to the world!" + +But one finds a more real example of Moore's poetry in this quatrain:-- + + "There's a beauty, for ever unchangingly bright, + Like the long, sunny lapse of a summer day's light, + Shining on, shining on, by no shadow made tender, + Till Love falls asleep in its sameness of splendour." + +If one compares passages like these with, for instance, Cowper's +anapaests, even in so beautiful a poem as "The poplars are felled, +farewell to the shade," it will be seen that Moore helped on the +extraordinary advance in poetical technique which marks the years from +1795 to the rise of Tennyson. Moore's sense of style is always +faulty--witness the very next couplet:-- + + "This was not the beauty--_oh, nothing like this!_ + That to young Nourmahal gave such magic of bliss." + +But he had a fine ear for metre, and in this poem he displayed all his +resources, changing the rhythm half-a-dozen times, with interpolating +bursts of song. + +When, in addition, we remember that the most indolent reader could never +for an instant mistake his meaning--that the volume of thought was +always light as compared with the faculty of expression--that every +harshness was carefully smoothed away, and condensation always +sacrificed to limpidity--it is not hard to understand the poem's +popularity. Yet, when all has been said, the last word is that _Lalla +Rookh_ is a work of very secondary merit, and retains its place in +literature mainly as an example of an extinct taste. Twenty years after +it was written, Moore knew this, and told Longman that, "in a race to +future times (if any thing of mine could pretend to such a run), those +little ponies, the _Melodies_, will beat the mare _Lalla_ hollow." And +indeed, if it were not for the _Melodies_, nobody would now give an eye +to their stable companion. + + +[1] Parkinson. + +[2] Alluding to Rogers's poem "Italy." + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +PERIOD OF RESIDENCE ABROAD + + +Moore's residence on the Continent lasted three and a half years, and it +formed an interlude in his life, interrupting what was otherwise a very +continuous texture. The period was one of relative idleness, yet by no +means of rest; and although whatever he produced during it was in verse, +its close found the transition accomplished, from poet to man of +letters. + +The interlude opened with a real holiday, which was in truth amply +deserved. After a fortnight's stay in Paris, spent in seeing theatres, +sights, and a deal of company, Lord John Russell and his travelling +companion posted off through France to Geneva; explored the associations +of Ferney under the guidance of Dumont, the translator of Bentham, and +sometime tutor to Lord Lansdowne; and then set out for the Alps. The +passage over the Simplon, and the sight of the Jungfrau with the +sunset-flush on its snows, so wrought upon Moore's emotions that he shed +tears. At Milan the travellers parted company, Lord John proceeding to +Genoa, while Moore's destinations were Venice and Rome. Travelling +alone, in the "crazy little caleche" which he had been advised to buy, +was no joy, and he gladly reached La Mira, Byron's country house, two +hours' drive from Padua. The friends met for the first time after a +separation of five years, and Moore's note of the occurrence is +curiously lacking in warmth. The Byron whom he had known and liked so +well was a different person from the Byron of Italy. Much had happened +in the interval, and with a great deal of Byron's later, and maturer, +work, Moore was very imperfectly in sympathy. Nor did the Countess +Guiccioli much impress him. Byron, who had put his Venetian palace at +Moore's disposal, commended him to his friend Scott, who showed the +traveller round the place. A day or two later Byron came to Venice, and +there was much intimate talk between the two men. On the 11th of +October, Moore paid a farewell visit to La Mira and the Countess; and +before the poets parted, a notable thing happened. Lord Byron handed to +Moore the Memoirs of himself, of which Moore had heard for the first +time a few days earlier. + +From Padua to Ferrara and so to Florence we trace in the Diary rather a +homesick gentleman, who begins to affect the virtuoso a little, and at +the time to collect notes for an epistle on the cant of connoisseurs. In +Florence he found some acquaintances, and they were in shoals before him +at Rome, where he arrived in the end of October. During the three weeks +of his stay here, Chantrey the sculptor and Jackson the painter--to the +latter of whom Moore at this time sat--were his principal associates, +and he left Rome in their company. His impressions of Italy savour a +little too much of second-hand ideas to be of interest. Moore had, +evidently enough, no education in art and yet was so susceptible to +surrounding influences that his talk was all of pictures, statuary, +buildings and so forth. His judgments on the music which he heard are in +strong contrast, brief and confident--the utterance of a genuine taste. +But the friendship formed with Chantrey seems to have been sympathetic +and lasting, based on a common interest in human character. + +On December 11th Moore arrived in Paris, and 'went as soon as I could +with a beating heart to enquire for letters from home.' There were none +of recent date, for the beloved Tom was ill, and Bessy would not write +till the crisis was over; moreover, the Longmans wrote that nothing had +as yet been settled in the Bermuda business, so that a return to England +was impossible. "This is a sad disappointment," Moore writes,--"my dear +cottage and my books. I must, however, lose no time in determining upon +bringing Bessy and her little ones over; and wherever they are, will be +home, and a happy one, to me." + +Meanwhile, he took "an entresol in the Rue Chantereine at 250 fr. a +month," and saw a deal of society, English and French, with potentates +in plenty. But it did not console him. "I have no one here that I care +one pin for, and begin to feel, for the first time, like a banished +man," he wrote to Rogers; and a Christmas day apart from his family only +deepened his gloom. But on January 1st, 1820, Bessy and her young ones +landed safely in Paris, and things began to brighten singularly. "My +dear tidy girl," Moore writes, "notwithstanding her fatigue, set about +settling and managing everything immediately." Chief of the things +settled was a resolution not to go into society, "which was tolerably +adhered to for some time";--Moore meanwhile working at his "Fudge +Family in Italy," a first draft of the poetical impressions which he +published ultimately as _Rhymes on the Road_. After about a month, a +successful move was made to "a very pretty cottage in the Allee des +Veuves," somewhere in the Champs Elysees--"as rural and secluded a +workshop as I have ever had," says Moore. + +Gradually, however, virtue evaporated. The poet was beset with +invitations, and, moreover, he owns to a sense of depression before the +task of writing, "when the attention of all the reading world is +absorbed by two writers, Scott and Byron." He had also a consciousness +that his poetical essays in and upon connoisseurship were not the right +thing; and finally, in June, after the whole had been set up by a French +printer, it was decided to suppress the publication; Sir James +Mackintosh having advised the Longmans, that the incidental satire on +Castlereagh and other leading members of the Government would be +injurious to Moore's interest, at a time when it might be possible to +induce Government to drop its share of the claims against him; and Moore +himself being influenced by the wish to publish nothing new till he had +something of importance to produce. + +In July the kindness of friends, M. Villamil, a Spanish gentleman, and +his wife, enabled the Moores to move for the summer into pleasant +quarters--a little _pavillion_ in the grounds of the Villamils' house +near Sevres. Here the poet, still in pursuit of an important subject, +returned to an idea which first germinated in his mind after the +completion of _Lalla_--the story of a Greek who goes to Egypt in search +of some philosophic secret, and during a celebration of the Egyptian +priestly mysteries becomes enamoured of a young girl. She proves to be +a Christian, and the hero is thus introduced to the secret communion. It +is of course the basis of Moore's prose romance, _The Epicurean_, but +his collected works contain a considerable fragment of _Alciphron_, his +first sketch of it in verse, which dates from this time. Studies for the +work brought him into touch with French savants, and the more Moore read +upon the subject, the less he appears to have written. But the research +drew him to Paris and away from his quarters in the "pavilion"; and +when, in October, the household returned to its home in the Allee des +Veuves, and Moore and his wife dined at home with the little ones for +the first time since the beginning of July, "Bessy said in going to bed, +'This is the first rational day we have had for a long time.'" + +Lord John Russell notes penitently on this passage, that he regrets his +part in persuading Moore to prefer France to Holyrood, for "his +universal popularity was his chief enemy." At no time did Moore suffer +so much from being lionised, for his home was in easy reach of Paris, +and in Paris French and English alike pursued this celebrity. _Lalla +Rookh_ was then at the height of its fame; was in the East being +translated into Persian, and in the West transformed into a kind of +masque which a troupe of royal amateurs presented at Berlin: and Lalla's +poet was naturally much courted. Further, in the close of the year, +there came a missive from Byron which was a fatal encouragement to +idleness and outlay. He forwarded the continuation of the Memoirs, with +the suggestion that Moore should sell the reversion of the MS. The +suggestion was acted on after a while, and Murray consented to advance +the large sum of 2000 guineas. Meanwhile engagements accumulated, and +Moore began to lose health as well as time. He went into the world more +and more as a bachelor, Bessy, as always, falling into the background +when expenses grew high; though, at first, in Paris he and she went +about a good deal together. Nevertheless, he wrote with all sincerity on +March 25th, 1821:-- + + "This day ten years we were married, and though Time has made his + usual changes in us both, we are still more like lovers than any + married couple of the same standing I am acquainted with." + +In the autumn, it was decided that Moore should come to England _sub +rosa_, and try to compromise the Bermuda claims with a lump sum out of +Murray's advance. He was met with dissuasion by his friendly publishers +the Longmans, and it transpired finally that Lord Lansdowne had left +L1000 with them to attempt a similar settlement. The kindness gratified +Moore's best qualities, as well as his mild vanity, and though he +declined to profit by it, he was greatly uplifted. From London he +crossed to Dublin to see his parents after three years' separation--but +the separation had made no breach, for Moore wrote twice every week to +his mother. The visit was a short one, and he had some fears for his +safety from arrest, as he had been widely recognised in Dublin. But on +his return to town the publishers met him with joyful news. The chief +claim had been settled for L1000, and he was free to "walk boldly out +into the sunshine," and show himself up Bond Street and St. James's. Of +this L1000, three hundred were extorted from Mr. Sheddon, uncle and +recommender of the defaulting deputy; the rest was settled (as a +compliment) out of Lord Lansdowne's money, but a draft on Murray was +immediately sent him to repay the loan. + +For the present, however, Moore lacked the means to move back to +England, and he remained in Paris, where, in the summer of 1822, he at +last settled down to a serious piece of work--his _Loves of the +Angels_--"a subject," he says, "on which I long ago wrote a prose story +and have ever since meditated a verse one." The work went quickly, a +thousand lines were completed within two months; and in November, when +the poet's friends in Paris mustered to give him a farewell dinner, +allusion was made to the new poem as all but ready to appear. It was +actually out before Christmas. By that time Moore was back and +comfortably established at Sloperton (an intervening tenant having died +seasonably), and here he found his study enlarged, his family well, and +himself "most happy to be at home again." "Oh, quid solutis!"--he +exclaims, recalling the lines of Horace which tell of the joy it is to +shake off a load of care, and to rest after labours in a foreign land. + +When the _Angels_ appeared, the press was favourable, but Lady Donegal +and a good many more protested vehemently against the application to +profane purposes of the scriptural legend, which tells of the sons of +God mating with daughters of men. Publishers are sensitive to this type +of criticism, and the Longmans jumped at Moore's offer to remodel the +poem, by giving it an Eastern cast, and "turning his poor Angels into +Turks." Accordingly a fifth edition was produced, in which the +metamorphosis was completed; but the disguise was soon abandoned, and +Moore appears to have been ashamed of his concession, for in his preface +to the poem in the 1841 edition, no mention is made of this recension. + +_The Loves of the Angels_ never attained to the popularity of _Lalla +Rookh_, and yet it seems a much more praiseworthy composition. In the +first place, Moore had chosen a subject that fell more within his range. +Outside of light verse, his only themes were love and patriotism, and +here we have the amatory poet indulging his genius to the full. The +whole poem is about love-making--love-making _in excelsis_, and +surrounded with accessories so decorative that they remove all hint of +reality. One feels instinctively that the fierce accent of passion would +be out of place here, and, consequently, does not censure the absence of +it. His three fallen angels who meet and recall the loves for which they +lost heaven, furnish three types of love-story, distinguished with all +the care of a troubadour expert in _la gaye science_. + +The first angel--one of a lower rank in heaven--is of look "the least +celestial of the three," and, before the crisis in his story, has tasted + + "That juice of earth, the bane + And blessing of man's heart and brain." + +He is the one whom woman resisted--for Woman is throughout the poem all +but deified; and his lady, to escape from the terrors of his love, as he +comes to her after the wine-cup, steals the spell-word from him, and +flies off to heaven, whither his wings can no longer follow. The second +angel, a spirit of knowledge, is wooed by woman rather than her wooer, +and at last is fated to destroy her with the death of Semele. Moore +evidently thought that much knowledge was a dangerous thing for the sex. +His ideal of womanhood is rather that depicted in the third story, of +which the third angel is the subject, not the narrator. In this angel-- + + "That amorous spirit, bound + By beauty's spell, where'er 'twas found," + +who fell-- + + "From loving much, + Too easy lapse, to loving wrong," + +we may, I think, fairly trace some lineaments of Moore's conception of +himself. For this seraph a gentler doom was decreed. He and his nymph +are first drawn together by the snare of music, a snare even though in +sacred song: for, as the poem tells-- + + "Love, though unto earth so prone, + Delights to take Religion's wing + When time or grief hath stained his own. + How near to Love's beguiling brink + Too oft entranced Religion lies! + While Music, Music is the link + They _both_ still hold by to the skies." + +The lovers meet at the altar, but they appeal to the altar to consecrate +their vows. And thus the poem closes with a passage in celebration of +connubial love, which, even though it perhaps seemed to Lady Donegal too +bold a gloss on the text of Genesis, may very well have pleased the +poet's Bessy; for we can be very certain that the poet was thinking more +of Bessy than of Genesis when he wrote it. I shall quote the whole +passage, which contains some lines that have hardly their equal in +Moore's writings--notably the fine strain beginning, "For humble was +their love,"--and, further on, the closing period which recalls, yet not +by imitation, Wordsworth's scarcely more beautiful tribute to his +wife:-- + + "Sweet was the hour, though dearly won, + And pure, as aught of earth could he, + For then first did the glorious sun + Before Religion's altar see + Two hearts in wedlock's golden tie + Self-pledged, in love to live and die. + Blest union! by that Angel wove, + And worthy from such hands to come; + Safe, sole asylum, in which Love, + When fall'n or exiled from above, + In this dark world can find a home. + + "And though the spirit had transgress'd, + Had, from his station 'mong the blest + Won down by woman's smile, allow'd + Terrestrial passion to breathe o'er + The mirror of his heart, and cloud + God's image, there so bright before-- + Yet never did that Power look down + On error with a brow so mild; + Never did Justice wear a frown + Through which so gently Mercy smiled. + + "For humble was their love--with awe + And trembling like some treasure kept, + That was not theirs by holy law-- + Whose beauty with remorse they saw, + And o'er whose preciousness they wept. + Humility, that low, sweet root, + From which all heavenly virtues shoot, + Was in the hearts of both--but most + In Nama's heart, by whom alone + Those charms, for which a heaven was lost, + Seem'd all unvalued and unknown; + And when her Seraph's eyes she caught, + And hid hers glowing on his breast, + Even bliss was humbled by the thought-- + 'What claim have I to be so blest?' + Still less could maid, so meek, have nursed + Desire of knowledge--that vain thirst, + With which the sex hath all been cursed, + From luckless Eve to her, who near + The Tabernacle stole to hear + The secrets of the angels: no-- + To love as her own Seraph loved, + With Faith, the same through bliss and woe + Faith, that, were even its light removed, + Could, like the dial, fix'd remain, + And wait till it shone out again;-- + With Patience that, though often bow'd + By the rude storm, can rise anew; + And Hope that, ev'n from Evil's cloud, + Sees sunny Good half breaking through! + This deep, relying Love, worth more + In heaven than all a Cherub's lore-- + This Faith, more sure than aught beside, + Was the sole joy, ambition, pride + Of her fond heart--th' unreasoning scope + Of all its views, above, below-- + So true she felt it that to _hope_, + To _trust_, is happier than to _know_. + + "And thus in humbleness they trod, + Abash'd, but pure before their God; + Nor e'er did earth behold a sight + So meekly beautiful as they, + When, with the altar's holy light + Full on their brows, they knelt to pray, + Hand within hand, and side by side. + Two links of love, awhile untied + From the great chain above, but fast + Holding together to the last! + Two fallen Splendours, from that tree, + Which buds with such eternally, + Shaken to earth, yet keeping all + Their light and freshness in the fall. + + "Their only punishment, (as wrong, + However sweet, must bear its brand,) + Their only doom was this--that, long + As the green earth and ocean stand, + They both shall wander here--the same, + Throughout all time, in heart and frame-- + Still looking to that goal sublime, + Whose light remote, but sure, they see; + Pilgrims of Love, whose way is Time, + Whose home is in Eternity! + Subject, the while, to all the strife + True Love encounters in this life-- + The wishes, hopes, he breathes in vain; + The chill, that turns his warmest sighs + To earthly vapour, ere they rise; + The doubt he feeds on, and the pain + That in his very sweetness lies:-- + Still worse, th' illusions that betray + His footsteps to their shining brink; + That tempt him, on his desert way + Through the bleak world, to bend and drink, + Where nothing meets his lips, alas!-- + But he again must sighing pass + On to that far-off home of peace, + In which alone his thirst will cease. + + "All this they bear, but, not the less, + Have moments rich in happiness-- + Blest meetings, after many a day + Of widowhood passed far away, + When the loved face again is seen + Close, close, with not a tear between-- + Confidings frank, without control, + Pour'd mutually from soul to soul; + As free from any fear or doubt + As is that light from chill or stain, + The sun into the stars sheds out, + To be by them shed back again!-- + That happy minglement of hearts, + Where, chang'd as chymic compounds are, + Each with its own existence parts, + To find a new one happier far! + Such are their joys--and, crowning all, + That blessed hope of the bright hour, + When, happy and no more to fall, + Their spirits shall, with freshen'd power, + Rise up rewarded for their trust + In Him, from whom all goodness springs, + And shaking off earth's soiling dust + From their emancipated wings, + Wander for ever through those skies + Of radiance, where Love never dies!" + +There is nothing else in the poem at all so good as this. And even this +would gain considerably by condensation, even by simple excisions. But +the writing is consistently polished, easy, and--short of +inspiration--even excellent. The opening may be quoted for a fine +example:-- + + "'Twas when the world was in its prime, + When the fresh stars had just begun + Their race of glory, and young Time + Told his first birthdays by the sun; + When, in the light of Nature's dawn + Rejoicing, men and angels met + On the high hill and sunny lawn, + Ere sorrow came, or Sin had drawn + 'Twixt man and heav'n her curtain yet! + When earth lay nearer to the skies + Than in those days of crime and woe, + And mortals saw without surprise, + In the mid air, angelic eyes + Gazing upon this world below." + +Moore had abandoned the heroic couplet, and also the anapaestic measure, +in favour of the eight-syllabled iambic, used with skilful variations of +rhyme. And it is a proof of his matured judgment, that there is none of +the tendency to melodrama which disfigures _Lalla Rookh_. He had +realised that horror was not for him to convert to beauty; he tears no +passion to tatters. Indeed, in the one instance where he plunges into a +melodramatic subject, describing the fate of Lilis shrivelled to ashes +by the embrace of her lover, and her unblest kiss, printed with "Hell's +everlasting element," the vehemence is more impressive because more +restrained. + +At the same time, it does not seem probable that any current of taste +will bring back either the _Loves of the Angels_ or _Lalla_ into +popularity. Everywhere, even in the beautiful passage on wedlock's +consolations, ornament is pushed to redundancy; there is no +concentration in the style. The same looseness of texture may be +observed in Scott and Byron, but Scott and Byron have behind their work +a weight of personality which is lacking in Moore. They are moreover +closer in touch with reality than Moore, who attributes to himself in +the Diary "that kind of imagination which is chilled by the real scene +and can best describe what it has not seen, merely taking it from the +descriptions of others." He quotes Milton and Dante as instances where +this kind of imagination produces the noblest work. One can only +say--and Moore would have been prompt to agree--that Thomas Moore was +neither Dante nor Milton; and for poets of a lower order we want close +touch with fact. Moore's gift, indeed, was not imagination. His highest +talent lay, like that of Horace, in giving expression to common +emotions, which belong rather to a race, or a class, than to an +individual, and which are consequently very general, though not very +poignant, in their appeal. + +A much higher rank may be claimed for him as a writer of satiric verse +than of romantic narrative. The satiric inspiration with him long +outlasted the other, for the _Loves of the Angels_ was virtually the +last poem published under his own name.[1] But under his other +incarnation, as Thomas Brown the Younger, he contributed squibs to +various newspapers and issued volumes for another dozen of years. The +_Odes on Cash, Catholics, and other matters_, collected in 1828, show +him to advantage, and we find something of the "wonted fires" even in +_The Fudges in England_, published so late as 1835, after his brain had +begun to flag. But for the top of his achievement in this kind one would +always turn to the volume published a few months after The _Loves of the +Angels_. This was the _Fables for the Holy Alliance and Rhymes on the +Road_, comprising the work which he had cast and recast so often in +Paris, together with a considerable handful of occasional verses. + +From this general laudation, the _Rhymes on the Road_, Moore's +impressions of Switzerland and Italy, must be excepted. Nothing in them +repays perusal but the "Introductory Rhymes," with their ingenious and +erudite discussion of the places and methods in which poets may +compose--where Moore incidentally alludes to a favourite theory and +practice of his own, which he supported by the example of Milton, as +well as that here cited:-- + + "Herodotus wrote most in bed, + And Richerand, a French physician, + Declares the clockwork of the head + Goes best in that reclined position." + +There is also a good skit on the ubiquitous English tourist, which ends +with the vision of + + "Some Mrs. Hopkins, taking tea + And toast upon the wall of China." + +But for the rest, we have serious lucubrations--a long, long way after +_Childe Harold_--upon Venice, Florence, the first view of Mont Blanc, +Rousseau's abode, and other such moving themes. It is a vast relief to +turn to the _Fables_, of which there are eight; and if one reader thinks +the first the best, with its description of all the royalties at dinner +in an Ice Palace on the Neva, and the general confusion when the Ice +Palace takes to melting, it is odds but the next will choose another for +his favourite. Most of them have a Proem, and one may quote the Proem +and part of the Fable of "The Little Grand Lama." + + PROEM. + + Novella, a young Bolognese, + The daughter of a learn'd Law Doctor, + Who had with all the subtleties + Of old and modern jurists stock'd her, + Was so exceeding fair, 'tis said, + And over hearts held such dominion, + That when her father, sick in bed, + Or busy, sent her, in his stead, + To lecture on the Code Justinian, + She had a curtain drawn before her, + Lest, if her eyes were seen, the students + Should let their young eyes wander o'er her, + And quite forget their jurisprudence. + Just so it is with Truth, when _seen_, + Too dazzling far,--'tis from behind + A light, thin allegoric screen, + She thus can safest teach mankind. + + FABLE. + + In Thibet once there reign'd, we're told, + A little Lama, one year old-- + Raised to the throne, that realm to bless, + Just when his little Holiness + Had cut--as near as can be reckon'd-- + Some say his _first_ tooth, some his _second_. + Chronologers and Nurses vary, + Which proves historians should be wary. + We only know th' important truth, + His Majesty _had_ cut a tooth. + And much his subjects were enchanted,-- + As well all Lama's subjects may be, + And would have giv'n their heads, if wanted, + To make tee-totums for the baby. + Throned as he was by Right Divine-- + (What Lawyers call _Jure Divino_, + Meaning a right to yours, and mine, + And everybody's goods and rhino,) + Of course, his faithful subjects' purses, + Were ready with their aids and succours; + Nothing was seen but pension'd Nurses, + And the land groan'd with bibs and tuckers. + + Oh! had there been a Hume or Bennet, + Then sitting in the Thibet Senate, + Ye Gods, what room for long debates + Upon the Nursery Estimates! + What cutting down of swaddling-clothes + And pin-a-fores, in nightly battles! + What calls for papers to expose + The waste of sugar-plums and rattles! + + But no--If Thibet _had_ M.P.'s, + They were far better bred than these; + Nor gave the slightest opposition, + During the Monarch's whole dentition. + But short this calm:--for, just when he + Had reach'd th' alarming age of three, + When Royal natures, and, no doubt, + Those of _all_ noble beasts break out-- + The Lama, who till then was quiet, + Show'd symptoms of a taste for riot; + And, ripe for mischief, early, late, + Without regard for Church or State, + Made free with whosoe'er came nigh; + Tweak'd the Lord Chancellor by the nose, + Turn'd all the Judges' wigs awry, + And trod on the old Generals' toes: + Pelted the Bishops with hot buns, + Rode cockhorse on the City maces, + And shot from little devilish guns, + Hard peas into his subjects' faces. + In short, such wicked pranks he play'd, + And grew so mischievous, God bless him! + That his Chief Nurse--with ev'n the aid + Of an Archbishop--was afraid, + When in these moods, to comb or dress him. + Nay, ev'n the persons most inclined + Through thick and thin, for Kings to stickle, + Thought him (if they'd but speak their mind, + Which they did _not_) an odious pickle. + +Praed himself never equalled the ease and gaiety of these admirable +compositions, and their only defect as satire is that they are too gay +and too good-humoured, though certainly not too respectful. Moore's +shafts have no poison: there is no strength of hatred to drive home the +barb. Yet the sincerity is real, and here and there the wit leaps into +real poetry, as in this stanza from "The Torch of Liberty"-- + + "I saw th' expectant nations stand, + To catch the coming flame in turn;-- + I saw, from ready hand to hand, + The clear, though struggling, glory burn." + +For finish and force these productions are far ahead of the earlier +verses of the _Postbag_ and _Fudge Family in Paris_: they are also clear +of the rhetoric which occasionally overloads the latter. But none of +them quite reaches the pitch attained in the lines on the Death of +Sheridan (reprinted in the 1823 volume) which were based on the report +that the Prince of Wales, after repeated neglect of entreaties, sent at +last a gift of L200 to the dying man, who, knowing it too late, returned +the missive. A few stanzas must be cited. + + "How proud they can press to the fun'ral array + Of one whom they shunn'd in his sickness and sorrow;-- + How bailiffs may seize his last blanket, to-day, + Whose pall shall be held up by nobles to-morrow! + + "And Thou, too, whose life, a sick epicure's dream, + Incoherent and gross, even grosser had pass'd, + Were it not for that cordial and soul-giving beam, + Which his friendship and wit o'er thy nothingness cast:-- + + "No, not for the wealth of the land, that supplies thee + With millions to heap upon Foppery's shrine;-- + No, not for the riches of all who despise thee, + Though this would make Europe's whole opulence mine;-- + + "Would I suffer what--ev'n in the heart that thou hast-- + All mean as it is--must have consciously burn'd, + When the pittance, which shame had wrung from thee at last, + And which found all his wants at an end, was return'd." + +There is a real anger inspiring the phrase, worthy of Dryden at his +best, which stigmatises the Prince's life--"a sick epicure's dream, +incoherent and gross." But Moore was too easily moved by kindness, and a +civil word or action from Eldon or from Canning exempted them for ever +from his attacks. Except Castlereagh, in whom he saw with justice the +inveterate enemy of Ireland--and that enemy a renegade from Grattan's +principles--he pursued no man relentlessly, and no institution moved him +to continued hatred except the Church of Ireland. "Could you not +contrive," said Sydney Smith to a portrait painter at work on a head of +Moore, "to throw into the features a little more hostility to the +Establishment?" Enough hostility certainly was thrown into the verses +which he continued for years to contribute to the papers; and he pleased +himself vastly with one address to a shovel hat:-- + + "Gods! when I gaze upon that brim, + So redolent of Church all over, + What swarms of Tithes, in vision dim,-- + Some pig-tail'd, some like cherubim, + With ducklings' wings--around it hover! + Tenths of all dead and living things, + That Nature into being brings, + From calves and corn to chitterlings." + +It is not a long way from verse of this kind on this subject to the +prose of "Captain Rock." The distance, no doubt, covers a descent. But +it may fairly be urged that if Moore after the year 1823 was only in a +secondary sense a writer of verse, and primarily occupied with prose, +the reason is, not that prose was easier or paid better, but because he +was increasingly preoccupied with matter which he could not handle +except in prose--matter of serious controversial argument--and matter +which he was impelled to handle by a growing desire to serve his own +country. + + +[1] _Alciphron_, issued in 1839, was, as has been said, a rehandling of +a fragment composed during his residence in Paris, and has in any case +no importance. + + + + +CHAPTER V + +WORK AS BIOGRAPHER AND CONTROVERSIALIST + + +After his return from Paris to England, once the task was accomplished +of seeing his two books of verse, serious and comic, through the press, +Moore turned naturally to resume the _Life of Sheridan_ which he had +been obliged to drop during his stay on the Continent, remote from all +the living sources of information. But the business of collecting +material was a long one; the claims of the Sheridan family for a share +in profits were not yet settled; and in the summer of 1823 Moore +accepted an invitation which led to a new literary undertaking, carried +through before the _Sheridan_. This was a proposal from the Lansdownes +that he should accompany them on a tour through Ireland. + +The party met in Dublin, and a characteristic little episode is recorded +in the Diary. Moore's mother wanted to see her son's distinguished +friend, but was shy of a visit from him; so it was arranged that Lord +Lansdowne should be walked past the windows where the old couple sat at +watch, while he and the poet waved their salutations. + +On the way south Moore revived memories of his courtship by a visit to +Kilkenny. "Happy times!" he notes, "but not more happy than those which +I owe to the same dear girl still." Further south, alarming rumours +began to come in, telling of secret organisation among the peasantry, +and of the ascendency of "Captain Rock," a mysterious individual in +whose name orders and threatening letters were then issued. Killarney +charmed Moore with its loveliness, but we find sympathetic observations +also concerning Lord Lansdowne's trouble with his Kerry tenants, +occasioned by their habits of sub-letting, rearing large families, and +so forth. Altogether, the Journal is written by one who sees keenly the +oppression of tithes, but on all other matters wears a landlord's +spectacles; and this criticism was made sharply, and with justice, in an +answer to the book which resulted from this journey. + +Moore came back with his head full of material, and set to work reading +for a projected narrative of his tour; but after a couple of weeks, the +brilliant idea occurred to him of converting it into a _History of +Captain Rock and his Ancestors_. The project expanded a good deal as he +wrote, and six months' work resulted in a considerable volume, of which +the first part was a review of Irish history, which showed with +ingenious irony how well English policy, from the first enactments of +Henry II. against Irish dress, has been adapted to perpetuate the type +and breed of Captain Rock. It was the first book which Moore had written +in prose, and nowhere else in his prose writings was he so lavish of +wit. I may cite a couple of examples. + + "My unlucky countrymen," says Captain Rock (for the Captain was the + nominal author of his own Memoirs) "have always had a taste for + justice--a taste as inconvenient to them, situated as they have + always been, as a taste for horse-racing would be to a Venetian." + + "Our Irish rulers have always proceeded in proselytism on the + principle of a wedge with its wrong side foremost.... The courteous + address of Launcelot to the young Jewess, 'Be of good cheer, for + truly I think thou art damned,' seems to have been the model on + which the Protestant Church has founded all its conciliatory + advances to Catholics." + +The broad facts of English misrule in Ireland were not then staled by +much repetition, and Moore's statement of them was read with eagerness. +In execution the book was faulty, the irony being ill sustained towards +the latter part, where it touched contemporary topics. But the success +was brilliant, and from Almack's to Holland House Moore heard nothing +but its praises. Naturally enough, it made its way in Ireland; "the +people through the country are subscribing their sixpences and shillings +to buy a copy," a Dublin bookseller wrote; and the Catholics of Drogheda +forwarded a formal expression of gratitude, which pleased Moore the +better as he "rather feared the Catholics would not take very cordially +to the work, owing to some infidelities to their religion which break +out now and then in it." And, in truth, the tone is throughout that of +one who rather deplores the employment of tyranny to frighten Irish +Catholics out of their religion than dislikes the idea of a change of +faith. Politically speaking, however, the tone of the book was firm +enough. Moore, like most Irishmen, had little knowledge of Irish +history, and only began to read it when he had to instruct others in its +lessons. Whether because of its effect on his mind, or because _Captain +Rock_ gave him a reputation in Ireland, which he dearly valued, as the +champion of Irish liberties, it is certain that from this time onward +the direction of his mind was increasingly towards Irish subjects. + +He had felt the attraction earlier. A letter to Corry, written when +_Lalla Rookh_ was nearly completed, says: "I have some thoughts of +undertaking a very voluminous work about Ireland (if properly encouraged +by _patres nostri_--the Longmans), and this will require my residence +for at least two or three years in or near Dublin." Nothing came of the +project, which was perhaps not strongly formed; and in any case he was +drawn away from it by the enforced move to France. And although one can +trace, from the publication of _Captain Rock_ onward, a steady bent of +purpose in him to use his pen in the service of his country, he was a +second time driven out of his course by an unforeseen event. In the +midst of the Captain's triumphs, while editions were rapidly succeeding +each other, a great stroke of misfortune fell on Moore. Byron died; and +the depositary of his Memoirs was immediately plunged into a most +embarrassing situation. + +The case about this famous document may be briefly stated. In October +1819, Byron handed Moore the first portion of it, as a gift which would +ultimately be of value; and in 1821 he sent the remainder to his friend +in Paris, making the suggestion that money might be raised on it by +anticipation. This was accordingly done, and, in September 1821, Murray +agreed to pay two thousand guineas, and took the manuscript into his +keeping. Part of this money was applied in settlement of the Bermuda +claims, and in November of that year Moore signed a deed making over the +property. This deed was submitted to Byron, and Byron signed an +assignment of the manuscript to Murray. Scarcely was the transaction +completed, when scruples were aroused in Moore by Lord Holland's saying +that he wished the money could have been got in any other way. Lord +Holland's objection, as Moore states it (though expressly in his own +words) was, that it seemed like depositing in cold blood a quiver of +poisoned arrows for use in future warfare upon private character. Moore +protested against this view of the document, and Lord Holland, who had +read the manuscript, could recall nothing admitting of such a +description, except a passage relating to Mme de Stael, and a charge +against Sir Samuel Romilly--both of which, Moore pointed out, could be +omitted or neutralised in editing for publication, as he had reserved +the right to do. Nevertheless, the scruple wrought in him, and in the +following April (1822) he approached Murray with a request that the deed +of sale should be cancelled, and replaced by an agreement converting the +transaction into a loan, with the manuscript held as security till Moore +should be able to repay. An agreement on these lines was accordingly +drawn up, and Moore's conscience was relieved. He expresses strongly in +his Diary his feeling of satisfaction that the control of the matter was +again in his own hands. + +In the succeeding year he appears to have arranged that the Longmans +should take over the debt (and presumably the security), advancing him +the means to repay Murray; and on May 13th one of the firm mentioned +that the money was ready. On the 14th it was too late; news of Byron's +death reached London; and that evening Moore received a note from +Douglas Kinnaird "anxiously inquiring in whose possession the Memoirs +were, and saying that he was ready on the part of Lord Byron's family +to advance the L2000 for the manuscript, in order to give Lady Byron and +the rest of the family an opportunity of deciding whether they wished +them to be published or no." + +Moore soon learned that Murray, immediately on hearing the news, had +gone to Wilmot Horton, offering to place the Memoirs at the disposal of +the family, without recognising that Moore had any voice in the matter. +Moore went to Hobhouse and explained his view of the situation, which +was that nothing could be done without his consent; and he substantiated +his view by recalling a clause which he had inserted in the +draft-agreement. This gave him a period of three months, in case of +Byron's death, in which to raise the money. The agreement had never been +formally completed, and the draft could not be found. But Murray +admitted in principle Moore's claim, and expressed himself ready to +comply with the arrangement, provided his money were repaid in full, +with interest. The manuscript could then be disposed of, as Moore +suggested, by placing it in the hands of "Lord Byron's dearest friend, +his sister, Augusta Leigh." + +From the proposal that the work should be placed at the disposal of Lady +Byron, Moore dissented altogether; it would be treachery, he said (and +Hobhouse agreed), to Byron's intentions and wishes. He also strongly +opposed the view, put forward by Hobhouse and Kinnaird, that Mrs. Leigh +ought "to burn the manuscript altogether without any previous perusal or +deliberation." This, he said, was to treat it as if it were a pest-bag, +whereas, "although the second part was full of very coarse things, the +first contained (with the exception of about three or four lines) +nothing which on the score of decency might not be safely published." + +Matters were at this point on May 15th, and on the 16th a meeting took +place at Murray's between Moore, Hobhouse, and Mr. Wilmot Horton and +Colonel Doyle, the last two representing Mrs. Leigh. The agreement +between Moore and Murray had not yet been found, and discussion was +conducted on the assumption that Moore had a controlling voice in the +matter. Thus, although, as it was subsequently decided, Byron's formal +sanction of the assignment of the property to Murray would have rendered +the later agreement inoperative, Moore has full right to praise or blame +for the consent which he gave to the step taken at this memorable +meeting; when, as the world knows, after a very quarrelsome scene, the +manuscript was formally destroyed by Mrs. Leigh's representatives. + +It does not appear that any one of the parties concerned in the act felt +in the least that they were depriving Byron of a posthumous +justification of his own career. Moore, in all the references to this +Memoir, treats it solely as a piece of literature, and Lord John +Russell, who had read most, if not all, of the composition, simply says +that it "contained little trace of Byron's genius and no interesting +details of his life." Those who were eager for suppression appear to +have been influenced by the desire to avoid scandal; and the notion was +widespread, for Moore, after the affair, was congratulated on having +"saved the country from a pollution." His most serious objection to +destroying the MS. rested on the support which such an action would give +to this view of what Byron had written. + +But the objection was not strong enough to induce him to jeopardise his +own character. Moore's hands were tied in the transaction by the fact +that he stood to lose two thousand guineas if the MS. were destroyed, +and would avoid this loss if his own opinion, favouring publication, +were adopted. Whoever opposed publication in the discussion at Murray's, +had merely to hint that Moore's advocacy was interested, and pride would +at once constrain the needy poet to consent to the holocaust. + +The two persons who stood to lose in the matter were Moore and Murray, +and both made a creditable sacrifice. Murray resigned his chances of a +considerable profit. But Moore incurred deliberately a ruinous burden of +debt. Even so, his sensitive conscience was not quite clear as to the +justification of his act; but Hobhouse appears to have decided him by +saying that Byron had more than once expressed a regret at having put +the Memoirs out of his own power, and had only been prevented from +reclaiming them by his dislike to taking back a gift. + +Moore's need for consulting on points of honour did not end with the +burning of the MS. Byron's family were anxious to repay him the money +which he had paid to Murray before the cremation; and, not unnaturally, +Lord Lansdowne and other friends urged him to accept. But he refused +persistently to do so, though one adviser after another forced him to +postpone for a week the irrevocable step of publishing his account of +the transaction in the papers. His view was, that his duty had been to +surrender the trust into the hands most proper to receive it, and that +he could keep at least the credit of having made a sacrifice in order to +do so. With this credit he refused to part; and he notes that he had +little trouble in bringing his men of business, the Longmans, to take +his view of the matter, but could not so easily persuade Lord Lansdowne, +with Rogers and the rest, that a poor man ought to act on the same +principles as if he were rich. It should be remembered to Moore's credit +that he on many occasions followed his own sense of honour when he might +have pleaded the advice of most honoured and honourable persons for +adopting another course. + +Friends of Moore's fame will rejoice that he acted in so scrupulous a +spirit, but the necessity is to be deplored. The heavy load of debt thus +thrown upon him forced him into producing too much. It also made it +practically inevitable that he should recoup himself for this loss by +undertaking the most lucrative task that offered--namely, a biography of +Byron; yet he was uncertain for a considerable time whether the thing +ought to be done, and, if done, whether he was the right person to do +it. Even when his mind was clear of these perplexities--which Hobhouse +strengthened by dissuading him from the task--there was a long period of +suspense for which Murray was answerable. During three years Moore was +distracted, anxious, and uneasy, unable to settle down to any important +work. + +For the present, however, once the Byron business was settled, his mind +and his hands were full. It had been finally settled that the Longmans, +and not Murray, should be the publishers of the _Life of Sheridan_; they +undertaking, not only to pay Moore a thousand guineas, but to give the +Sheridan family half profits, once 2500 copies had been disposed. Moore +went resolutely to work, and in October of the next year the book made +its appearance, and succeeded beyond expectation. The Longmans expressed +their sense of its merits by adding L300 to the stipulated thousand. + +The _Life of Sheridan_ did not interest contemporaries mainly as a piece +of biography. Many references to traits and stories of the dramatist and +statesman, which occur in the Diary, make it plain that Moore had +conceived an opinion of Sheridan by no means wholly favourable, and +biography of the unsparing order was not a task which he would have +undertaken. His aim was to outline Sheridan's career, rather than to +paint the man, and consequently the book's main value lay in the +historical view which it gave of the past fifty years. On this Moore was +congratulated by so good a judge as Jeffrey, and he had a right to feel +that his claim was established to rank with serious political thinkers. + +Yet even before this, he was by no means regarded merely as a person of +quick fancy and lively talent. It was proposed that he should join +Jeffrey in editing the _Edinburgh_; and, still more remarkable, in 1822 +the proprietors of the _Times_ invited him to replace Barnes for six +months in conducting their paper. Moore refused the offer (which was +made at the suggestion of Rogers), but felt highly gratified; and from +his return to England he was a constant contributor to the _Times_, +sending there all his satiric verses. Their popularity was so great that +the proprietors authorised Barnes to pay Moore a retainer of L400 a +year; and up to 1828 this source of income, with the annuity from Power, +was his main revenue. It was precarious, however; for the _Times_ +sometimes took a tone in handling Irish topics which made it difficult +for Moore to continue the connection, and in 1827 he formally closed it. +It was renewed, however, after Barnes made a tour in Ireland (carrying +introductions from Moore), and returned ready "to support the Irish +cause with all his might." + +Indeed, the best work of the three years 1825-8 is to be found in the +_Odes on Cash, Corn, and Catholics_, nearly all of which were +contributed to the _Times_. The first "evening" of _Evenings in Greece_, +and the fifth and sixth numbers of _National Airs_, which were the work +done for Power at this period, have little in them but fluent verse; and +even less can be said for the work which Moore took up as a _piece de +resistance_, his discarded Egyptian story, which he now completed as a +prose romance. In _The Epicurean_ we have the last and by no means +sprightly runnings of the vein which produced _Lalla_ and the _Loves of +the Angels_: an imagination feeding itself on marvels read of in books, +and producing literature which appealed to curiosity more than to any +other instinct. The description of the Egyptian mysteries seen by the +young philosopher, who goes to the land of pyramids and catacombs in +search of new truth, is frigid in the extreme; and the flashes of +genuine poetry which redeem _Lalla_ and _The Angels_ find no place in +this very bad example of deliberately poetic prose. Nevertheless its +oversweetened eloquence found plenty of readers, and the book realised +L700 to its author,--of which, however, L500 had already been +anticipated, independently of the main debt, the two thousand guineas. + +One may note here a very curious scruple of literary conscience which +Moore adhered to with surprising consistency. Although heavily in debt, +and forced to make every penny by sheer production, he constantly set +aside a means, which for at least ten years was constantly open to him, +of earning money with little labour. His reputation then stood at its +highest point; he was not only high in favour with the frequenters of +Holland House, but also with the whole fashionable world and its far-off +imitators. A single trait--which, with his usual naive pleasure in +instances of his own popularity, he records--may illustrate the matter. +At a country ball, a young lady who was fortunate enough to shake hands +with the poet "wrapped the hand up in her shawl, saying no one else +should touch it that night." Fame of this sort is very marketable, and +to-day would bring its owner big offers from the popular magazines. +Their equivalent in those days was found in the annuals of the type of +the _Forget-me-not_, _Souvenir_, etc.; and request after request was +made to Moore for his name either as editor or contributor. The Longmans +proposed to undertake such a publication, and tempted him with the +prospects of L500 to L1000 a year if he would edit it. He replied, not +with a direct refusal, but with a letter stating his views concerning +literature of this class, which not only convinced the firm that he +personally would injure his reputation by accepting, but decided them to +abandon the scheme. Again, about 1827, Heath the engraver offered, first +L500 and subsequently L700 a year to Moore if he would edit a new album +or magazine, and at the same time tried to force on him a cheque for a +hundred pounds as the price of a contribution of a hundred lines. But +Moore was not to be tempted. Only once in his career did he depart from +what his sense of the dignity of letters demanded, and that was at a +time when he had brought himself low in purse by writing books to +express his convictions, and refusing commissions that would have +brought in large sums. His scruple, which nowadays seems strangely +demoded, is the more respectable because he never hints a word of blame +for those who did not share that "horror of Albumising, Annualising, and +Periodicalising which my one inglorious surrender (and for base money +too) has but confirmed me in." Characteristically enough, however, he +did for courtesy what he so often refused to do for profit, and waived +the scruple in favour of his old and beautiful friend Lady Blessington, +to whom he thus expressed himself. He sent her some verses for her _Book +of Beauty_, which are among the latest and by no means the worst that he +wrote. + +In 1827, however, at a time when nothing was yet settled as to the _Life +of Byron_, his refusal of the inducements held out by Heath and the +Longmans was not his only example of constancy to a point of honour. +Letters apprised him in December 1826 that his father's death could not +be long deferred, and when he reached Dublin the old man was too far +gone to see or recognise his son. It is characteristic of Moore that he +counted this to be a great relief, "as I would not for worlds have the +sweet impression he left upon my mind when I last saw him exchanged for +one which would haunt me, I know, dreadfully through all the remainder +of my life." This morbid shrinking from actual physical impressions of +pain or horror was a marked trait of the man, and not a manly one; it +was doubtless closely connected with his temperamental liability to +uncontrollable bursts of emotion. Nevertheless it was a thing hardly +more within his will-power than is the common tendency to turn faint at +the sight of blood; and in other respects he made up for it by +exhibiting a noble staunchness. The death of his father was a heavy +blow, as making the first gap in a family so closely linked by +affection; but a man at forty-seven must be prepared to lose his +parents, and the actual trouble of so quiet a death in the fulness of +age would soon have passed naturally. But John Moore's pension died with +him, and his son, already sufficiently embarrassed, found his mother and +sister added to his other charges. The burden could have been avoided; +for Lord Wellesley, then Viceroy, at once signified a wish to continue +the half-pay pension to Moore's sister, out of a fund which he, as +Lord-Lieutenant, could dispose of without reference to England, where +the King might reasonably be presumed unfriendly to such a favour. "All +this," Moore notes, "very kind and liberal of Lord Wellesley; and God +knows how useful such an aid would be to me, as God alone knows how I am +to support all the burdens now heaped upon me; but _I could not_ accept +such a favour. It would be like that _lasso_ with which they catch wild +animals in South America; the noose would only be on the _tip_ of the +horn, it is true, but it would do." + +He found himself again approved in his action by men of business (Power +the publisher and various Irish friends) but censured by Lord Lansdowne. +His answer was ready, however. _The Life of Sheridan_, with its +outspoken strictures on certain passages in Whig policy, had not been +altogether relished at Bowood, and Moore was for once not sorry, since +the lack of approbation proved the independence of his attitude. And it +was now easy for him to say that, since Lord Lansdowne had described his +last published book as too conciliatory to the Tories, any favour coming +to its author from a Tory government would certainly be construed by +unfriendly judges as the price of this civility. + +At last, however, the long negotiations about Byron's Life and Letters +came to a conclusion. Moore, whose debt was to the Longmans, and who was +moreover bound to them by gratitude for much real friendliness, inclined +to write the _Life_ for them, and an arrangement to that effect was +made. But in February 1828, when Murray, who held the great bulk of the +material, finally made up his mind to secure Moore's services, if +possible, both as editor and biographer, the Longmans, with their +accustomed liberality, waived their claim. It was settled that Moore +should receive 4000 guineas, of which sum half was to be advanced, to +pay off his debt to the Longmans. And thus, after many efforts, he got, +for a time at least, level with the world. + +The work once undertaken went on fast--Moore working, he writes, "as +hard as it is in my nature to work at anything"--and by the end of 1829 +the first of two quarto volumes was ready for publication. In his +prefatory note to the second volume, which shortly followed, Moore--whom +Byron called "the only modest author he had ever known"--attributed the +success of the work to the interest of the subject and the materials. +There is no denying that his modesty was in this case justified. The +_Life of Byron_ has probably been more read than any biography in the +language, with the single exception of Boswell's; yet it has no claim to +rank, for instance, with Lockhart's masterpiece as a literary +achievement. Moore's task was simply to weave together a chain of +narrative from the copious materials presented to him by the poet's +journals, letters, and, not least, by his poems. His work was, however, +hampered by the necessity of sparing sensibilities, and we have +frequently to wish that he had been less discreet. Nevertheless, upon +the whole, a very difficult undertaking was carried through with supreme +tact, with well-practised dexterity, and, above all, with a most +commendable absence of pretension. Beyond the skilled selection and +grouping of materials, Moore's part is very considerable. It amounts to +a very acute exposition of the Byron whom he had known--a man wholly +unlike the popular conception of him. Naturally enough, the work has the +character of a defence or justification, and as such it is loyal and +sincere. Moore never goes back on his friend. But there were in that +friend's character certain elements which he disliked, and in his +intellect ranges which he did not fully comprehend; and we feel always +that the Byron whom Moore best understands is the Byron of earlier days, +the writer of vehement romance and impassioned soliloquy--a Byron who +had not yet come to the full scope of his powers. This also was natural +enough, for Moore's personal intercourse with Byron practically ended +when Byron married. + +Their friendship began, drolly enough, as has been already mentioned, +out of a cartel resulting from another challenge. In 1809, Moore saw +_English Bards and Scotch Reviewers_, and had no special cause to +quarrel with the attack upon his own work. Little, + + "The young Catullus of his day, + As sweet, but as immoral, in his lay," + +might regard the attack as verging on a tribute; and indeed Little's +poems were among Byron's earliest favourites and models in verse. But +Moore was choleric; he did not like to hear himself entitled the +"melodious advocate of lust"; and further on he came upon a passage +which touched him on a sensitive point. His abortive duel with Jeffrey +furnished too obvious material for the satirist to miss--above all, when +Jeffrey was the special mark--and accordingly Moore found the following +reference to it:-- + + "Can none remember that eventful day, + That ever glorious, almost fatal fray, + When Little's leadless pistol met the eye, + And Bow Street's myrmidons stood laughing by?" + +A note was appended, stating that, in the duel at Chalk Farm, "on +examination, the balls of the pistols were found to have evaporated." + +The satire being anonymous, Moore, though sufficiently vexed, took no +steps; but when a second edition was issued with Byron's name, he wrote +from Ireland to the author, saying that in the note "the lie was given" +to his own public statement, published in the _Times_ concerning the +duel, and demanding to know whether Byron would "avow the insult." + +This letter, as Moore soon learnt, had not reached its address, for +Byron had gone abroad; but he was told that Hodgson had undertaken to +forward it. Nothing more was heard, and Moore let things rest till a +year and a half later, when Byron returned from abroad. Moore had in the +meantime married, and was about to become a father; he was therefore, as +he admits, inclined to be conciliatory, but none the less determined to +push the matter to an explanation. Referring to the previous letter, +which he assumed to have miscarried, he re-stated his grievance in +writing, but then continued:-- + + "It is now useless to speak of the steps with which it was my + intention to follow up that letter. The time which has elapsed + since then, though it has done away neither the injury nor the + feeling of it, has in many respects materially altered my + situation; and the only object which I have now in writing to your + Lordship is to preserve some consistency with that former letter, + and to prove to you that the injured feeling still exists, however + circumstances may compel me to be deaf to its dictates at present. + When I say 'injured feeling,' let me assure your Lordship that + there is not a single vindictive sentiment in my mind towards you. + I mean but to express that uneasiness under (what I must consider + to be) a charge of falsehood, which must haunt a man of any feeling + to his grave, unless the insult be retracted or atoned for." + +Byron answered stiffly enough, that he had never seen Moore's denial, +and therefore had never intended "giving the lie"; but that he could +neither retract nor apologise for a charge of falsehood which he never +advanced. He was ready, he said, "to accept any conciliatory proposition +which did not compromise his own honour"--or, failing that, to give +satisfaction. Moore, in his account of the affair, admits freely that he +had shown a want of tact in talking of friendly advances, while +demanding an explanation; and he expresses his admiration for Byron's +conduct in the difficulty. It is certain that the younger man showed +more sense and less inclination to take offence, and the final proposal +that a friendly meeting should be arranged was Byron's. The place fixed +on was Rogers's table, and Campbell was of the company; and the dinner +(though complicated by Byron's unexpected wish to dine on biscuits and +soda water--neither of which was forthcoming) had the happiest results. +Byron formed a lasting friendship with Rogers; but between him and Moore +an intimacy of the closest kind ripened rapidly--the more so because +Byron's state was then one of considerable isolation. A few months +later, the blazing success of _Childe Harold_ only confirmed the +friendship, as it made the new poet the lion of a society where Moore's +position was already firmly fixed. Jealousy was none of Moore's vices, +or he had ample ground for it in that sudden leap past him, into a +region of fame which, as he always knew in his heart, he could never +occupy. But even a jealous nature might have been conciliated by Byron's +frank enthusiasm. "I am too proud of being your friend," he wrote, "to +care with whom I am linked in your estimation"; and the fragmentary +"Journal" which he kept in 1813 expresses the grounds of his admiration +very fully. + + "Moore has a peculiarity of talent, or rather talents--poetry, + music, voice--all his own; and an expression in each, which never + was, nor will be, possessed by another. But he is capable of still + higher nights in poetry. By the bye, what humour, what--everything, + in the 'Post Bag'! There is nothing Moore may not do, if he will + but seriously set about it. In society he is gentlemanly, gentle, + and, altogether, more pleasing than any individual with whom I am + acquainted. For his honour, principle, and independence, his + conduct to...[1] speaks 'trumpet-tongued.' He has but one + fault--and that one I daily regret--he is not _here_." + +Byron had also, what was no impediment in such a friendship, a great +admiration for his friend's work, and his letters teem with inquiries +after the progress of _Lalla_. Moore's abandonment of the story which +resembled too closely the _Bride of Abydos_, he thought unnecessary, and +was sincerely grieved to have stood in the light. Indeed, it is +sufficiently evident that Byron's feeling for Moore was a good deal +warmer than Moore's for Byron; not unnaturally, considering that Moore +was newly married and deep in love with his wife. Byron is always the +more frequent correspondent; it is he who has to reproach the other with +slackness. But, it must be insisted again, the friendship had been begun +when Moore was already rich in friendships and happy in a home, while +Byron was moody and lonely in a world against which he cherished +grievances; and this new companionship filled a large space in his life. +The sympathy between the two is easily understood, if one remembers not +only that each in his way exercised an extraordinary attraction for men +as well as women, but that their tastes coincided. The days when Moore +knew Byron well were Byron's period of dandyism, and Moore was always +something of a dandy. Both belonged to Watier's, the dandies' club _par +excellence_, and, being the only persons in the set who were men of +letters as well as men of fashion, they were naturally drawn together. +Moore's removal from town, too, detracted in no way from their +intimacy, since whenever he returned to London, he came now as a +bachelor. In 1814 they were almost daily together during his stay, and +the letters give us pleasant hints of their joint festivities, from fine +assemblies to lobsters and brandy and water at Stevens's in Bond Street. +Their friendship was so close that it permitted of Moore's advising +Byron not only to marry, but to make a particular choice--and one other +than that which he disastrously made. Further, when the choice had been +made, it was to Moore that Byron confided first his rejoicings and +afterwards something of his perplexities. + +Nevertheless Byron's marriage ended their comradeship, and the friends +did not meet in the months when Lady Byron's unexplained departure and +obdurate silence loosed a storm of obloquy on her husband. Moore was +quick in sympathy, and Byron wrote him a letter such as could only be +written to a trusted intimate. And when finally his departure was fixed +on, verse spoke his feelings much better than the rather pompous +dedication in prose which he had prefixed to the _Corsair_ in January +1814:-- + + "My boat is on the shore + And my bark is on the sea; + But before I go, Tom Moore, + Here's a double health to thee. + + "Were't the last drop in the well + As I gasped upon the brink, + Ere my fainting spirit fell, + 'Tis to thee that I would drink. + + "With that water, as this wine, + The libation I would pour + Should be--peace with thine and mine + And a health to thee, Tom Moore." + +Of their meeting in Italy, three years after this was written, something +has been already said. To the end of the chapter Byron was the more +constant correspondent of the two. There are not wanting in Moore's +Diary remarks respecting Byron in which other things than liking can be +perceived; sharp disapprobation (and merited) for his writing to Murray +details of a Venetian intrigue which would enable the woman to be +identified; and later, a distinct touch of spleen occasioned by the +disparaging estimate of all recent poetry which Byron paraded in his +controversy with Bowles. Yet these are only hints of a passing mood, and +it is clear that Moore was always proud of the friendship; he is quick +to write down Lord Clare's assurance (which is supported by a letter of +Byron's own) that Clare and he were the people whom Byron cared most +for. It is also most clear that Byron's death, incurred in the cause of +a nation's freedom, set him on a pinnacle in Moore's estimation, and, in +the eyes of that always generous critic, more than redeemed whatever was +amiss in his career. The _Life_ did effectively what it was meant to do: +it presented a favourable view of Byron's character, all the more +convincing because the means used were chiefly quotations of Byron's own +words. It is a great praise in a task so difficult to say that Moore +never offends us; and on many occasions his comment is not merely sane +and generous, uniting the tolerance of a man of the world with the +insight of a poet; it is also instinct with dignity. For an excellent +example of such moments, and of Moore's prose style at its best, the +conclusion of the memoir may be given:-- + + "The arduous task of being the biographer of Byron is one, at + least, on which I have not obtruded myself: the wish of my friend + that I should undertake that office having been more than once + expressed, at a time when none but boding imagination could have + foreseen much chance of the sad honour devolving to me. If in some + instances I have consulted rather the spirit than the exact letter + of his injunctions, it was with the view solely of doing him more + justice than he would have done himself; there being no hands in + which his character could have been less safe than his own, nor any + greater wrong offered to his memory than the substitution of what + he affected to be for what he was. Of any partiality, however, + beyond what our mutual friendship accounts for and justifies, I am + by no means conscious; nor would it be in the power, indeed, even + of the most partial friend to allege anything more convincingly + favourable of his character than is contained in the few simple + facts with which I shall here conclude--that through life, with all + his faults, he never lost a friend;--that those about him in his + youth, whether as companions, teachers, or servants, remained + attached to him to the last;--that the woman, to whom he gave the + love of his maturer years, idolises his name; and that, with a + single unhappy exception, scarce an instance is to be found of any + one, once brought, however briefly, into relations of amity with + him, that did not feel towards him a kind regard in life and retain + a fondness for his memory. + + "I have now done with the subject, nor shall be easily tempted into + a recurrence. Any mistakes or misstatements I may be proved to have + made shall be corrected;--any new facts which it is in the power of + others to produce will speak for themselves. To mere opinions I am + not called upon to pay attention--and still less to insinuations or + mysteries. I have here told what I myself know and think concerning + my friend, and now leave his character, moral as well as literary, + to the judgment of the world." + +No sooner was the work on Byron completed than the prospect of another, +no less lucrative, offered itself. A proposal was made, with Lady +Canning's approbation, that Moore should write the Life of Canning. "The +importance of the period, the abundance of the materials I should have +to illustrate it, and my general coincidence with the principles of +Canning's latter line of politics," as well as the money, all tempted +Moore greatly, but he decided against it for a characteristic reason. + + "An obstacle presented itself in the person of Lord Grey, of whose + conduct, during the period in question, it would be necessary to + speak with such a degree of freedom as both my high opinion of him, + and my gratitude to him for much kindness, would render impossible. + If left to myself, I might perhaps manage to do justice to all + parties without offending any; but under the dictation of Lady + Canning the thing would be impracticable." + +The scruple was honourable, but it illustrates the growing difficulty of +Moore's position. Bound by ties of long alliance to the Whigs, he was, +in reality, less and less at one with either English party; and he +claimed and exercised a perfect freedom of expression in so far as +principles at least were concerned. But his regard for persons +constantly hampered him, and, conscious of this personal loyalty, he did +not cease to consider himself as one having claims on party rewards. +Lord Lansdowne came into office under the coalition in 1827, and the +Whig party were fully in power from 1830 onwards; yet Moore went +unrewarded, and a trace of bitterness is clearly perceptible in his +tone. Were it not that from 1829 onwards the Diary has been a good deal +expurgated by its editor, we should probably hear more of this note. We +have no direct expression of Moore's feelings either on the Act +emancipating the Catholics or on the Reform Bill. It is sufficiently +evident, however, from other passages, that Moore deprecated the +tumultuary agitation by which the Duke of Wellington was persuaded to +reverse the traditional policy of his party; it is probable that he +considered the surrender as none the Less ignominious because he +rejoiced to see it made. As to Reform, we have his mind plainly enough +given in several later jeremiads. "We are now hastening to the brink +with a rapidity which, croaker as I have always been, I certainly did +not anticipate." That is again and again the burden of his song, and +again and again he deplores that concessions were made in block, and not +doled out by minimum doses. As Lord John Russell neatly observes, had +Reform never passed, Moore would have lived and died a staunch Reformer. +But the passing of Reform showed him for what he really was--an Irish +politician of Grattan's school, hostile to every kind of Radicalism, but +strong in defence of two things--the principle of religious toleration +and the principle of nationality. + +The result of all this was to associate Moore increasingly, both as +student and politician, with Irish controversy and Irish personages. He +declined to write the Life of Canning because it would necessitate +personal criticism on Lord Grey, and he felt no call to give utterance +to this criticism. But when it came to a question of speaking or holding +his peace on the subject of his own country, Moore declined to be +influenced by personal considerations. Once free to choose a subject, +his choice is notable. Having declined the Canning proposal, he set to +work immediately on a very different theme, the _Life of Lord Edward +Fitzgerald_, and worked on it with enthusiasm, although the hope of a +lucrative success was in this case slight indeed. More than that, as the +Whig party settled down to the task of administration, they found, as +usual, trouble in Ireland; and first Lord Holland, then Lord John +Russell, urged Moore to let alone the biography of an Irish rebel till +such time as Ireland should be quiet. Moore answered that this would be +to rival the rustic in Horace, who waited till the stream should be done +flowing by; and further, that it was a question of principle with him to +publish. Lord Lansdowne's considerate silence weighed more with him than +these intercessions, but the book came out in July 1831, with little of +the eclat to which its author was now accustomed. It is nevertheless the +best of his prose writings, and conveys with great moderation the +essential truths about the series of measures and events which led up to +the terrible crisis of 1798. What is still better, it gives an extremely +vivid impression of the young rebel chief, who had much that specially +endeared him to Moore in his warm and impulsive affections and his very +generous nature. There was nothing in the subject outside Moore's +sympathy or comprehension, and this was scarcely true either in the case +of Sheridan or of Byron. + +No sooner was this work out of hand than a new one was put on the +stocks, arising again directly out of Moore's tastes and +pre-occupations. This was the very curious _Travels of an Irish +Gentleman in search of a Religion_, which leads naturally to some +discussion of Moore's own beliefs. + +We have seen that he went to college as a Catholic (though not without +some consideration of the other possibility), and was thus shut off from +the rewards of proficiency; but also that, while in college, he +abandoned the practice of confession and that his intimates were mainly +Protestants. More than this, he married a Protestant, and allowed the +children of the marriage to be brought up in their mother's religion, +and for a considerable period attended church with his family--as is +proved by various entries in the Diary down to 1824, or thirteen years +after his marriage. And in 1825 there occurs this curious note. Lord +Lansdowne, referring to a magazine article, in which Moore's songs were +mentioned, said, "They take you for a Catholic." "I answered," Moore +writes, "they had but too much right to do so." + +It is evident that his Catholicism was, to say the least of it, +unobtrusive in these days; and, although a note in the journals of +travel mentions the effect always produced on him by the celebration of +Mass, he seems rather inclined to endorse the distaste for so much gaudy +ceremonial which his Bessy owned to when first he took her to a Catholic +service. The most important passage, however, bearing upon his views +occurs in his account of the family interview after his father's +death:-- + + "Our conversation naturally turned upon religion, and my sister + Kate, who, the last time I saw her, was more than half inclined to + declare herself a Protestant, told me she had since taken my + advice, and remained quietly a Catholic.... For myself, my having + married a Protestant wife gave me an opportunity of choosing a + religion, at least for my children, and if my marriage had no other + advantage, I should think this quite sufficient to be grateful for. + We then talked of the differences between the two faiths, and they + who accuse all Catholics of being intolerantly attached to their + own would be either ashamed or surprised (according as they were + sincere or not in the accusation), if they had heard the sentiments + expressed both by my mother and sisters on the subject." + +Taking all these things into account, I think it is not unfair to put an +autobiographical construction on the _Travels of an Irish +Gentleman_--which, although dedicated to the People of Ireland as a +"defence of their ancient national faith by their devoted servant the +Editor of 'Captain Rock's Memoirs,'" is, like that earlier work, couched +in a tone of irony, and opens with a "Soliloquy up Two Pair of +Stairs:"-- + + "It was on the evening of the 16th day of April, 1829--the very day + on which the memorable news reached Dublin of the Royal Assent + having been given to the Catholic Relief Bill--that, as I was + sitting alone in my chambers, up two pair of stairs in Trinity + College, being myself one of the everlasting 'Seven Millions' thus + liberated, I started suddenly, after a few moments' reverie, from + my chair, and taking a stride across the room, as if to make trial + of a pair of emancipated legs, exclaimed, 'Thank God! I may now, if + I like, turn Protestant.'" + +It would be wrong to say that Moore, after emancipation had freed him +"not only from the penalties attached to being a Catholic, but from the +point of honour which had till then debarred me from being anything +else," seriously contemplated a change of religion. I think, however, +that on examining his consciousness, he found that up till this period +he had defended his religious position to himself solely by the point of +honour, and that, now the point of honour was removed, he felt it +incumbent on him to be able to speak with his enemies in the gate. I +believe also that the effect of his reading was to substitute for a +somewhat vague Christianity a definite attachment to Catholicism. His +earlier attitude of mind is well expressed by the following passage in +his Diary--not the only one of its kind:-- + + "I sat up to read the account of Goethe's _Dr. Faustus_ in the + _Edinburgh Magazine_, and before I went to bed experienced one of + those bursts of devotion which perhaps are worth all the + churchgoing forms in the world. Tears came fast from me as I knelt + down to adore the one only God whom I acknowledge, and poured forth + the aspirations of a soul deeply grateful for all His goodness." + +That was written in Paris some five years before the conversation with +his sister Kate. It seems to me improbable that, after the reading and +writing which went to the _Travels of an Irish Gentleman_, he would have +expressed himself quite in the same way as to the advantage of being +able to make his children Protestants. And it is certain that in later +life, though on the friendliest terms with the rector of his parish, he +never attended service at the church. + +The intention of the _Travels_ was, however, rather to furnish a weapon +than to establish faith. In a passage of the Diary (which, by the way, +deprecates the complete identification of himself with his hero), he +says:-- + + "My views concerning the superiority of the Roman Catholic Religion + over the Protestant in point of antiquity, authority, and + consistency agree with those of my hero, and I was induced to put + them so strongly upon record from the disgust which I feel, and + have ever felt, at the arrogance with which most Protestant parsons + assume to themselves and their fellows the credit of being the only + true Christians, and the insolence with which weekly from their + pulpits they denounce all Catholics as idolaters and anti-Christ." + +In short, this book, which he speaks of in a letter to Sir William +Napier, his friend and neighbour, as "purely the indulgence of a hobby," +was designed rather to annoy than to persuade. It was the attempt of an +Irish Catholic, who felt increasingly his right and power to speak for +his nation, to retort upon uncivil opponents not merely with argument +but with derision. And for this purpose no plan could have been more +effectual than the one which he chose of setting his young gentleman in +the first instance, after his decision to be a Protestant, to search for +the one true Protestantism. + +Further than this it is unnecessary to go into the consideration of a +forgotten piece of polemics, which only those will read who find, like +Moore himself, "no subject so piquant as theology." His attainments in +this branch of learning were considerable for a layman. We have seen +that in 1814 he surprised Jeffrey by his article for the _Edinburgh_ on +the Fathers of the Early Church; and in 1831, while the _Travels_ were +in preparation, Murray astounded Milman by revealing to him that Moore +was the author of an article on _German Rationalism_. Moreover, these +appear to have been the only two of Moore's numerous contributions to +the Whig quarterly in which he took pleasure. Reviewing, in the ordinary +way, he describes as "work which I detest, and in consequence always do +badly." But recondite learning always had a fascination for him, and the +scholar in him grew with years. + +The scholarly taste for historical research was unhappy in one of its +consequences. As early as 1829, the Longmans projected a group of +histories of the British Isles, in which England was to be treated by +Sir James Mackintosh in three volumes, while Scott and Moore sketched, +in a volume apiece, the story of their respective countries. Lord John +Russell observes judiciously that had Moore kept to the restriction, the +result might have been an easy, agreeable, and readable work. Unluckily, +however, he obeyed rather his sense of what was needed in a history of +Ireland than a perception of what he himself was fit to do, and the +task, undertaken with alacrity, became a burden. Instead of one volume, +it dragged out to four, of which the first appeared in 1835, and the +last in 1846; and the work is wholly devoid of any original merit, bald +and colourless. "His time," says Lord John, "was absorbed by it, his +health worn, and his faculties dragged down to a wearisome and +uncongenial task." + +Yet this is to blame unreasonably Moore's choice of a subject. The truth +is that, when he engaged on it, his mind had lost its elasticity and +freshness of invention, from a variety of circumstances which must be +considered in a review of the last period of his life. + +At the same time, it was an honourable end to that long literary career. +The easy singer of light loves closed his ceaseless activities with a +long period of drudgery, spent, says Lord John Russell, in "the critical +examination of obscure authorities upon an obscure subject." But the +obscure subject was the history of the singer's own country, and Moore +was at least well justified in holding that urgent need existed for +spreading among the English, and still more among the Irish, a knowledge +of the history of Ireland. + + +[1] Probably Lord Moira. _See_ above, p. 55. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +THE DECLINE OF LIFE + + +I have now sketched to its close the later period of Moore's literary +career; there remains to be set out the sad list of domestic troubles +under which his health and intellect finally gave way. But first, it is +pleasant to dwell upon some of the brighter circumstances which made +middle age for him not the least enjoyable period of a life rich in +enjoyment--and above all upon the indications, which he so highly +valued, of Ireland's growing enthusiasm for her own poet. + +Moore liked always "digito monstrari et dicier, 'Hic est'"; and his +Journal abounds with records of his ingenuous satisfaction in such +tributes. Here is an agreeable passage, which brings not only the little +poet, but his very adoring (and adorable) wife, before us:-- + + "Oct. 15, 1829. To Bath with Bessy, to make purchases, carpets, + chimney pieces, etc., etc. In the carpet shop (in Milsom St.) where + I gave a cheque for the money, and my signature betrayed who I was, + a strong sensation evident through the whole establishment, to + Bessy's great amusement; and at last the master of the shop (a very + respectable-looking old person), after gazing earnestly at me for + some time, approached me and said, 'Mr. Moore, I cannot say how + much I feel honoured, etc., etc.,' and then requested that I would + allow him to have the satisfaction of shaking hands with one 'to + whom he was indebted for such etc., etc.' When we left the shop, + Bessy said, 'What a nice old man! I was very near asking him + whether he would like to shake hands with the poet's _wife_ too.'" + +A far more conspicuous instance, however, of his "friendly fame" is +afforded by the narrative of his expedition to Scotland, in the autumn +of 1825, when the publication of his _Sheridan_ entitled him to a +holiday, and Bessy insisted that he should take one. The purpose of the +journey was to visit Sir Walter Scott, whom Moore had only once met, +some twenty years earlier. There was no other guest in the house at +Abbotsford, and Sir Walter, as Lockhart testified afterwards, enjoyed +having Moore to himself, and gave up his mornings, usually sacred to +work, in honour of the occasion. The liking between the two men was +immediate, but none the less profound; and on the third day, the Diary +notes that Scott said, "laying his hand cordially on my breast, 'Now, my +dear Moore, we are friends for life.'" Neither friend had ever power to +serve the other, but there is no passage in Moore's memoirs more +evidently sincere than that in which he expresses (only a few months +later) his "deep and painful sympathy" in the news of Scott's financial +misfortune:--"For poor devils like me (who have never known better) to +fag and to be pinched for means, becomes, as it were, a second nature; +but for Scott, whom I saw living in such luxurious comfort, and +dispensing such cordial hospitality, to be thus suddenly reduced to the +necessity of working his way, is too bad, and I grieve for him from my +heart." + +But in 1825 all went gaily at Abbotsford, and Scott lionised his guest +with enthusiasm--Jeffrey helping. In the Law Courts at Edinburgh Moore +found himself "the greatest show of the place, and followed by crowds"; +but the main demonstration took place when Scott conducted his guest to +the theatre, and the whole pit immediately rose at them. Moore was +compelled to bow his acknowledgments for two or three minutes, and the +orchestra played Irish melodies after each act; all this to the vast +delight of Scott, who, just fresh from cordialities in Ireland, was glad +to see his countrymen return the compliment. + +But it was in Ireland itself that Moore found himself feted and honoured +with a kind of welcome such as seldom has been accorded to any man of +letters. In 1830, the research for reminiscences of Lord Edward +Fitzgerald gave him a reason to cross to Dublin for a long visit, and +take his wife and boys to see his mother. Here, for the first and only +time, Moore made a public appearance before a gathering of his +countrymen assembled for a political purpose. A meeting had been called +to celebrate the recent Revolution in France, and the poet was set down +to second one of the resolutions. Eloquence was one of his +accomplishments, and he appears to have enjoyed the excitement of +feeling that "every word told on his auditory," who overwhelmed him with +applause. + +The meeting had special significance, as marking a definite political +connection, which the character of his book on Lord Edward only +emphasised when it came to be published. He had been brought into close +touch with the leading Repealers, and expressed a general approbation of +their objects--though he thought O'Connell's agitation for Repeal both +premature and ill-judged. He was, in truth, hardly more in complete +sympathy with the Irish leader than with his Whig friends, who seemed to +display in office (which they now held) all the qualities which he had +disliked in their predecessors. In Ireland, however, there was every +disposition to minimise differences of opinion, and the public +enthusiasm for his character and achievements expressed itself, in 1832, +by an effort to induce him to enter Parliament. + +Moore replied with a refusal, on the ground that his means were narrow +and precarious, and that he could not spare the time; as indeed he might +well say, for in this year he had been forced, not only to accept +Marryat's offer of L500 for contributions to a magazine, but even to +borrow (for the second time in his life) from a friend, Rogers. + +Curiously enough, a second proposal of the same kind came to him from a +very different quarter. Lord Anglesey, then Viceroy, conveyed through a +third person his wish that Moore should stand for Dublin University, and +promised him all the Government support. In declining this offer on the +same grounds as he had alleged to the Limerick electors, Moore added a +very plain statement that, with the views he entertained, he could not +enter parliament under the sanction of that Government. The Whigs had +resorted to coercion, and "As long," he wrote, "as the principle on +which Ireland is at present governed shall continue to be acted on, I +can never consent to couple my name, humble as it is, with theirs." + +The matter dropped then, so far as Government was concerned. But the +Limerick constituency was not so easily put off, although Moore had +explained to O'Connell--who was anxious to have the poet's +support--that he should never think of entering parliament except as a +purely unfettered representative. Such was the eagerness, that a scheme +was formed of purchasing an estate worth L300 a year in the county, and +presenting it to the poet; and after this proposal had been communicated +by letter, Gerald Griffin, author of _The Collegians_, came, along with +his brother, in person to Sloperton to urge its acceptance. + +Moore was not prepared for the visit, but welcomed his guests. Part of +Gerald Griffin's account may be cited as showing an exceedingly able +young Irishman's attitude of mind towards the poet (_the_ poet), and the +impression which Moore left on him:-- + + "Oh, my dear L----, I saw the poet! and I spoke to him and he spoke + to me, and it was not to bid me 'get out of his way,' as the King + of France did to the man who boasted that his majesty had spoken to + him; but it was to shake hands with me and to ask me 'How I did, + Mr. Griffin?' and to speak of 'my fame.' _My_ fame! Tom Moore talk + of my fame! Ah the rogue, he was humbugging, L----, I'm afraid. He + knew the soft side of an author's heart, and perhaps he had pity on + my long, melancholy-looking figure, and said to himself, 'I will + make this poor fellow feel pleasant if I can,' for which, with all + his roguery, who could help liking and being grateful to him?... + + ..."We found our hero in his study, a table before him, covered + with books and papers, a draw half opened and stuffed with letters, + a piano also open at a little distance; and the thief himself, a + little man, but full of spirits, with eyes, hands, feet, and frame + for ever in motion, looking as if it would be a feat for him to sit + for three minutes quiet in his chair. I am no great observer of + proportions, but he seemed to me to be a neat-made little fellow, + tidily buttoned up, young as fifteen at heart, though with hair + that reminded me of 'Alps in the sunset'; not handsome perhaps, but + something in the whole cut of him that pleased me; finished as an + actor, but without an actor's affectation; easy as a gentleman, but + without _some_ gentlemen's formality; in a word, as people say when + they find their brains begin to run aground at the fag-end of a + magnificent period, we found him a hospitable, warm-hearted + Irishman, as pleasant as could be himself, and disposed to make + others so." + +Nothing but civilities resulted from the interview. We learn from +Moore's Diary that he gave them dinner, and told them his opinion of +Repeal--which was, that separation must be considered as its inevitable +consequence. This startled his guests, and they disclaimed "all thoughts +and apprehensions" of such a result. "What strange short-sightedness!" +Moore exclaims. It may be noted that Moore was always exaggerated in his +estimate of consequences, and foretold the most prodigious upheavals as +a result of the Reform Bill. It is also to be noted, that in his +opinion, "so hopeless appeared the fate of Ireland under English +government, whether of Whigs or Tories," that he "would be almost +inclined to run the risk of Repeal even with separation as its too +certain consequence, being convinced that Ireland must go through some +violent and convulsive process before the anomalies of her present +position can be got rid of, and thinking such riddance well worth the +price, however dreadful would be the pain of it." So far was Moore from +thinking that Catholic Emancipation settled Ireland's claims in full. + +His refusal to represent an Irish constituency was however definitely +conveyed to the envoys in a letter, written for publication, which after +grateful acknowledgment of the honour done him, and of the kindness +which had proposed a national subscription to provide him with the +necessary qualification, ended as follows:-- + + "Were I obliged to choose which should be my direct paymaster, the + government or the people, I should say without hesitation, the + people; but I prefer holding on my free course, humble as it is, + unpurchased by either; nor shall I the less continue, as far as my + limited sphere of action extends, to devote such powers as God has + gifted me with to that cause which has always been uppermost in my + heart, which was my first inspiration, and shall be my last--the + cause of Irish freedom." + +Moore's friends with one accord congratulated him not only on the taste +of his letter, but on his decision. And indeed, quite apart from +considerations of money, his position in Parliament would have been +impossible. In agreement neither with Whigs nor Tories, he was hardly +more in sympathy with O'Connell's party; and he gave strong expression +to his feelings in a remarkable lyric included in the tenth and last +number of the _Irish Melodies_, published in 1834:-- + + "The dream of those days when first I sung thee is o'er, + Thy triumph hath stain'd the charm thy sorrows then wore; + And ev'n of the light which Hope once shed o'er thy chains, + Alas, not a gleam to grace thy freedom remains. + + "Say, is it that slavery sunk so deep in thy heart, + That still the dark brand is there, though chainless thou art; + And Freedom's sweet fruit, for which thy spirit long burn'd, + Now, reaching at last thy lip, to ashes hath turn'd. + + "Up Liberty's steep by Truth and Eloquence led, + With eyes on her temple fix'd, how proud was thy tread! + Ah, better thou ne'er hadst lived that summit to gain, + Or died in the porch, than thus dishonour the fane." + +A footnote pointed the meaning in these words. + + "Written in one of those moods of hopelessness and disgust which + come occasionally over the mind, in contemplating the present state + of Irish patriotism." + +Not unnaturally, O'Connell was angry, and his friend Con Lyne wrote to +Moore, entreating "an alleviating word." Moore replied, the Journal +notes-- + + "that I was not surprised at O'Connell's feeling those verses, as I + had felt them deeply myself in writing them; but that they were + wrung from me by a desire to put on record (in the only work of + mine likely to reach after-times) that though going along, heart + and soul, with the great cause of Ireland, I by no means went with + the spirit or the manner in which that cause had been for a long + time conducted." + +He admitted that, though the verses were addressed to Ireland, O'Connell +had a right to take them to himself, "as he is and has been for a long +time, to all public intents and purposes, Ireland." That was just what +Moore complained of. He disliked the removal of "all independent and +really public-spirited co-operators"; he regarded the position of this +"mighty unit of a legion of ciphers" as a threat to freedom, certain to +lead to an abuse of power. "Against such abuse of power, let it be +placed in what hands it might," he "had all his life revolted and would +to the last revolt." From the dignity of this really serious criticism +he detracted somewhat by adding that O'Connell's resolution against +duelling had done much "to lower the once high tone of feeling in +Ireland"; for he omitted to make the necessary observation that, when +O'Connell forswore duelling, he by no means forswore personal +vituperation. The letter contained no allusion to a feeling which +certainly was in Moore's mind when he wrote the verses--namely, his +dislike of the "annual stipend from the begging-box." But even without +this, it was an explanation ill calculated to alleviate, and Moore +thought that public feeling in Ireland might probably run strong against +him. + +Ireland, however, was constant to her poet. In the next summer (1835) he +crossed to Dublin, when the British Association was meeting there, and +the demonstration when he was first seen in the theatre went beyond all +customary bounds and was not to be checked without a brief speech from +the box. But a more ceremonious ovation was to come. Moore decided to go +to Wexford to visit the home of his grand-parents, and he was to be the +guest of a Mr. Boyse who lived at Bannow. On the approach to this town +from Wexford--where Moore was met by his host--the party was encountered +by a cavalcade bearing green banners, and so escorted formally to a +series of triumphal arches, where a decorated car awaited the poet, with +Nine Muses ("some of them remarkably pretty girls") ready to place a +crown on his head. It had been arranged that the Muses should follow on +foot; but as the crowd pressed in, Moore made three of them get up on +the car. As they proceeded slowly along, with a band playing Irish +melodies, and the tune set to Byron's "Here's a health to thee, Tom +Moore," the hero turned to the pretty Muse behind him and said, "This is +a long journey for you." "'Oh, sir,' she exclaimed, with a sweetness and +kindness of look not to be found in more artificial life, 'I wish it was +more than three hundred miles.'" + +Speeches followed, with dancing in the evening, and a green balloon +floated over the dancers, bearing to the skies, "Welcome, Tom Moore." +That evening there came an express from the Lady Superior of the +Presentation Convent at Wexford, begging for a visit to her community. +Thither accordingly Moore was taken next day, and, for a crowning +ceremony, planted with his own hands--"Oh Cupid, prince of gods and +men!"--a myrtle in the convent garden. No sooner was the plant in the +earth, than the gardener proclaimed, while filling up the hole, "This +will not be called _myrtle_ any longer, but the _Star of Airin_!" Well +may Moore ask, "Where is the English gardener chat would have been +capable of such a flight?" + +Demonstrations of this organised character did not recur; but the +spontaneous outbursts of feeling manifested themselves, publicly and +privately, in ways often a little ridiculous, but not less often really +touching. When Moore next visited Ireland (in 1838) he went to the +theatre evidently with the purpose of making a speech, and the +opportunity was furnished with eclat: "There exists no title of honour +or distinction," he told them, "to which I could attach half so much +value as that of being called your poet--the poet of the people of +Ireland." Certainly the title was not grudged; and the people of Ireland +claimed a sort of proprietary right in their bard, as he found when he +embarked at Kingstown for his return. + + "The packet was full of people coming to see friends off, and + amongst others was a party of ladies, who, I should think, had + dined on board, and who, on my being made known to them, almost + devoured me with kindness, and at length proceeded so far as to + insist on, each of them, _kissing_ me. At this time I was beginning + to feel the first rudiments of coming _sickness_, and the effort + to respond to all this enthusiasm, in such a state of stomach, was + not a little awkward and trying. However, I kissed the whole party + (about five, I think) in succession, two or three of them being, + for my comfort, young and good-looking, and was most glad to get + away from them to my berth, which through the kindness of the + captain (Emerson) was in his own cabin. But I had hardly shut the + door, feeling very qualmish, and most glad to have got over this + osculatory operation, when there came a gentle tap at the door, and + an elderly lady made her appearance, who said that having heard of + all that had been going on, she could not rest easy without being + also kissed as well as the rest. So, in the most respectful manner + possible, I complied with the lady's request, and then betook + myself with a heaving stomach to my berth." + +A more modest and less embarrassing act of homage was brought to Moore's +notice in London by Panizzi. Among the labourers at work on the +buildings of the British Museum was a poor Irishman, who, learning that +Moore was sometimes to be seen there, offered a pot of ale to any one +who would point him out. Accordingly, next time Moore came, the Irishman +was taken to where he could get a sight of the poet, as he sat reading. +Such was his pleasure at being able to say "I have seen," that he +doubled the pot of ale to his conductor. Again, in 1842 Moore was coming +away from a public dinner with Washington Irving, and they found rain +falling and themselves in sore need of cab or umbrella. + + "As we were provided with neither," Moore writes, "our plight was + becoming serious, when a common cad ran up to me and said: 'Shall I + get you a cab, Mr. Moore? Sure, ain't _I_ the man that patronises + your Melodies?' He then ran off in search of a vehicle, while + Irving and I stood close up, like a pair of male Caryatides under + the very narrow projection of a hall door-ledge, and thought at + last that we were quite forgotten by my patron. But he came + faithfully back, and while putting me into the cab (without minding + at all the trifle that I gave him for his trouble) he said + confidentially in my ear: 'Now mind, whenever you want a cab, + Misthur Moore, just call for Tim Flaherty, I'm your man.' Now this + I call _fame_, and of somewhat a more agreeable kind than that of + Dante, when the women in the street found him out by the marks of + hellfire on his beard." + +Green balloons, effusive elderly spinsters and the rest, all had their +ridiculous side, and Moore was not slow to see it. But, taking these +merely as symptoms of a very genuine affection, one may conclude that he +had a fair right to feel in his country's gratitude a deep source of +strength and consolation. For the rest, the pleasures of friendship and +of society never failed him so long as he was able to enjoy them; and +his English friends, in the time when he most needed it, did him a real +service. + +We have seen that he neither liked the measures of the Whig +administration--which included two of his intimates, Lord Lansdowne and +Lord John Russell, with many others of his friends--nor was in the least +disposed to conceal his dislike of them. Lord John wrote to say that he +was glad of Moore's decision not to enter Parliament, as it would pain +him to find his friend going into the opposite lobby. But he was none +the less inclined to serve Moore, and his first step showed an extreme +anxiety to propitiate the poet's easily alarmed scruples. He approached +Lord Melbourne, then Premier, with a proposal to bestow a pension on +Moore's sons. Melbourne replied, with great justice, that to make a +small provision for young men was only an encouragement to idleness, and +that whatever was done, should be done for Moore himself. When the +administration was reconstructed in July 1835, Lord John offered his +friend a place in the State Paper Office, which was declined, and Lord +Lansdowne then wrote, approving this refusal, but urging in the +strongest terms Moore's acceptance of a pension, "which," he said, "no +human being can blame the government for giving or you for accepting. +The administration is one of a more popular character as respects your +Irish opinions than any which has existed or is likely to exist; and +your literary reputation is so established that there is not a country +under the sun where literary rewards or distinctions exist in which you +would not be recognised as the first and most deserving object of them." + +To this Moore replied that he would trust himself entirely to Lord +Lansdowne's guidance, and accordingly a letter reached him in Dublin, +saying that a pension of L300 a year had been granted him--the first +granted by the Administration. On his return from the festivities in +Bannow, a letter from Bessy awaited him, which is copied in the +Journal:-- + + "My dearest Tom,--Can it _really_ be true that you have a pension + of L300 a year? Mrs., Mr., two Misses and young Longman were here + to-day, and tell me it is really the case, and that they have seen + it in two papers. Should it turn out true, I know not how we can be + thankful enough to those who gave it, or to a Higher Power. The + Longmans were very kind and nice and so was _I_, and I invited them + _all five_ to come at some future time. At present I can think of + nothing but L300 a year, and dear Russell jumps and claps his hands + for joy.... If the story is true of the L300, pray give dear Ellen + L20, and _insist_ on her drinking L5 worth of wine _yearly_ to be + paid out of the L300 a year.... Is it true? I am in a fear of hope + and anxiety and feel very oddly. No one to talk to but sweet Buss, + who says, 'Now, Papa will not have to work so hard, and will be + able to go out a little.' ... _N.B._--If this good news be true, it + will make a great difference in my _eating_. I shall then indulge + in butter to potatoes. _Mind_ you do not tell this piece of + gluttony to _any_ one." + +It is pleasant to think of this climax to all the exultation of the +Wexford processions. Moore was entitled to say to himself that he had +done yeoman's service to the principles for which a Whig administration +then stood, and yet had shown his complete independence of persons. What +he received, no man could say had been gained by any compromise with his +convictions; and it came at a time when it was much needed, for his +power of literary production had largely spent itself. The comic +inspiration had not indeed wholly run dry, for in 1835 Moore published +_The Fudges in England_ (a work even more unworthy of its predecessor +than most sequels); and in 1836 he entered into an agreement to supply +the _Morning Chronicle_ with squibs--his _Times_ connection having long +dropped. But except for this, and the furbishing up in 1839 of +_Alciphron_, his first draft in verse of the Egyptian story, nothing +more appears to have been produced by him, except the volumes of his +_History of Ireland_, which appeared respectively in 1835, 1836, 1840, +and 1846. + +In fact, within the last seventeen years of his existence, Moore wrote +little or nothing but these volumes of history, for which he appears to +have received L500 apiece. It will be seen how timely was the succour of +the pension. + +One other resource, however, and a considerable one, was afforded by a +project on which Moore's heart had long been set, and which finally +matured in 1837--that of collecting his poetical works into a complete +edition. The copyrights of his early Poems had returned to him, but the +great bulk of his lyrics was held by Power's widow--for the little +publisher had died in 1836, not before disputed accounts had altered the +long and friendly relation between him and the author of the _Irish +Melodies_. Longmans now bought out her rights for L1000, and paid Moore +another thousand for the task of collecting and arranging the poems and +writing prefaces, many of which contain interesting biographic detail. +It was a long labour, but the edition was finally completed in 1841. +Unhappily in that year, he was in no case to be concerned for its +success or failure; the Diary hardly refers to this event, of such +importance in a man's literary life. Troubles, which had long been heavy +and insistent upon him, then fairly culminated. + + * * * * * + +In spite of his love and talent for society, Moore was essentially a +domestic animal; and, as he advanced in life, his home ties were +stronger and stronger. The welfare of his children and their health--for +they were all delicate--preoccupied him with a constant and painful +anxiety, which was, however, more than compensated by the pleasure which +he derived from them as they grew up. + +He was indeed no baby-worshipper, and notes profanely after one birth: +"Bessy doing marvellously well, and the little fright, as all such young +things are, prospering also." The first death in his household, that of +an infant girl, Byron's goddaughter, affected him mainly as a cause of +grief to his wife; and even when he lost his eldest daughter in 1817, +truly and deeply though he sorrowed, it is evident enough that the +weight of the blow fell on Bessy rather than on him. He was then the one +of the two to take thought for the other; not perhaps that he cared +less, but that his temperament was then more natural and healthy. + +Eight years later he notes the first symptom of what was doubtless a +growing infirmity. About a fortnight after his father's death he spent +the evening in Dublin with some old friends, and sang a good deal for +them.--"In singing 'There's a song of the Olden Time,' the feeling which +I had so long suppressed" (for he had been active in endeavouring to +keep up his mother's spirits) "broke out; I was obliged to leave the +room, and continued sobbing hysterically on the stairs for several +minutes." From this onward, the same proclivity manifested itself at +intervals with growing vehemence. After any stress of emotion, the +plangent quality of his own voice in singing tended to produce one of +these outbursts, when it seemed as if his chest must burst under the +strain. Yet he always fought against the weakness, and notes more than +once how, after a sudden collapse of this kind, he made an effort, and +returned to the piano, laughing at himself, while he rattled off gay +songs. + +But the wrench which of all others seems to have done most to shatter +him, came not long after this first breakdown (which dates from the end +of 1826, his forty-seventh year); and it found a man strangely altered +from what he had been ten or twelve years earlier. His eldest girl's +death had left the second, Anastasia, to inherit a double share of +affection, and her chronic delicacy kept her parents continually +anxious. At last the beginning of the end came early in 1829, just at +the moment when Moore was receiving news that Catholic emancipation was +a certainty. "Could I ever have thought," he writes, "that such an event +would, under any circumstances, find me indifferent to it? Yet such is +almost the case at present." Even when he wrote this, he did not realise +the worst; the truth was not forced on him till his wife had been +"wasting away on the knowledge of it" for three weeks. We have his +detailed account of the last fortnight, during which the parents could +do nothing but make their child's last days as happy as they +could--spending the evenings together with the girl, playing little +games, reading aloud and so forth. His description of the end must be +quoted:-- + + "Next morning (Sunday 8th) I rose early, and, on approaching the + room, heard the dear child's voice as strong, I thought, as usual; + but on entering, I saw death plainly in her face. When I asked her + how she had slept, she said 'Pretty well,' in her usual courteous + manner; but her voice had a sort of hollow and distant softness, + not to be described. When I took her hand on leaving her, she said + (I thought significantly), 'Good-bye, papa.' I will not attempt to + tell what I felt at all this. I went occasionally to listen at the + door of the room, but did not go in, as Bessy, knowing what an + effect (through my whole future life) such a scene would have on + me, implored me not to be present at it.... In about three quarters + of an hour or less, she called for me, and I came and took her hand + for a few seconds, during which Bessy leaned down her head between + the poor dying child and me, that I might not see her countenance. + As I left the room, too, agonised as her own mind was, my sweet + thoughtful Bessy ran anxiously after me, and, giving me a + smelling-bottle, exclaimed, 'For God's sake, don't you get ill.' In + about a quarter of an hour afterwards, she came to me, and I saw + that all was over. I could no longer restrain myself; the feelings + I had been so long suppressing found vent, and a fit of loud + violent sobbing seized me, in which I felt as if my chest were + coming asunder." + +Avoiding, after his habit, the actual sensations of horror, Moore took +his wife out for a drive while the funeral was going on. There is no +doubt, as I have said already, something unmasculine in all this +shrinking from the physical impression, and one may trace something of +the luxury of grief in the detailed recital. But the note with which it +closes has the true accent of tragedy:-- + + "And such is the end of so many years of fondness and of hope; and + nothing is left us but the dream (which may God in his mercy + realise), that we shall see our pure child again in a world more + worthy of her." + +Gradually, however, time healed the rawness of the wound, and in June of +the same year, a new interest was added to Moore's London visits. His +eldest boy, Tom, was installed at the Charterhouse, on a nomination +secured through Lord Grey, and from this onward the Diary is full of +references to the boy's charming (but idle) ways. Moore records dinners +with Master Tom,--"who, bless the dear fellow, was more amusing than any +of the _beaux esprits_,"--compliments on his beauty, valued all the more +because a likeness was noted to his mother, and, in short, gives every +instance of parental fondness. We read less perhaps about the other boy, +Lord John Russell's godson and namesake, who entered the same school a +year or two later, Sir Robert Peel this time giving the nomination. But +of both his boys Moore was mighty fond and proud, and it was a moment of +great happiness in his life when, in 1830, he conveyed Bessy and the +pair of them to Dublin for a visit to his other home in Abbey Street. + + "My sweet sister Nell, just the same gentle spirit as ever; both in + great delight with our boys; and my dear Bess never looked so + handsome as she did sitting by my mother, with a face bearing the + utmost sweetness and affection, all for my sake. Had a most happy + family dinner." + +The happiness lasted through the visit of six weeks. It was fifteen +years since Bessy Moore had been in Ireland, and then she had not lived +in the same house with her husband's folk, who consequently knew her +mainly by report. "They have now, however," Moore writes, "had her with +them as one of themselves, and the result has been what I never could +doubt it would be." + +Six months later an urgent summons from his sister prepared him for the +severing of the closest and oldest of all ties. But when he reached +Dublin he found his mother rallied, and her doctor (Crampton) quoting +Mother Hubbard at her. After three or four days her strength was so far +restored that he felt able to return. But her parting from her son was +that of one taking the last farewell. She told him--and indeed she had +good right to--that he had always done his duty, and more than his duty, +by her and hers. Twelve months later she died, and the news was +announced by letter. The effect upon Moore was not that of shock, but +rather of deep and saddening depression, which continued for some days +and seemed more to be a bodily indisposition than any mental affliction. +"To lose such a mother was," he said, "like a part of one's life going +out of one." + +There was, however, one consolation for this great loss. Moore's sister, +Ellen, became a yearly visitor to the Sloperton household, and was drawn +fairly into the home circle. Meanwhile, the enthusiasm of his +countrymen, and the good help of the pension, brightened matters; and, +as the boys grew up, Moore's pleasure in their society increased +steadily. + +He had procured, under the most distinguished auspices, their admission +to a first-rate school; and, fond as he was, he enforced in some matters +a standard of conduct more rigid than usual. He set his face against +their taking money from any one but their parents, and expressed +righteous indignation when Lord Holland defended to him the practice of +tipping. Still more indignant was he when the head master represented to +him that the elder boy could get an exhibition worth about L100 a year +to take him to college, and that Moore need only add an allowance of +L150! It seems, however, that exhortations against extravagance +prevailed less than the example of spending money freely, which was set +to the young Tom by those with whom his father led him to associate. The +younger son, Russell, was steadier in character, but decided, like his +brother, for the army; and Moore was accordingly put to the heavy +expense of outfitting both and launching them in this costly profession. +Once launched, however, he was sanguine enough to expect that they could +live on their pay. + +Tom was gazetted to the 22nd regiment in 1837, and was given six months +to study French in Paris, where his father established him under +pleasant conditions. Having joined his regiment in 1838 at Cork, he was +shortly transferred to Dublin, and here his presence was a pleasure to +his aunt, Moore's favourite sister; the news of this made a happy break +in the anxieties at Sloperton, where Bessy Moore, always delicate, had +just come through a severe illness. In the summer, Moore joined his son +and his sister, and was, as we have seen, enormously applauded by his +countrymen at the theatre. Next day the father and son were to have +dined with Lord Morpeth, the Irish Chief Secretary, but by one of the +lapses of memory which began to be habitual with Moore, they presented +themselves instead at the Vice-Regal Lodge and were half through dinner +before the guest realised what he had done, only to be overwhelmed with +expressions of delight at the mistake. It was no doubt a little +difficult for a young man with a father who was on such terms with both +the people and the rulers of Ireland to realise that he was only the son +of a needy and struggling worker, always at straits to make ends meet: +and probably Tom himself took the view, expressed to Moore by a friend +newly come from Ireland, that such an allowance should be made to the +young soldier as would enable him to "live like a gentleman." Moore was +angry, and it is easy to sympathise with his disappointment; easy also +to condemn his want of foresight. + +Tom's regiment was ordered to India, and to India also went the younger +son, Russell, for whom a cadetship in the Company's Army had been +secured. The younger boy sailed in April 1840, and, although the +parting was a heartbreak (above all to the mother), Moore felt at every +turn what he calls gratefully "the value of a friendly fame like mine." +Directors of the Company, officers aboard ship, governors of provinces, +all vied with one another in services; and when the lad reached +Calcutta, Lord Auckland, then Governor-General, gave him a room in +Government House. + +Little good came of all these good offices. Lord Auckland's sincere +kindness could only manifest itself in looking after an invalid and +writing cordial letters to the parents. Russell Moore's health was quite +unequal to the profession he had chosen, and eighteen months after he +had reached India, news came that he had been dangerously ill and was +ordered home. + +In the meanwhile the other son, though keeping his health, was incurring +debts. There is a note from Bessy, copied into the Diary, surely as +heartbroken a cry as could come from a wife and mother. Enclosing a bill +for L120 drawn by Tom upon his father, she writes that she can hardly +bring herself to send it:-- + + "It has caused me tears and sad thoughts, but to _you_ it will + bring these and hard _hard_ work. Why do people sigh for children? + They know not what sorrow will come with them. How _can_ you + arrange for the payment? and what could have caused him to require + such a sum? Take care of yourself; and if you write to him, for + God's sake, let him know that it is the very last sum you will or + _can_ pay for him. My heart is sick when I think of you, and the + fatigue of mind and body you are always kept in. Let me know how + you think you can arrange this." + +A second draft for L100 followed quick on it, and early in the next +year, still worse news. The young man had sold his commission and was on +his way home. L1500 in all had been spent in fitting him out and +purchasing, first an ensigncy, then a lieutenancy; and this was the +upshot of so much anxiety and outlay. And the second boy, who had done +all that could be hoped of him, was on his way home too, to a sad +meeting. "It seemed all but death," Moore writes, "when he stepped out +of the carriage exhausted with the journey, and wasted with lung +disease." There was a rally for a few months, during which Moore was +busy trying to shape some new future for the prodigal Tom, who was +remaining in France. Four hundred pounds would have preserved his +lieutenancy (being the money actually paid down out of the price of his +commission), but Moore refused to find it. He was already reduced to +borrowing from a friend, Mr. Boyse, his Wexford host; and though Rogers, +Lord Lansdowne, and probably many others would, as Lord John Russell +regretfully comments, have willingly advanced the larger sum, they heard +nothing of the need. Moore's own object was to secure his son a +commission in the Austrian service, but Tom himself wrote from France +suggesting the Legion Etrangere. Interest was quickly made with Soult +through Madame Adelaide, who received the prodigal and made much of him +for his father's sake--"a continuation of that spoiling process," Moore +writes sadly, "to which poor Tom (as my son) has been from his childhood +subjected." The thing was settled accordingly, not without another draft +for a hundred and odd pounds to enable the son to leave for Algiers. A +few days before he set out for the new dangers and hardships of Africa, +his brother had died peacefully at home. It was only the last straw in a +load of trouble that the one remaining child could not even get leave +for a farewell visit home, before he launched, under no good omens, into +a new career and clime. + +The record of the nest year (1843) is short and uninteresting--notes of +engagements for the most part. One is characteristic enough to quote:-- + + "_March_ 23. Breakfasted at Rogers's to meet Jeffrey and Lord + John--two of the men I like best among my numerous friends. + Jeffrey's volubility (which was always superabundant) becomes even + more copious, I think, as he grows older. But I am ashamed of + myself for finding any fault with him." + +_"Lenior et melior fit accedente senecta"_ is a phrase that has full +application to this veteran of letters. The year closed with a cruel +hoax (the crueller as it coincided with fresh demands from Tom). Some +one in Ireland wrote to inform Moore that L300 had been left him as a +testimony of regard. Moore had suspicions, but he adds:-- + + "There was an air of truth and reality which half lured my poor + Bess and myself into hailing it as a providential God-send. + Already, indeed, her generous heart was apportioning out the + different presents it would enable her to make to my sister, to the + poor H----s, etc. Alas! alas! I wish no worse to the ingenious + gentleman who penned the letter than an exactly similar + disappointment." + +I shall add the next entry in the Diary, Moore's farewell to the year +1843:-- + + "A strange life mine; but the best as well as pleasantest part of + it lies _at home_. I told my dear Bessy, this morning, that while I + stood at my study window, looking out at her, as she crossed the + field, I sent a blessing after her. 'Thank you, bird,' she replied, + 'that's better than money'; and so it is. Bird is a pet name she + gave me in our younger days, and was suggested by Hamlet's words, + 'Hillo, ho, ho, boy! come, bird, come'; being the call, it seems, + which falconers use to their hawk in the air, when they would have + him come down to them." + +What one feels on reading these passages, and contrasting them with many +earlier ones, is perhaps best expressed by assenting to the view of Miss +Berry, recorded in the Diary. Moore had taken the liberty of an old +friend in going unasked to one of her famous _soirees_, and on his +saying something of this:-- + + "She reverted in her odd way to the early days of our acquaintance, + and said, 'I didn't so much like you in those days. You were + too-too--what shall I say?' 'Too brisk and airy perhaps,' said I. + 'Yes,' she replied, taking hold of one of my grizzly locks, 'I like + you better since you have got these.' I could then overhear her, + after I left her, say to the person with whom I had found her + speaking, 'That's as good a creature as ever lived!'" + +The light and buoyant nature, which had been so sorely battered, +received its final shock soon after the date to which I have brought +this story. 1844 was spent in scriving over the _History_,--Moore +repelling now the friendly advances even of his Bowood neighbours, yet +with difficulty repelling them. The task was finished at last in the +spring of 1845, but there remained the need of a preface, and Moore +records that after various endeavours he left this, "in utter despair," +to the publishers to provide. Later in the year, the annual visit from +his sister Ellen made a brightness in the house, now so quiet; and after +she had gone, there came letters from Tom asking for money for a trip +home. It was sent, and he wrote back rejoicing at the prospect, but +explaining that he should not come before spring owing to a cough which +he had contracted. The words were ominous, and both his parents almost +made up their minds that they were never to see him again. + +The foreboding was only too well justified. But the first blow which +fell was one little looked for. Ellen Moore died suddenly in her bed. A +month later came from Africa "a strange and ominous-looking letter which +we opened with trembling hands, and it told us that my son Tom was +dead." I add one last quotation from the Diary. + + "The last of our five children now are gone and I am left desolate + and alone. Not a single relative have I now left in the world." + +That is practically the end of Moore's life. A severe illness followed, +and "when he recovered," says Lord John Russell, "he was a different +man." "Nothing seemed to rest upon his mind," and, with his memory, his +wit had gone also. He made an excursion to town in 1846 to superintend +the production of the last volume of his history, and one year later +still, to be the guest of Rogers, who was to Moore, at any rate, a most +considerate, loyal, helpful, and constant friend. But what he wrote to +this friend from Sloperton was true: "I am sinking here into a mere +vegetable." So, peacefully at the last, after five years of mere +breathing, in which neither joy nor sorrow touched him, he faded out of +life; watched over to the last by the woman who had grown more necessary +to him with every year. + +He left her unprovided with money, yet not without provision. The +Memoirs which he, himself a great lover and reader of such literature, +had scrupulously kept for a period of close on thirty years, were always +designed to be a posthumous resource; and he had confided them by a will +made many years earlier to the care of Lord John Russell. Had he +foreseen that the friend of whom he asked this office would be charged +with the cares of an Administration, when it fell to be accomplished, +the request would probably not have been made; but being made, it was +duly honoured, and Moore, who had always liked impressive auspices for +his children at the font,[1] had himself a Prime Minister for his +biographer. + +The work might perhaps have been better done by a man less fully +occupied, but the purpose for which the Memoirs were written could not +have been more fully served. The Longmans offered L3000 for the Memoirs, +if Lord John would edit them, and it was found that for this sum an +annuity could be bought, equal to the pension which had for the last +part of Moore's life been the sole resource of the household. Bessy +Moore lived and died in Sloperton, and was laid in the churchyard beside +her husband and her children; and old men in the little Wiltshire hamlet +remember her and her good works--the only one of her lifelong pleasures +and occupations which was left to this good woman, whom it is impossible +to think of as lonely. The record of her life and her husband's--for the +two are inseparable--may close with as touching a little attention as +was ever paid by an elderly man to his elderly wife. In 1839, when +money was no way plenty with him, Moore sent five pounds to a friend, +which the friend was to forward anonymously to Bessy for her poor--thus +giving her the pleasure which he judged she would most value, without +the distress of thinking that he must labour more to make up the little +outlay. + + +[1] Lady Donegal, Byron, Lord Lansdowne, Lord John Russell, and Dr. Parr +were among the sponsors. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +GENERAL APPRECIATION + + +Of Moore's personal qualities not much remains to be said; but we may +endeavour to account for the fact that he became the fashion when he was +one-and-twenty, and retained an undiminished vogue for a matter of forty +years. + +His singing undoubtedly first brought him into notice; a late passage in +the Journal recalls, across a gulf of years, one evening at a musical +assembly, when people laughed and stared to see a little Irish lad +brought out to sing after some distinguished professionals; and how the +contemptuous wonder was changed to wonder of a very different kind when +the singer had produced his effect. Hard upon these successes, and +helped by them to succeed, came his _Anacreon_, a volume of easy, +springing and melodious verse, flushed with prodigal youth; and the +combination of the two gifts excited such widespread admiration, that +their fortunate possessor was much sought out. In these early days Moore +was no doubt largely what is called a ladies' man, and the genius for +friendship which he possessed showed itself a good deal with women. From +these years dates the long intimacy with Lady Donegal and her sister, +Miss Godfrey--an intimacy which his marriage in no way ended. These +friends continued for years to correspond with him and to advise on his +affairs. But after marriage, he formed no new friendships with women. +His delight in feminine society never left him, but it was of a special +order. + +Moore was by universal consent the very best of company; a talker who +delighted in the give and take of conversation, and was at least as well +pleased with other people's wit as his own. He had perhaps the less +occasion to be jealous, having in his singing a resource which made him +unrivalled. This talent, however, he would only use in a mixed +company--"hating this operation with he-hearers," as he notes somewhere +of a men's dinner when he was forced to depart from his habit. To women +and for them he sung, while his singing powers lasted; but it is not +unfair to say that he valued women in society chiefly as decorative +accessories and as an audience. Among the innumerable good things noted +in his Diary, hardly one is credited to a woman. And, well as he liked +singing to a mixed audience, it is clear that his chief pleasure, as he +advanced in life, lay in the society of men. + +With men, his intimacies were numerous enough, for Moore was as popular +in clubs as in drawing-rooms, and most of his intimates were persons of +title. Byron said that "Tommy dearly loved a lord"; and a hundred people +know this saying, for one who has seen Byron's sincerer utterance (not +published in Moore's edition of the _Life and Letters_):--"I have had +the kindest letter from Moore. I do think that man is the +best-hearted--the only _hearted_ being I ever encountered; and his +talents are equal to his feelings." It is therefore worth while to note +that Moore by no means loved any or every lord. He did, however, +certainly desire to associate with those who possessed hereditary +station and had the brains to make a generous use of it, both in +acquiring power and in drawing to their houses men like Moore +himself--or Sydney Smith, whom Moore loved better to meet than any lord, +except perhaps Lord John Russell. His deliberate opinion, stated more +than once in the Diary, was that in his time the most agreeable and also +the purest tone of society was to be found at the top of the social +ladder. And in point of fact he was admitted to intimacy with the Whig +aristocracy in its most brilliant day. Bowood and Holland House, as +Moore knew them, were probably the best things of their kind that +England has ever seen. + +For a description of the charm which made him not only welcome but +courted in these great houses, it would be hard to better that set down +by Haydon the painter, in his autobiography:-- + + "Met Moore at dinner, and spent a very pleasant three hours. He + told his stories with a hit-or-miss air, as if accustomed to people + of rapid apprehension. It being asked at Paris who they would have + as godfather for Rothschild's child, 'Talleyrand,' said a + Frenchman. _'Pourquoi, Monsieur?' 'Parce qu'il est le moins + chretien possible.'_ Moore is a delightful, gay, voluptuous, + refined, natural creature; infinitely more unaffected than + Wordsworth; not blunt and uncultivated like Chantrey, or bilious + and shivering like Campbell. No affectation, but a true, refined, + delicate, frank poet, with sufficient air of the world to prove his + fashion, sufficient honesty of manner to show fashion has not + corrupted his native taste; making allowance for prejudices instead + of condemning them, by which he seemed to have none himself; never + talking of his own work from an intense consciousness that + everybody else did; while Wordsworth is talking of his own + productions from apprehension that they are not enough matter of + conversation. Men must not be judged too hardly. Success or failure + will either destroy or better the finest natural parts. Unless one + had heard Moore tell the above story of Talleyrand, it would have + been impossible to conceive the air of half-suppressed impudence, + the delicate light-horse canter of phrase, with which the words + floated out of his sparkling anacreontic mouth." + +To the personal notability which his social talent secured him, Moore +owed much of his later successes as a prose writer: in part because of +the access which it afforded to sources of information; in part because +everybody knew him, and read with expectation whatever he wrote. But as +a poet, his fame was a thing wholly independent of personal charm. +People knew that the writer whose songs they had by heart was courted in +the most brilliant world; they knew also that he had shown in various +difficult junctures a high spirit of honour and independence. But they +knew these things mainly because they liked his poetry. Prom all this +contemporary fame of the poet, one must try to analyse what remains. + +Moore himself--except during his stay in Paris, when much adulation led +him to question whether he might not perhaps really deserve to rank with +Scott and Byron--always regarded his poetry as unlikely to last. His +modesty was real; for not only did he feel himself overshadowed by Scott +and Byron, but, placed in the difficult position of knowing himself +popular and Wordsworth all but unread, he never hesitated in recognising +Wordsworth's as by far the greater talent. His growing admiration for +this poet is all the more remarkable, because at many meetings his sense +of ridicule was frequently stimulated by Wordsworth's egotism and +"soliloquacious" habit of conversation. Coleridge he could neither like +nor understand, and it seems that he did not care much for Shelley. But +throughout his Diary, one finds him manifesting, in many passages, the +conviction that these men, the unread, were better artists than himself; +and he notes with exceptional pleasure any word of praise from them, as +if he expected only dislike and disapprobation for his facile and +popular verses. Not less should it be noted, that none of them praised +his longer poems, but all (except of course Wordsworth) spoke with +sincere enthusiasm of his lyrics. The opinion of Landor and of Shelley +was, in effect, that expressed by Moore himself: that of his whole work +the _Irish Melodies_ alone were likely to last into future times. But +both Shelley (as reported by his wife) and Landor agreed in attributing +to Moore's lyrics the highest poetical merit. How far critical opinion +may ultimately bear out this estimate must remain to be seen; but +probably the depreciation of Moore's work, which prevails at present, is +hardly more judicious than Lord John Russell's extravagant over-praise. + +The last century has been one of increasing virtuosity in the management +of lyric metres. From Cowper and Crabbe to Mr. Swinburne, is a strange +distance; and it has not been sufficiently realised that Moore is very +largely responsible for the advance. Many critics have noted the change +from the strictly syllabic scansion of Pope's school to metres like +those of Tennyson's _Maud_, and a hundred later poems, in which syllabic +measurement is wholly discarded. It has been noted also that, even in +the freer metres of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, lyric +writers confined themselves to variations of the trochee or iambic, and +that an anapaestic or dactylic measure is hardly found before Waller. But +it has hardly been recognised that till Moore began to use these triple +feet, no poet used them with dexterity and confidence. + +Coleridge, it is true, and Scott had employed a broken rhythm, +substituting the temporal for the syllabic ictus, to vary the monotony +of the eight-syllabled narrative verse. But, to judge of the best that +could be done before Moore's time with a purely anapaestic measure, one +may refer to Wordsworth's "At the corner of Wood Street, when daylight +appears." These verses are sufficiently destitute of the lyrical quality +which is so constantly present in any work of Shelley's. But Moore had +done all but all his best work, before Shelley had written six poems +worthy of remembrance. + +Going back, as we have seen, to the seventeenth century for his +inspiration in style, Moore began by using only the trochaic and iambic +measures. In the _Epistles and Odes_, we find one epistle (that to +Atkinson) written in well-managed anapaeests, but more notable is the +very delicate rhythm of the Canadian Boat Song--inspired by a tune. It +is Moore's great distinction that he brought into English verse +something of the variety and multiplicity of musical rhythms. When the +_Irish Melodies_ began to appear, it is no wonder that readers should +have been dazzled by the skill with which a profusion of metres were +handled; and the poet showed himself even more inventive in rhythms than +in stanzas. + +The most curious part of the matter is that Moore was really importing +into English poetry some of the characteristics of a literature which he +did not know. He had not a word of Gaelic, and (like O'Connell) desired +to see it die out. He observes that Spanish alone of European metrical +systems employs "assonantic" instead of consonantic rhyme, though he was +bred in a country where rhyme of this order had been brought to an +extraordinary pitch of perfection. But he based his work upon Irish +times, composed in the primitive manner, before music was divorced from +poetry. One may say, virtually, that in fitting words to these tunes, he +reproduced in English the rhythms of Irish folk song. + +The thing was not done completely: for instance, in the first number of +the _Melodies_, the song "Erin, the smile and the tear in thine eye," is +to the tune of "Eileen Aroon," and the Irish words (which survive in +this instance and, I am told by my friend Mr. O'Neil Russell, in only +one other), do not correspond in metre with Moore's. He has varied the +tune, and is consequently using a different stanza, which corresponds +with the Irish only in the last three lines of the refrain. In the other +instance, that of "O blame not the bard," there is a general +correspondence in metre, but here the Irish metre is one not very +different from an ordinary English stanza--though, as usual in Irish +folk-poetry, the line is measured by time and not by syllables. + +The need for fitting metre to music forced Moore into employing a wide +variety of stanzas; and his example was of service in a day which had +been little used to anything but the couplet and quatrain of three or +four well-worn types. But by far more remarkable was the achievement in +three separate poems of a metrical effect wholly new in English. Of +these, one is probably the most beautiful lyric that Moore ever wrote:-- + + "At the mid hour of night, when the stars are weeping, I fly + To the lone vale we loved, when life shone warm in thine eye; + And I think oft, if spirits can steal from the regions of air, + To revisit past scenes of delight, thou wilt come to me there, + And tell me our love is remember'd, even in the sky! + + "Then I sing the wild song 'twas once such pleasure, to hear, + When our voices, commingling, breathed, like one, on the ear; + And, as Echo far off through the vale my sad orison rolls, + I think, O my love! 'tis thy voice, from the Kingdom of Souls, + Faintly answering still the notes that once were so dear." + +In the second, the same structure is used for the line, but with a +different and simpler stanza:-- + + "Through grief and through danger thy smile hath cheer'd my way, + Till hope seemed to bud from each thorn that round me lay; + The darker our fortune, the brighter our pure love burn'd; + Till shame into glory, till fear into zeal was turn'd; + Yes, slave as I was, in thy arms my spirit felt free, + And bless'd even the sorrows that made me more dear to thee. + + "Thy rival was honour'd, whilst thou wert wrong'd and scorn'd, + Thy crown was of briers, while gold her brows adorn'd; + She woo'd me to temples, while thou layest hid in caves, + Her friends were all masters, while thine, alas! were slaves; + Yet cold in the earth, at thy feet, I would rather be, + Than wed what I love not, or turn one thought from thee. + + "They slander thee sorely, who say thy vows are frail-- + Hadst thou been a false one, thy cheek had look'd less pale, + They say too, so long thou hast worn those lingering chains, + That deep in thy heart they have printed their servile stains-- + Oh! foul is the slander--no chain could that soul subdue-- + Where shineth _thy_ spirit, there liberty shineth too!" + +In these verses we have of course an allegory. By a fashion common in +Irish poetry, the poet expresses as a love song his political +allegiance--though here the Catholic Church, rather than Ireland, is the +"Dark Rosaleen" or "Kathleen ni Houlihan," to whom the passion is +addressed. The third of this remarkable group has been quoted already: +it is Moore's rebuke to Ireland, or to O'Connell, "The dream of those +days when first I sung thee is o'er"; and it is very notable that for +such an occasion he should have chosen his most distinctively Irish +manner. The peculiarity of these metres--the dragging, wavering cadence +that half baulks the ear--is the distinctive characteristic of Irish +verse. No English poet, so far as I know, has caught it; but Mangan gave +this character to some of his finest renderings from the Irish, and in +our own day Mr. Yeats has shown an increasing tendency towards this +subtle and evasive beauty. + +It is I think mainly as an artist in metre that Moore still holds an +importance in the history of English poetry; and any one considering the +poems just quoted will see how individual and original were his +achievements. But the admirable qualities in his verse by which he +impressed his contemporaries were rather those of lightness and +swiftness: its sweetness, of which much was made, is a good deal less +admirable. For this, however, the nature of his best lyric work was +largely responsible. + +He wrote songs to be sung; and the best verse is not that which sings +best. Language has to be softened down for singing, as it need not be +for speech; and this softening approaches to emasculation. The habit of +writing for music injured Moore's versification even when he wrote +narrative verse; and we have the result in the excessive smoothness of +_Lalla Rookh_. + +Even more unfortunately did the medium of production affect his style. +Moore's conception of singing was certainly not one in which the words +were to be sacrificed to the music; but he wrote his words to be sung; +and words for singing must carry their meaning easily through the ear to +the intelligence--for what is sung can never be caught so easily as what +is spoken. He was led, therefore, to use a strict economy of ideas; to +expand rather than condense his meaning. Take such a verse as this (from +"Farewell, but whenever you welcome the hour"):-- + + "Let Fate do her worst; there are relics of joy, + Bright dreams of the past, which she cannot destroy, + Which come in the night-time of sorrow and care, + And tiring back the features that joy used to wear. + Long, long be my heart with such memories fill'd! + Like the vase, in which roses have once been distill'd-- + You may break, you may shatter the vase if you will, + But the scent of the roses will hang round it still"-- + +and set beside it Shelley's:-- + + "Music when soft voices die + Vibrates in the memory: + Odours when sweet violets sicken + Live within the sense they quicken; + Rose leaves when the rose is dead + Are heaped for the beloved's bed; + And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone, + Love itself shall slumber on." + +There is no doubt of Shelley's superiority; but on the other hand +Shelley's words, if sung, would not carry their sense so easily as +Moore's. The mind would lose itself in the quick succession of +metaphors; and it is noticeable in the _Melodies_ how often the whole +song is merely the skilful and deliberate evolution of a single +metaphor--an art akin to the rhetorician's. This is true even of the +famous "Oh breathe not his name"; and, indeed, it is not less true that +Emmet's utterance was the real poem--Moore's only an ingenious +amplification of the thought--or rather of a part of it. + +One must bear in mind, then, that Moore's lyrics are verse written for +public utterance, designed to produce their impression instantly, and +not to sink slowly into the mind: and it is useless to compare them with +the packed thought of Shakespeare's sonnets, Wordsworth's odes, or +whatever else is in the highest category of lyric poetry. + +There is, however, a class of verse to which hardly anything can be +preferred, and in it are not only the songs of Shakespeare, but some of +Scott's and many of Burns's; music as simple as a bird's, dealing in the +simplest emotions, free from all taint of rhetoric. In that class I do +not think that anything of Moore's can be placed. But one must remember +when Moore wrote. He wrote under the influence of the eighteenth +century, when the reaction towards a style less coloured by convention +had barely set in. He wrote, it is true, when Scott did, and not long +after Burns; but both Burns and Scott (whenever Scott is at his best) +had the guiding inspiration of a perfect style in the Lowland vernacular +poetry, never sophisticated by criticism, or by the intrusion of a +dialect of polite prose. And if one compares Moore's lyrics with the +best that Burns wrote _in English_, when liable to the influence of Gray +and the rest, I do not think it is to Burns that the preference will be +given--by the impartial arbiter, who should be neither Scot nor Irish. + +It is, however, unreasonable to talk about Moore's lyrics as a whole, +for the work falls into two distinct categories, and in one of these +Moore must be pronounced the equal of any man who ever lived. The +lighter numbers breathe the very spirit of gaiety, united to a real +distinction of style:-- + + "Drink to her, who long + Hath waked the poet's sigh, + The girl who gave to song + What gold could never buy." + +Still more characteristic perhaps is another, so melodious and so +roguish:-- + + "The young May moon is beaming, love, + The glow-worm's lamp is gleaming, love, + How sweet to rove + Through Morna's grove, + When the drowsy world is dreaming, love! + + Then awake!--the heavens look bright, my dear, + 'Tis never too late for delight, my dear, + And the best of all ways + To lengthen our days + Is to steal a few hours from the night, my dear." + +Neither Prior nor Praed, nor any other master of the lighter lyric, has +equalled these; and better still, perhaps, is the well-known verse:-- + + "The time I've lost in wooing, + In watching and pursuing + The light that lies + In woman's eyes, + Has been my heart's undoing. + Though Wisdom oft has sought me, + I scorn'd the lore she brought me. + My only books + Were woman's looks, + And folly's all they've taught me." + +But it should be noticed that the gay metre, which fits this last humour +like a glove, is on the very next page applied to a serious theme, which +it dishonours, none the less for the refrain tacked on:-- + + "Oh, where's the slave so lowly, + Condemn'd to chains unholy, + Who, could he burst + His bonds at first, + Would pine beneath them slowly? + What soul, whose wrongs degrade it, + Would wait till time decay'd it, + When thus its wing + At once may spring + To the throne of Him who made it? + Farewell, Erin,--farewell, all, + Who live to weep our fall." + +The tune no doubt demanded the double rhyme, and in Irish, it must be +remembered, double rhymes do not involve a jingle, being only an +assonance of the vowels ("weepeth" for instance would be a full rhyme to +"meeting"). Moore, writing English, was profuse in double rhymes, and +did not even shrink from the device, proper only, with few exceptions, +to trivial and comic verse, of forming the rhyme with two words. Thus, +for instance, we find him destroying a fine opening in the lyric:-- + + "Avenging and bright fall the swift sword of Erin + On him who the brave sons of Usna betray'd-- + For every fond eye he hath waken'd a tear in, + A drop from his heart-wounds shall weep o'er her blade." + +All this criticism is of course from the standpoint of a reader. +Considered as compositions to be sung, the _Melodies_ are probably +little injured by this defect in style, and the rhetorical effect of-- + + "Where's the slave so lowly + Condemned to chains unholy," + +may even gain by the amplitude of the ending. + +Throughout, I think, it can hardly be denied that the poetry of Moore's +lyrics lies very close to eloquence and is remote from that distinctive +quality of the highest poetic expression which transcends rhetoric +altogether. A proof lies in the fact that these songs are among the most +translatable of all poetry--and among the most translated. Their charm +lies, like that of French poetry (before the Romantic movement), in the +felicitous expression of an apt or moving thought. It might be difficult +to express the idea so well in another language; but no one would feel +it impossible. Take such lines as:-- + + "To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, + Creeps in this petty pace from day to day," + +and the most careless will feel that, beyond the idea expressed, there +is an accent, and a suggestion as if of gesture, somehow incorporated +with the actual words and inseparable from them. An effect of this kind +is rarely achieved by Moore. His words always clearly convey the +definite thought, but they hardly ever convey anything more. We have, in +the most characteristic examples of his art, a quite extraordinary +eloquence, in such poems as those on Emmet and on Emmet's betrothed, or +that on Lord Edward ("When he who adores thee"), or "The Prince's Song" +("When first I met thee"); or again in the fierce strain of "Sad one of +Sion." The last stanzas of this may be quoted; they compare the fate +that was Judea's with the fate that may be Ireland's. + + "Yet hadst thou thy vengeance--yet came there the morrow, + That shines out, at last, on the longest dark night, + When the sceptre that smote thee with slavery and sorrow, + Was shiver'd at once, like a reed, in thy sight. + + "When that cup, which for others the proud Golden City + Had brimm'd full of bitterness, drench'd her own lips; + And the world she had trampled on heard, without pity, + The howl in her halls, and the cry from her ships. + + "When the curse Heaven keeps for the haughty came over + Her merchants rapacious, her rulers unjust, + And, a ruin, at last, for the earthworm to cover, + The Lady of Kingdoms lay low in the dust." + +Nothing could be more complete and rounded as the expression of an +emotion than "The Harp that once"; but I find less rhetoric and even +more poetry in the lovely address to the spirit of Irish music which +closed the sixth number of the _Melodies_, and should have closed the +series. Familiar as it is, Moore has become so far obsolete, for English +readers, that it may be given here:-- + + "Dear Harp of my Country! in darkness I found thee, + The cold chain of silence had hung o'er thee long, + When proudly, my own Island Harp, I unbound thee, + And gave all thy chords to light, freedom, and song! + The warm lay of love and the light note of gladness + Have waken'd thy fondest, thy liveliest thrill; + But so oft hast thou echo'd the deep sigh of sadness, + That even in thy mirth it will steal from thee still. + + "Dear Harp of my Country! farewell to thy numbers, + This sweet wreath of song is the last we shall twine! + Go, sleep with the sunshine of Fame on thy slumbers, + Till touch'd by some hand less unworthy than mine: + If the pulse of the patriot, soldier, or lover, + Have throbb'd at our lay, 'tis thy glory alone; + I was but as the wind, passing heedlessly over, + And all the wild sweetness I waked was thy own." + +Except in the _Sacred Songs_ there is nothing in Moore's work fit to +stand beside such lyrics as these; and the finest of these _Songs_ +breathes an inspiration very like that of the _Melodies_:-- + + "Fall'n is thy throne, O Israel! + Silence is o'er thy plains; + Thy dwellings all lie desolate, + Thy children weep in chains." + +Another opens with a very beautiful verse:-- + + "The turf shall be my fragrant shrine; + My temple, Lord! that arch of thine; + My censer's breath the mountain airs, + And silent thoughts my only prayers." + +But here, in the working out of the idea, one feels, as so often in +Moore, rather sated with sweetness. For an extreme example of this +cloying ornament, to which he owed so much of his popularity, one would +quote:-- + + "Oh! had we some bright little isle of our own, + In a blue summer ocean far off and alone, + Where a leaf never dies in the still-blooming bowers, + And the bee banquets on through a whole year of flowers; + Where the sun loves to pause + With so fond a delay, + That the night only draws + A thin veil o'er the day; + Where simply to feel that we breathe, that we live, + Is worth the best joy that life elsewhere can give." + +There is no flaw in such work, but the taste is too florid. +Occasionally, however, we find his taste wholly at fault in the choice +of a phrase, as in "Sir Knight, _I feel not the least alarm_," or the +still worse "Believe me, if all those _endearing young charms_,"--a +lapse into the worst dulcification of confectionery. + +There is of course a fashion in verse as in anything else, and Moore's +excellences are precisely the least congenial to the current taste in +criticism. There is a fashion for nakedness of expression, and Moore +always shrank from brutality; there is a fashion for strained uses of +language, and Moore was always studiously accurate and lucid. But it may +be questioned whether, setting aside the opinion of professed and +professional critics, Moore's poetry would not be found to retain a +vigorous life. He was never, and never wished to be, in the least +esoteric; his object was to be understood by all. A poet who insists +upon this aim must perhaps sacrifice something, but he may also achieve +something not common. Oddly enough, there is no poet in English except +Goldsmith who appeals to simple people so much as Moore. These two can +often bring poetry home in triumph where even Shakespeare would never +find an entrance. + +But Moore's importance in the history of literature lies in his +connection not with English but with Irish literature. It was not for +nothing that Ireland hailed him for her first national poet. Nowadays, +even English readers probably know that poetry of a class not inferior +to Moore's was being written in Ireland in Moore's lifetime. He was the +younger contemporary of Seaghan Clarach, the full contemporary of +Raftery. But the nation which stood behind Grattan--that fused, +bi-lingual people welded into a unity during the years that led up to +1782, yet not so closely welded but that a wedge could be driven +in--accepted English as the language of political leadership; and it +caught eagerly at any manifestation of its national unity. Deprived of a +parliament, it found a poet of its own. It heard for the first time in +the _Irish Melodies_ a song that came from the heart of Ireland, uttered +in a language which nine out of every ten Irishmen could understand. A +journalist, writing in 1810, says: "Moore has done more for the revival +of our national spirit than all the political writers whom Ireland has +seen for a century." The other Irishmen who had shown great literary +talent--Burke, Goldsmith, and Sheridan--belonged body and soul to +English letters. Moore's case was different. Almost without knowing it, +he wrote primarily for his own countrymen, and in return they honoured +him, not perhaps on this side idolatry, but with a sane instinct, +because he had done for Ireland, what neither Seaghan Clarach nor +Raftery, nor all the bards of Munster and Connaught, could at that +moment do for her. He had given a voice to Ireland; he had put into her +mouth a song of her own. + +Standing apart now, from the times and circumstances in which Moore +wrote, we can see that what Ireland got from him was not all gain. The +literature produced so profusely in the days of Young Ireland, and +modelled mainly upon him, echoes only too faithfully his declamatory +tone; and worse than that, it is flooded by the exuberance of sentiment, +which was Moore's besetting weakness. Other models, and, it is to be +hoped, better ones, now are rapidly replacing those of Moore and his +followers; with the younger generation, even in Ireland, he has lost his +hold. But in Ireland his poetry is still, as a matter of course, +familiar to all Irishmen of the nationalist persuasion, young and old. +And for the older men, he has lost none of his magic. To them such +criticism as is found in this book will seem, one must fear, a kind of +impiety and certainly of ingratitude; for they remember the days when +many and many an Irish peasant, leaving his country for the New World, +carried with him two books--_Moore's Melodies_ and the _Key of Heaven_. + +And certainly it is no small title to fame for a poet that he was in his +own country for at least three generations the delight and consolation +of the poor. Tattered and thumbed copies of his poems, broadcast through +Ireland, represent better his claim to the interest of posterity than +whatever comely and autographed editions may be found among the +possessions of Bowood and Holland House. + + + + +APPENDIX + + +DATES OF MOORE'S PUBLICATIONS + + +The kindness of Mr. Andrew Gibson allows me to reprint from a privately +circulated pamphlet the following catalogue, compiled by him for his +Lecture (delivered in Belfast), on "Thomas Moore and his First +Editions"[1]:-- + + +List showing the order in which the various Editions were taken up in +the course of Mr. Gibson's Lecture; and giving, together with the sizes, +the actual or supposed dates of publication.[2] + +_Works with music are distinguished by an asterisk._ + +1. The Odes of Anacreon. 4to. 1800.[3] + +2. The Poetical Works of the late Thomas Little, Esq. 8vo. 1801. + +3. Sheet Songs*:[4] + (a) Published by F. Rhames, No. 16 Exchange Street, + Dublin, before Sir John Stevenson received + his knighthood in 1803:-- + Buds of Roses, Virgin Flowers, a chearful Glee, + for 4 voices, the poetry translated from + Anacreon by T. Moore, Esqr. The Music + composed (& respectfully dedicated to the + Honble. Augustus Barry) by J.A. Stevenson, + Mus. D. Price Is. 6d. British. + + Though Fate, my Girl, a Canzonet with an + Accompaniment for the Piano Forte or Harp, + the Poetry by Thos. Moore, Esqr. The Music + Composed by J.A. Stevenson, Mus. D. + Price 1/1. + + Dear! in pity do not speak, a Canzonet for + two Voices, with an Accompaniment for the + Piano Forte or Harp, the Poetry by Thos. + Moore, Esqr., set to Music by J.A. Stevenson, + Mus. D. Price 1s. + + Scotch Song [Mary, I believ'd thee true] with an + Accompaniment for the Piano Forte or Harp, + the Poetry by Thos. Moore, Esqr., the + Music Composed by J.A. Stevenson, Mus. D. + Price 6d. + + (b) Music as well as words by Moore. Published by + Carpenter, Old Bond Street, London:-- + + Oh Lady Fair! A Ballad for Three Voices. + Dedicated to the Rt. Honble. Lady Charlotte + Rawdon. 1802. + + When Time who steals our years away. A Ballad + dedicated to Mrs. Henry Tighe of Rosanna. + + Fly from the World O Bessy to me. + + Farewell Bessy. + + Good Night. + + Friend of my Soul. + + (c) "Dublin, Published by F. Rhames, 16 Exchange + Street. Price 3 British Shillings":-- + + Give me the Harp. A Chorus Glee, with an + Accompaniment for two Performers on one + Piano Forte. Sung with great applause at the + Irish Harmonic Club on Wednesday, the 4th + May, 1803, when that Society had the Honor + of entertaining His Excellency Earl Hardwicke. + The Words translated from Anacreon + by Thomas Moore, Esqr. The Music composed + by Sir John A. Stevenson, Mus. Doc. + + (d) "London, Printed for James Carpenter, Old Bond + Street. 1805":-- + + A Canadian Boat Song [Faintly as tolls the + evening chime] Arranged for Three Voices. + By Thomas Moore, Esqr. + +4. Epistles, Odes, and other Poems. 4to. 1806. + +5. Irish Melodies. First Number. Fol. [1808]*.[5] + +6. Irish Melodies. Second Number. Fol. [1808]*. + +7. Corruption and Intolerance: two Poems. 8vo. 1808. + +8. The Sceptic: a Philosophical Satire. 8vo. 1809.[6] + +9. Irish Melodies. Third Number. Fol. [1810]*. + +10. A Letter to the Roman Catholics of Dublin. 8vo. 1810. + +11. A Melologue upon National Music. ?Fol. [1811]*.[7] + +12. M.P. or The Blue Stocking. Sm. fol. [1811]*. + +13. M.P. or The Blue-Stocking. 8vo. 1811.[8] + +14. Irish Melodies. Fourth Number. Fol. [1811]*.[9] + +15. Intercepted Letters; or, The Twopenny Postbag. 8vo. 1813. + +16. Irish Melodies. Fifth Number. Fol. [1813]*.[10] + +17. A Collection of the Vocal Music of Thomas Moore. + Sm. fol. [1814]*. + +18. Irish Melodies. Sixth Number. Fol. [1815]*.[11] + +19. The World at Westminster. A Periodical Publication. + 2 vols. 12mo. 1816. + +20. Sacred Songs. First Number. Fol. [1816]*.[12] + +21. Lalla Rookh. 4to. 1817. + +22. The Fudge Family in Paris. 8vo. 1818. + +23. National Airs. First Number. Sm. fol. 1818*.[13] + +24. Irish Melodies. Seventh Number. Fol. 1818*.[14] + +25. Tom Crib's Memorial to Congress. 8vo. 1819. + +26. National Airs. Second Number. Sm. fol. 1820*. + +27. Irish Melodies, with a Melologue upon National Music. + 8vo. 1820. + +28. Irish Melodies. Eighth Number. Fol. 1821*.[15] + +29. Irish Melodies, by Thomas Moore, Esq. With an + Appendix, containing the Original Advertisements + and the Prefatory Letter on Music. 8vo. 1821.[16] + +30. National Airs. Third Number. Sm. fol. 1822*. + +31. National Airs. Fourth Number. Sm. fol. 1822*. + +32. The Loves of the Angels, a Poem. 8vo. 1823. + +33. The Loves of the Angels, an Eastern Romance. The + Fifth Edition. 8vo. 1823.[17] + +34. Fables for the Holy Alliance, Rhymes on the Road, + etc., etc. 8vo. 1823. + +35. Sacred Songs. Second Number. Fol. [1824]*. + +36. Irish Melodies. Ninth Number. Fol. [1824]*. + +37. Memoirs of Captain Rock. 12mo. 1824. + +38. Memoirs of the Life of the Right Honourable Richard + Brinsley Sheridan. 4to. 1825. + +39. National Airs. Fifth Number. Sm. fol. [1826]*. + +40. Evenings in Greece. First Evening. Sm. fol. [1826]*. + +41. The Epicurean, a Tale. 12mo. 1827. + +42. National Airs. Sixth Number. Sm. fol. [1827]*. + +43. A Set of Glees. Sm. fol. [1827]*. + +44. Odes upon Cash, Corn, Catholics, and other Matters. 8vo. 1828. + +45. Legendary Ballads. Sm. fol. [1830]*. + +46. Letters and Journals of Lord Byron: with Notices of + his Life. 2 vols., 4to., 1830.[18] + +47. The Life and Death of Lord Edward Fitzgerald. 2 vols., 8vo. 1831. + +48. The Summer Fete. Sm. fol. [1831]*. + +49. Evenings in Greece. [Second Evening]. Sm. fol. [1832]*. + +50. The Works of Lord Byron: with his Letters and + Journals, and his Life. 17 vols., 8vo. 1832-33. + +51. Travels of an Irish Gentleman in search of a Religion. + 2 vols., 8vo. 1833. + +52. Irish Melodies. Tenth Number. [With Supplement]. Fol. [1834]*. + +53. Vocal Miscellany. Number 1. Sm. fol. [1834]*. + +54. Vocal Miscellany. Number 2. Sm. fol. [1835]*. + +55. The Fudge Family in England. 8vo. 1835. + +56. The History of Ireland. First Volume. 8vo. 1835. + +57. The History of Ireland. Second Volume. 8vo. 1837. + +58. Alciphron, a Poem. 8vo. 1839. + +59. The History of Ireland. Third Volume. 8vo. 1840. + +60. The Poetical Works of Thomas Moore. Collected by + himself. 10 vols., 8 vo. 1840-41. + +61. The History of Ireland. Fourth Volume. 8vo. 1846.[19] + + +[1] I have altered the dates given for the first and second numbers of +Irish Melodies in accordance with Mr. Gibson's recent discoveries.--S.G. + +[2] Copies of all the editions were exhibited, with the exception of +Nos. 8, 11, 13, and 46. + +[3] A copy of the second edition, 2 vols. 8vo., 1802, also was shown. + +[4] These were only given as a selection. + +[5] This edition ends at page 68. Copies of the first reprints, ending +at page 51, also were exhibited. + +It is to be understood that copies of the Dublin editions and the London +editions (both copyright), up to the seventh number, were shown. + +[6] A copy is in the British Museum. + +[7] This is advertised in William and James Power's trade lists of the +period. It is thus referred to in a letter from Moore to his mother, +dated "Saturday, May 1811":--"I have been these two or three days past +receiving most flattering letters from the persons to whom I sent my +Melologue." Kent, in his edition of "The Poetical Works of Thomas +Moore," makes the "Melologue" an integral part of the "National Airs," +and states the following in reference to the latter:--"Another +collection of songs, not unworthy of being placed in companionship with +the Irish Melodies, appeared from the hand of Moore in 1815." But the +"Melologue" was produced in 1811, as has now been shown, and the first +number of the "National Airs" did not make its appearance until 1818, +while the last one was only originally published in 1827. + +[8] A copy is in the British Museum. + +[9] In the London edition the Advertisement is dated "Bury-Street, St. +James's, Nov., 1811," whereas in the Dublin edition it is dated +"London,--January, 1812." + +[10] The London and Dublin editions have each the following "Erratum" +annexed to the Advertisement:--"The Reader of the Words is requested to +take notice of an alteration (which was made too late to be conveniently +printed) in the first verse of the first Song, 'Thro' Erin's Isle'; he +will find the verses, in their corrected form, engraved under the Music, +Pages 2 and 3." + +[11] In the London edition the Advertisement is dated "Mayfield, +Ashbourne, March, 1815." In the Dublin edition it has "April" instead of +"March." + +[12] The London edition imprint reads:--"London, Published by J. Power, +34, Strand." The Dublin edition imprint reads:--"Dublin. Published by W. +Power 4 Westmorland St." + +[13] The London edition imprint reads:--"London, Published April 23rd, +1818, by J. Power, "34, Strand." The Dublin edition imprint +reads:--"Dublin, Published 6th July 1818, by W. Power 4 Westmorland +Street." + +[14] The London edition imprint reads:--"London, Published October 1st +1818, by J. Power, 34, Strand." The Dublin edition imprint +reads:--"Dublin, Published 9th Decr. 1818, by W. Power, 4, Westmorland +Street." + +[15] The Symphonies and Accompaniments in the London edition are by +Henry R. Bishop. Those in the Dublin edition are by Sir John Stevenson. + +I exhibited copies of both editions, and read to my audience a telling +Advertisement by William Power in the Dublin edition, in which he states +that "with _him_ originated the idea of uniting the Irish Melodies to +characteristic words." + +Moore had already entered into a new agreement with James Power, who had +not permitted his brother to share in it; and in July 1821, "James +Power, of the Strand, London, Music Seller, obtained an injunction to +restrain William Power, of Westmorland Street, Dublin, from publishing a +pirated edition of the Eighth Number of Moore's Irish Melodies"--_vide_ +"Notes from the Letters of Thomas Moore to his Music Publisher, James +Power," page 88. + +[16] The manuscript of the Dedication and the Preface, in Moore's +handwriting, also was exhibited. It is the property of Mr. William +Swanston. + +[17] The copy shown belongs to Mr. Robert May. + +[18] A copy of the third edition, 3 vols. 8vo., 1833, was exhibited. I +have since obtained a copy of the first edition. + +[19] Having spoken for nearly two hours, I found it necessary to refrain +from also referring to the following, together with several other +works:-- + +1. Memoirs, Journals, and Correspondence of Thomas Moore. Edited by the +Right Honourable Lord John Russell, M.P. 8 vols. 8vo., 1853-56. + +2. Notes from the Letters of Thomas Moore to his Music Publisher, James +Power (the publication of which was suppressed in London). 8vo. [1854]. + +3. Prose and Verse, Humorous, Satirical and Sentimental. By Thomas +Moore. With suppressed passages from the Memoirs of Lord Byron. Chiefly +from the Author's own Manuscript, and all hitherto inedited and +uncollected. 8vo. 1878. + +The last-named publication includes the contributions of Moore to the +_Edinburgh Review_, between 1814 and 1834. + + + + +INDEX + + A + + "After the Battle" (quotation). + _Alciphron_. + Alliance, The Holy. + _Anacreon, Odes of_ (Moore's Translation). + Anglesey, Lord. + _Anthologia Hibernica_. + Atkinson, Joseph. + Auckland, Lord. + + B + + _Belfast Commercial Chronicle_. + Bermuda. + Bishop, Sir Henry. + Blake. + Blessington, Lady. + Boswell. + _Bride of Abydos, The_ (Byron). + "Brown, Thomas". + Burke. + Burns. + Byron. + Byron's Memoirs. + Byron, Lady. + + C + + Campbell. + "Canadian Boat-song". + Canning. + -----, Lady. + _Captain Rock, History of_. + Carpenter (publisher). + Castlereagh, Lord. + Catholicism. + Catholic Emancipation. + Chantrey. + Charlotte, Princess of Wales. + _Childe Harold_ (Byron). + Church of Ireland. + Clarach, Seaghan. + Clare, Lord. + Coleridge. + _Corsair, The_ (Byron). + _Corruption and Intolerance_. + Corry, Isaac. + Cowper. + Crabbe. + Curran. + -----, Sarah. + + D + + Dante. + "Dear Harp of my Country" (quotation). + Donegal, Lady. + Doyle, Colonel. + "Drink to her who long" (quotation). + Dryden. + Dyke, Miss E.. + -----, Miss H.. + + E + + Edgeworth, Miss. + _Edinburgh Review, The_. + _Emancipation, Catholic_. + Emmet, Robert. + _English Bards and Scotch Reviewers_ (Byron). + _Epicurean, The_. + _Epistles and Odes_. + "Erin, the smile and the tear in thine eye". + _Evenings in Greece_. + _Examiner, The_. + + F + + _Fables_. + "Farewell, but whenever you welcome the hour" (quotation). + "Feast of Roses at Cashmere, The" (quotation). + "Fire Worshippers, The" (quotation). + _Fitzgerald, Lord Edward, Life of_. + FitzGibbon, Lord Chancellor. + Fitzwilliam, Lord. + Fletcher. + _Fragments of College Exercises_. + _Freeman's Journal_. + _Fudge Family in Paris, The_. + _Fudge Family in Italy, The_. + _Fudges in England, The_. + + G + + George, Prince of Wales. + _Giaour, The_ (Byron). + Gibson, Mr. Andrew. + Godfrey, Miss. + Goethe's _Dr. Faustus_. + Goldsmith. + Grattan. + Gray. + Grey, Lord. + Griffin, Gerald. + Guiccioli, Countess. + + H + + Hardwicke, Lord. + "Harp that once, The". + Haydon (painter). + Heath (engraver). + Hobhouse. + Holland. + Horace. + Horton, Mr. Wilmot. + Hudson, Edward. + Hume, Dr. (Moore's friend). + Hunt, Leigh. + + I + + _Intercepted Letters; or The Twopenny Postbag_. + _Ireland, History of_. + Irish folk-songs. + _Irish Melodies_ (see _Melodies_). + "Irish Peasant to his Mistress, The. + Irish verse. + Irving, Washington. + + J + + Jackson (painter). + Jeffrey (_Edinburgh Review_). + + K + + Kearney, Dr. + Kinnaird, Douglas. + + L + + _Lalla Rookh_. + Landor. + Lansdowne, Marquis of. + Leigh, Mrs.. + _Leinster Journal, The_. + Lessing. + "Little, Mr." + _Little, Poetical Works of the late Thomas_. + "Little Grand Lama, The". + Lockhart. + Longmans (publishers). + _Loves of the Angels, The_. + _Lyrical Ballads_ (Wordsworth). + + M + + Mackintosh, Sir James. + Mangan. + McNally, Leonard. + Marryat. + _Maud_ (Tennyson). + "Meeting of the Waters, The". + Melbourne, Lord. + _Melodies, Irish_. + _Melologue upon National Music_. + Milman. + Milton. + Moira, Lord. + + Moore, Thomas, + + birth and family history_; + precocious boyhood; + early verses; + schooldays; + Trinity College; + association with Robert Emmet; + entered at Middle Temple; + literary activity; + acquaintances in London; + presented to the Prince of Wales; + increasing social success; + publishes _Odes of Anacreon_; + _Poetical Works of the late Thomas Little_; + _Fragments of College Exercises_; + connection with Lord Moira; + goes to Bermuda; + visits America; widespread fame; + returns to England; + _Epistles, Odes, and Other Poems_; + attacked by _Edinburgh Review_; + challenges Jeffrey to a duel; + returns to Dublin; + inception of the _Irish Melodies_; + _Corruption and Intolerance_; + _The Sceptic_; + writes opera _M.P. or The Blue Stocking_; + marriage; + retires to the country; + commences _Lalla Rookh_; + _Intercepted Letters_; + _Sacred Songs_; + his reputation at its height; + contributes to the _Edinburgh Review_; + _Lalla Rookh_; + retires to Sloperton; + _The Fudge Family in Paris_; + financial troubles; + birth of a son; + begins the _Life of Sheridan_; + leaves England to escape imprisonment for debt; + declines offers of assistance from his friends; + life on the Continent; + visit to Byron; + lionised abroad; + end of his financial embarrassments; + _Loves of the Angels_; + returns to England; + _Odes on Cash, Catholics, and other matters_; + _The Fudges in England_; + _Fables for the Holy Alliance_; + _Rhymes on the Road_; + makes a tour through Ireland; + _History of Captain Rock and his Ancestors_; + difficulties with regard to Byron's Memoirs; + _Life of Sheridan_; + contributes to _The Times_; + death of his father; + story of his quarrel with Byron; + his friendship with Byron; + _Life of Lord Edward Fitzgerald_; + _Travels of an Irish Gentleman in search of a Religion_; + _History of Ireland_; + end of his literary career; + visit to Sir Walter Scott; + honoured in Ireland; + invited to enter Parliament; + receives a pension of L300 a year; + domestic troubles; + culmination of his sorrows; + illness and death; general appreciation; + + Reputation on the Continent; + popularity; + causes of his popularity; + his own estimate of his work; + his wide reading; + literary models; + a careful craftsman; + characteristics of his verse; + his failures; + licentiousness of his poetry; + methods of composition; + limitations and defects of his poetry; + essentially an amatory poet; + his satiric verses; + his lyrics; + ease and variety of his rhythms; + source of his rhythms; + his finest lyrics; + an artist in metre; + comparison with other poets; + supremacy in the writing of lighter lyrics; + uses of rhyme; + his poetry understood by all; + connection with Irish literature; + musical gifts; + politics; + religious views; + devotion to his parents and home; + personal appearance; + charm of manner; + friendships; + his acting; + financial affairs; + independence and high-mindedness; + love for Ireland; + a ladies' man; + intimacy with persons of title. + + _Moore, Memoirs of_ (Lord John Russell). + + -----, John (father). + -----, Mrs. (mother). + -----, Katherine (sister). + -----, Ellen (sister). + -----, Mrs., Bessy, _nee_ Dyke (wife). + + Moore, Barbara (daughter). + -----, Olivia (daughter). + -----, Anastasia (daughter). + -----, Thomas (son). + -----, Russell (son). + _Morning Chronicle, The_. + Morpeth, Lord. + _M.P. or The Blue Stocking_. + Murray (publisher). + + N + + Napier, Sir William. + Napoleon. + _National Airs_ (of Ireland). + + O + + "O breathe not his name" (quotation). + O'Connell. + _Odes on Cash, Catholics, and other matters_. + "Oh, Where's the slave so lowly" (quotation). + + P + + Panizzi. + _Paradise and the Peri_. + Parr, Dr. + Peel, Sir Robert. + Pope. + _Postbag, The_,. + Powers (music publishers). + Praed. + Prior. + Protestantism. + Prout, Father. + + R + + Raftery. + "Rebellion! foul, dishonouring word" (quotation). + Reform Bill. + _Reuben and Rose_. + _Rhymes on the Road_. + _Ring, The_. + _Rock, Captain, History of_. + Rogers, Samuel. + _Rokeby_ (Scott). + Romilly, Sir Samuel. + Ronsard. + Russell, Lord John. + + S + + _Sacred Songs_. + "Sad one of Sion" (quotation). + _Sceptic, The_. + Scott. + Shakespeare. + Shelley. + "She is far from the land" (quotation). + Sheridan. + _Sheridan, Life of_. + "Sheridan, Death of" (quotation). + Sloperton. + Smith, Sydney. + Southey. + Stael, Madame de. + Stevenson, Sir John. + "Sweet was the hour" (quotation). + Swinburne. + + T + + Tandy, Napper. + Tavistock, Lord. + Tennyson. + "Time I've lost in wooing, The" (quotation). + _Times, The_. + _Tom Crib's Memorial to Congress_. + _Travels of an Irish Gentleman in search of a Religion_. + Trinity College, Dublin. + Troy, Archbishop. + "'Twas thus by the shade" (quotation). + "'Twas when the world was in its prime" (quotation). + + U + + Union, Repeal of. + + V + + _Veiled Prophet, The_. + + W + + Wellesley, Lord. + Wellington, Duke of. + "When first I met thee" (quotation). + "When he who adores thee" (quotation). + Whyte, Samuel. + "Woodpecker, The,". + Wordsworth. + + Y + + Yeats. + "Young May moon is beaming, love, The," (quotation). + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Thomas Moore, by Stephen Gwynn + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THOMAS MOORE *** + +***** This file should be named 34930.txt or 34930.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/4/9/3/34930/ + +Produced by Andrea Ball and Marc D'Hooghe at +http://www.freeliterature.org + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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