University of Virginia Library

122. LETTER CXXII.

I called on Moore with a letter of introduction,
and met him at the door of his lodgings. I knew him
instantly from the pictures I had seen of him, but was
surprised at the diminutiveness of his person. He
is much below the middle size, and with his white
hat and long chocolate frock-coat, was far from
prepossessing in his appearance. With this material
disadvantage, however, his address is gentleman-like
to a very marked degree, and I should think no
one could see Moore without conceiving a strong
liking for him. As I was to meet him at dinner, I
did not detain him. In the moment's conversation
that passed, he inquired very particularly after Washington
Irving, expressing for him the warmest friendship,
and asked what Cooper was doing.

I was at Lady Blessington's at eight. Moore had
not arrived, but the other persons of the party—a
Russian count, who spoke all the languages of Europe
as well as his own; a Roman banker, whose dynasty
is more powerful than the pope's; a clever English
nobleman, and the “observed of all observers,”
Count D'Orsay, stood in the window upon the park,
killing, as they might, the melancholy twilight half
hour preceding dinner.

“Mr. Moore!” cried the footman at the bottom of
the staircase. “Mr. Moore!” cried the footman at
the top. And with his glass at his eye, stumbling
over an ottoman between his near-sightedness and the
darkness of the room, enter the poet. Half a glance
tells you that he is at home on a carpet. Sliding his
little feet up to Lady Blessington (of whom he was
a lover when she was sixteen, and to whom some of
the sweetest of his songs were written), he made his
compliments, with a gayety and an ease combined
with a kind of worshipping deference that was worthy
of a prime-minister at the court of love. With the
gentlemen, all of whom he knew, he had the frank,
merry manner of a confident favorite, and he was
greeted like one. He went from one to the other,
straining back his head to look up at them (for, singularly
enough, every gentleman in the room was six
feet high and upward), and to every one he said something
which, from any one else, would have seemed
peculiarly felicitous, but which fell from his lips as if
his breath was not more spontaneous.

Dinner was announced, the Russian handed down
“miladi,” and I found myself seated opposite Moore,
with a blaze of light on his Bacchus head, and the
mirrors with which the superb octagonal room is pannelled
reflecting every motion. To see him only at
table, you would think him not a small man. His
principal length is in his body, and his head and shoulders
are those of a much larger person. Consequently
he sits tall, and with the peculiar erectness of head
and neck, his diminutiveness disappears.

The soup vanished in the busy silence that beseems
it, and as the courses commenced their procession,
Lady Blessington led the conversation with the brilliancy
and ease for which she is remarkable over all
the women of her time. She had received from Sir
William Gell, at Naples, the manuscript of a volume
upon the last days of Sir Walter Scott. It was a
melancholy chronicle of imbecility and the book was
suppressed, but there were two or three circumstances
narrated in its pages which were interesting. Soon
after his arrival at Naples, Sir Walter went with his
physician and one or two friends to the great museum.
It happened that on the same day a large collection
of students and Italian literati were assembled, in one
of the rooms, to discuss some newly-discovered manuscripts.
It was soon known that the “Wizard of the
North” was there, and a deputation was sent immediately
to request him to honor them by presiding at
their session. At this time Scott was a wreck, with a
memory that retained nothing for a moment, and
limbs almost as helpless as an infant's. He was dragging
about among the relics of Pompeii, taking no
interest in anything he saw, when their request was
made known to him through his physician. “No,
no,” said he, “I know nothing of their lingo. Tell
them I am not well enough to come.” He loitered
on, and in about half an hour after, he turned to Dr.
H. and said, “Who was that you said wanted to see
me?” The doctor explained. “I'll go,” said he,
“they shall see me if they wish it;” and, against the
advice of his friends, who feared it would be too much
for his strength, he mounted the staircase, and made
his appearance at the door. A burst of enthusiastic
cheers welcomed him on the threshold, and forming
in two lines, many of them on their knees, they seized
his hands as he passed, kissed them, thanked him in
their passionate language for the delight with which
he had filled the world, and placed him in the chair
with the most fervent expressions of gratitude for his
condescension. The discussion went on, but not
understanding a syllable of the language, Scott was
soon wearied, and his friends observing it, pleaded the
state of his health as an apology, and he rose to take
his leave. These enthusiastic children of the south
crowded once more around him, and with exclamations
of affection and even tears, kissed his hands once
more, assisted his tottering steps, and sent after him a
confused murmur of blessings as the door closed on
his retiring form. It is described by the writer as the
most affecting scene he had ever witnessed.

Some other remarks were made upon Scott, but
the parole was soon yielded to Moore, who gave us an
account of a visit he made to Abbotsford when its
illustrious owner was in his pride and prime. “Scott,”
he said, “was the most manly and natural character
in the world. You felt when with him, that he was
the soul of truth and heartiness. His hospitality was
as simple and open as the day, and he lived freely

himself, and expected his guests to do so. I remember
his giving us whiskey at dinner, and Lady Scott
met my look of surprise with the assurance that Sir
Walter seldom dined without it. He never ate or
drank to excess, but he had no system, his constitution
was herculean, and he denied himself nothing.
I went once from a dinner-party with Sir Thomas
Lawrence to meet Scott at Lockhart's. We had
hardly entered the room when we were set down to a
hot supper of roast chickens, salmon, punch, etc.,
etc., and Sir Walter ate immensely of everything.
What a contrast between this and the last time I
saw him in London! He had come down to embark
for Italy—broken quite down in mind and body. He
gave Mrs. Moore a book, and I asked him if he would
make it more valuable by writing in it. He thought
I meant that he should write some verses, and said,
`Oh I never write poetry now.' I asked him to write
only his own name and hers, and he attempted it, but
it was quite illegible.”

Some one remarked that Scott's life of Napoleon
was a failure.

“I think little of it,” said Moore; “but after all, it
was an embarrassing task, and Scott did what a wise
man would do—made as much of his subject as was
politic and necessary, and no more.”

“It will not live,” said some one else; “as much
because it is a bad book, as because it is the life of an
individual.”

“But what an individual!” Moore replied. “Voltaire's
life of Charles of Twelfth was the life of an individual,
yet that will live and be read as long as there
is a book in the world, and what was he to Napoleon?”

O'Connell was mentioned.

“He is a powerful creature,” said Moore, “but his
eloquence has done great harm both to England and
Ireland. There is nothing so powerful as oratory.
The faculty of `thinking on his legs,' is a tremendous
engine in the hands of any man. There is an undue
admiration for this faculty, and a sway permitted to it
which was always more dangerous to a country than
anything else. Lord Althorp is a wonderful instance
of what a man may do without talking. There is a
general confidence in him—a universal belief in his
honesty, which serves him instead. Peel is a fine
speaker, but, admirable as he had been as an oppositionist,
he failed when he came to lead the house.
O'Connell would be irresistible were it not for the two
blots on his character—the contributions in Ireland
for his support, and his retusal to give satisfaction
to the man he is still coward enough to attack.
They may say what they will of duelling, it is the
great preserver of the decencies of society. The
old school, which made a man responsible for his
words, was the better. I must confess I think so.
Then, in O'Connell's case, he had not made his vow
against duelling when Peel challenged him. He accepted
the challenge, and Peel went to Dover on his
way to France, where they were to meet; and O'Connell
pleaded his wife's illness, and delayed till the law
interfered. Some other Irish patriot, about the same
time, refused a challenge on account of the illness of
his daughter, and one of the Dublin wits made a good
epigram on the two:—

The great period of Ireland's glory was between '82
and '98, and it was a time when a man almost lived
with a pistol in his hand. Grattan's dying advice to
his son, was, `Be always ready with the pistol!' He
himself never hesitated a moment. At one time,
there was a kind of conspiracy to fight him out of the
world. On some famous question, Corrie was employed
purposely to bully him, and made a personal
attack of the grossest virulence. Grattan was so ill,
at the time, as to be supported into the house between
two friends. He rose to reply; and first, without alluding
to Corrie at all, clearly and entirely overturned
every argument he had advanced that bore upon
the question. He then paused a moment, and
stretching out his arm, as if he would reach across
the house, said, `For the assertions the gentleman
has been pleased to make with regard to myself, my
answer here is, they are false! elsewhere it would be—
a blow!' They met, and Grattan shot him through
the arm. Corrie proposed another shot, but Grattan
said, `No! let the curs fight it out!' and they were
friends ever after. I like the old story of the Irishman
who was challenged by some desperate blackguard.
`Fight him!' said he, `I would sooner go to
my grave without a fight!' Talking of Grattan, is it
not wonderful that, with all the agitation in Ireland,
we have had no such men since his time? Look at
the Irish newspapers. The whole country in convulsion—people's
lives, fortunes, and religion, at stake,
and not a gleam of talent from one year's end to the
other. It is natural for sparks to be struck out in a
time of violence like this—but Ireland, for all that is
worth living for, is dead! You can scarcely reckon
Shiel of the calibre of her spirits of old, and O'Connell,
with all his faults, stands `alone in his glory.”'

The conversation I have thus run together is a mere
skeleton, of course. Nothing but a short-hand report
could retain the delicacy and elegance of Moore's
language, and memory itself can not imbody again
the kind of frost-work of imagery which was formed
and melted on his lips. His voice is soft or firm as
the subject requires, but perhaps the word gentlemanly
describes it better than any other. It is upon a
natural key, but, if I may so phrase it, it is fused
with a high-bred affectation, expressing deference and
courtesy, at the same time that its pauses are constructed
peculiarly to catch the ear. It would be difficult
not to attend him while he is talking, though the
subject were but the shape of a wine-glass.

Moore's head is distinctly before me while I write,
but I shall find it difficult to describe. His hair,
which curled once all over it in long tendrils, unlike
anybody else's in the world, and which probably suggested
his soubriquet of “Bacchus,” is diminished
now to a few curls sprinkled with gray, and scattered
in a single ring above his ears. His forehead is
wrinkled, with the exception of a most prominent
development of the organ of gayety, which, singularly
enough, shines with the lustre and smooth polish
of a pearl, and is surrounded by a semicircle of
lines drawn close about it, like entrenchments against
Time. His eyes still sparkle like a champaign bubble,
though the invader has drawn his pencillings
about the corners; and there is a kind of wintry red,
of the tinge of an October leaf, that seems enamelled
on his cheek, the eloquent record of the claret his wit
has brightened. His mouth is the most characteristic
feature of all. The lips are delicately cut, slight
and changeable as an aspen; but there is a set-up
look about the lower lip, a determination of the muscle
to a particular expression, and you fancy that you
can almost see wit astride upon it. It is written legibly
with the imprint of habitual success. It is half
confident, and half diffident, as if he were disguising
his pleasure at applause, while another bright glean
of fancy was breaking on him. The slightly-tossed
nose confirms the fun of the expression, and altogether
it is a face that sparkles, beams, radiates,—every
thing but feels. Fascinating beyond all men as he is
Moore looks like a worldling.

This description may be supposed to have occupied
the hour after Lady Blessington retired from the table;
for with her vanished Moore's excitement, and
everybody else seemed to feel that light had gone out
of the room. Her excessive beauty is less an inspiration
than the wondrous talent with which she draws
from every person around her his peculiar excellence.
Talking better than anybody else, and narrating, particularly,
with a graphic power that I never saw excelled,
this distinguished woman seems striving only
to make others unfold themselves; and never had diffidence
a more apprehensive and encouraging listener.
But this is a subject with which I should never be
done.

We went up to coffee, and Moore brightened again
over his chasse-café, and went glittering on with criticisms
on Grisi, the delicious songstress now ravishing
the world, whom he placed above all but Pasta; and
whom he thought, with the exception that her legs
were too short, an incomparable creature. This introduced
music very naturally, and with a great deal
of difficulty he was taken to the piano. My letter is
getting long, and I have no time to describe his singing.
It is well known, however, that its effect is only
equalled by the beauty of his own words; and, for
one, I could have taken him into my heart with my
delight. He makes no attempt at music. It is a kind
of admirable recitative, in which every shade of
thought is syllabled and dwelt upon, and the sentiment
of the song goes through your blood, warming
you to the very eyelids, and starting your tears, if you
have soul or sense in you. I have heard of women's
fainting at a song of Moore's; and if the burden of it
answered by chance to a secret in the bosom of the
listener, I should think, from its comparative effect
upon so old a stager as myself, that the heart would
break with it.

We all sat around the piano, and after two or three
songs of Lady Blessington's choice, he rambled over
the keys awhile, and sang “When first I met thee,”
with a pathos that beggars description. When the
last word had faltered out, he rose and took Lady
Blessington's hand, said good-night, and was gone
before a word was uttered. For a full minute after
he had closed the door no one spoke. I could have
wished, for myself, to drop silently asleep where I sat,
with the tears in my eyes and the softness upon my
heart.

I was in company the other evening where Westmacott,
the sculptor, was telling a story of himself
and Leigh Hunt. They were together one day at
Fiesole, when a butterfly, of an uncommon sable
color, alighted on Westmacott's forehead, and remained
there several minutes. Hunt immediately
cried out, “The spirit of some dear friend is departed,”
and as they entered the gate of Florence on their
return, some one met them and informed them of the
death of Byron, the news of which had at that moment
arrived.

I have just time before the packet sails to send you
an anecdote that is bought out of the London papers.
A nobleman, living near Belgrave square, received a
visit a day or two ago from a police officer, who stated
to him, that he had a man-servant in his house,
who had escaped from Botany Bay. His lordship
was somewhat surprised, but called up the male part
of his household, at the officer's request, and passed
them in review. The culprit was not among them.
The officer then requested to see the female part of
the establishment; and, to the inexpressible astonishment
of the whole household, he laid his hand upon
the shoulder of the lady's confidential maid, and informed
her she was his prisoner. A change of dress
was immediately sent for, and miladi's dressing-maid
was remetamorphosed into an effeminate-looking
fellow, and marched off to a new trial. It is a most
extraordinary thing that he had lived unsuspected in
the family for nine months, performing all the functions
of a confidential Abigail, and very much in favor
with his unsuspecting mistress, who is rather a serious
person, and would as soon have thought of turning
out to be a man herself. It is said, that the husband
once made a remark upon the huskiness of the maid's
voice, but no other comment was ever made reflecting
in the least upon her qualities as a member of the
beau sexe. The story is quite authentic, but hushed
up out of regard to the lady.