.
Thomas Moore (1779-1852), by his literary and social gifts, had made his name several years before 1811, when he first became personally acquainted with Byron. His precocity was as remarkable as his versatility. The son of a Dublin grocer, for whom his political interest secured the post of barrack-master, he went, like Sheridan, to Samuel Whyte's school, and was afterwards at Trinity College, Dublin. Before he was fifteen he had written verses, including lines to Whyte, himself a poet, the publication of which, in the
Anthologia Hibernica
(October, 1793; February, March, and June, 1794), gained him a local reputation. Coming to London in 1799, he read law at the Middle Temple. His
Odes
translated from Anacreon (1800), dedicated to the Prince of Wales, opened to him the houses of the Whig aristocracy; and his powers as a singer, an actor, a talker, and, later, as a satirist, made him a favourite in society. In 1801 appeared his
Poems: by the late Thomas Little
, amatory verses which Byron read, and imitated in some of the silliest of his youthful lines.