"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, Staël, 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."