"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.