im a beggar! Several of the Whig party came forward and offered in a
manner most creditable to them, to effect a subscription for the
purpose of paying off the poet's debt. Foremost among them was a
delicate young nobleman, with sunken cheek and intellectual aspect, who,
while traveling for his health on the Continent, had met Moore, with
whom he journeyed for a considerable time, and from whom he parted with
an intense admiration of the poet's genius and manly character. The
young nobleman--then far from being a rich man--headed the list with
eleven hundred pounds. The fact deserves to be recorded to the honor of
that young nobleman, who, by slow and sure degrees, has risen to be
prime minister of England--Lord John Russell.

Of the fact of Moore's steadfastly refusing to accept the subscription
offered to be raised for him by his aristocratic Whig friends, there can
be no doubt whatever; and the matter is more creditable to him when the
fact is remembered that it was not he himself who committed the error by
which he was rendered liable to the judgment given against him. He might
also have sheltered himself under the example of Charles James Fox, who
consented to accept a provision made for him by the leaders of his
party. But Moore detested all eleemosynary aid. He speaks in one of his
most vigorous poems with contempt of that class of "_patriots_" (to what
vile uses can language be profaned!),

"Who hawk their country's wrongs as beggars do their sores."

While sojourning at Paris upon that occasion Moore received a very
remarkable offer. Barnes, the editor of the _Times_, became severely
ill, and was obliged to recruit his health by a year's rest, and the
editorship of the _Times_ was actually offered to Moore, who, in telling
the story to a brilliant living Irishman, said, "I had great difficulty
in refusing. The offer was so tempting--_to be the Times for a
twelvemonth!_" The offering him the editorship of "the daily miracle"
(as Mr. Justice Talfourd called it) might, however, have been only a
_ruse de guerre_ of his aristocratic and political friends to bring him
back to London, where, for a variety of reasons social and political,
his company was then very desirable.

There is a very interesting circumstance connected with the birth of
Moore, which deserves record. The fact of the birth, as every one knows,
took place at Aungier-street, and its occasion was at a moment
singularly appropriate for the lyri