beginning to review for _The Edinburgh_. Considering that he was in a
way making his bread and butter by lampooning, however good-humouredly,
the ruler of his country, he seems to have been a little unreasonable in
feeling shocked that Lord Moira, on going as viceroy to India, did not
provide for him. In the first place he was provided for already; and in
the second place you cannot reasonably expect to enjoy the pleasures of
independence and those of dependence at the same time. At the end of
1817 he left Mayfield (his cottage near Ashbourne) and Lord Moira, for
Lord Lansdowne and Sloperton, a cottage near Bowood, the end of the one
sojourn and the beginning of the other being distinguished by the
appearance of his two best works, next to the Irish Melodies--"Lalla
Rookh" and "The Fudge Family at Paris." His first and almost his only
heavy stroke of ill-luck now came on him: his deputy at Bermuda levanted
with some six thousand pounds, for which Moore was liable. Many friends
came to his aid, and after some delay and negotiations, during which he
had to go abroad, Lord Lansdowne paid what was necessary. But Moore
afterwards paid Lord Lansdowne, which makes a decided distinction
between his conduct and that of Theodore Hook in a similar case.

Although the days of Moore lasted for half an ordinary lifetime after
this, they saw few important events save the imbroglio over the Byron
memoirs. They saw also the composition of a great deal of literature and
journalism, all very well paid, notwithstanding which, Moore seems to
have been always in a rather unintelligible state of pecuniary distress.
That he made his parents an allowance, as some allege in explanation,
will not in the least account for this; for, creditable as it was in him
to make it, this allowance did not exceed one hundred pounds a year. He
must have spent little in an ordinary way, for his Sloperton
establishment was of the most modest character, while his wife was an
excellent manager, and never went into society. Probably he might have
endorsed, if he had been asked, the great principle which somebody or
other has formulated, that the most expensive way of living is staying
in other peoples houses. At any rate his condition was rather precarious
till 1835, when Lord John Russell and Lord Lansdowne obtained for him a
Civil List pension of three hundred pounds a year. In his very last days
this was further increased by an additional hundred a year to his w