Note N — MEMORIES OF AUTHORS.

There were two who sought to throw filth upon the poet's grave, and they were his own countrymen,—Charles Phillips and John Wilson Croker. The former had written a wretched and unmeaning pamphlet, which he suppressed when a few copies only were issued; and I am proud to believe it was in consequence of some remarks upon it written by me, for which he commenced, but subsequently abandoned, proceedings against me for libel. The atrocious attack on Moore in the "Quarterly Review" was written by John Wilson Croker. It was the old illustration of the dead lion and the living dog. Yet Croker could at that time be scarcely described as living; it was from his death-bed he shot the poisoned arrow. And what brought out the venom? Merely a few careless words of Moore's, in which he described Croker "as a scribbler of all work," words that Earl Russell would have erased, if it had occurred to him to do so. Another countryman, Thomas Crofton Croker, assailed after his death the man whose shoe-latchets he would have been proud to unloose during his life. Moreover, his earliest slanderer was also of his own country,—an author named Quin. Of a truth it has been well said, A prophet is never without honor save in his own country. The proverb is especially true as regards Irish prophets. Assuredly, Moore was, and is, more popular in every part of the world than he was or is in Ireland. The reason is plain: he was, so to speak, of two parties, yet of neither: the one could not forgive his early aspirations for liberty, uttered in imperishable verse; the other could not pardon what they called his desertion of their cause, when he saw that England was willing to do, and was doing, justice to Ireland.