The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-10-19
TOM" MOORE'S INSULTS
WHY THE NAME OF ERIN,s POET is
NOT HONoRED IN AMERICA.
Besides ReviIing Thomas Jefferson,
He LibSied the Young Republic in
VitriOlic, ScOrnfuI Terms.
Chicago Times-Herald.

Chicago Times-Herald.
Irish-Americans are up in arms because
the name of Thomas Moore was omitted
from the roll of honor on the walls of the
new Congressional Library in Washington.
The Ancient Order of Hibernians is p=epar-
ing protest with a view of having the mat
ter corrected, and hopes to have Ireland S
favorite poet placed in the American pam
theon. Why was Moore's name left out?
The officials of the library say they did
not care to place Moore's name beside the
names of the other poets because Moore
deliberately insulted Thomas Jefferson and
wrote matter about the then President
which is almost unprintable. This becomes
matter of history, but few persons now
adays know much about it. What Moore
said about Jefferson was not TO be compared
with what he wrote about Americans and
American institutions.
Moore landed in America in 1894, and he
had hardly got his land legs when he began
writing verses roundly abusing all things
American. Perhaps the young mamie was
twentyfour was homesick; perhaps he
found so few people that had ever heard of
him that his vanity was hurt, or perhaps he
had a touch of indigestion Whatever the
cause. there is no doubt of the effect. If the
Americans of Jefferson day were as totally
depraved as the young singer described them
they must have been a very sad lot.
In his letter to Lord Viscount Forbes
(''Tommy dearly loves lord" said Byron,
and Byron was a lord himself and knew
Moore wrote from Washington:
But is it thus? Doth even the glorious
dream
Borrow from truth that dim, uncertain
Which tempts us still to give such fancies
scope
AS shock not reason while they nourssh
hope?
No, no. believe me- it's not so-even now,
While yet upon Columbias rising brow
The snowy smile of young presumption
plays
Her bloom is poisoned and her heart decays
Even now. in dawn of life, her sicky breath
Burns with the faint of empires near their
DEATH
And, like the nymphs of her own whitening
Cline
She's old in youth, she's blasted in her
prime"
Alas for Tom Moore's gallantry. He
couldn't find a pretty girl in America. He
must have had indigestion. After predict
ing the fall Of the government within
fortnight So the young poet charges that
America has poured her poison over every
social grace and has not a single courtesy
left He describes their horrible condition as
1.-The apathy of wrong, the bosoms ice.
A slow and cold stagnation into vice.
The growing commerce of the young re-
public he lashes in this fashion,:
Long has it palsied every grasping hand
And greedy spirit through this bartering
land;
So loose abroad that virtues self is sold,
And conscience, truth and honesty are mace
To rise and fall, like other wares OF trade"
And as If this were not bad enough-as II
CHI no America
kingdom-the fiery young satirist opens a
new vial of vitriol and pours 1t out on the
sizzling States so:
ALREADY in this free, this virtuous state
Which, Frenchmen tell us, was ordained by
To show the world what high perfection
From rabble senators and merchant kings
Even here alre ady patriots learn to steal
Their private perquisites from pubic veal ara
Ard guardians of the countrys sacred nre,
Like Afric's priests, let out the flame Tor
hire
These vaunted demagogues who nobly rose
From England'S debtors to be England
Who could their monarch in their purse
And break allegiance but to cancel debt.
Have proved at length the minerals
tempting hue
Which makes a patriot, can unmake him,
too.
OH Freedom. Freedom, how L hate thy
can't
VI
OF puIpled madmen, were they numbered
From Roman Nero down to Russian Paul,
Could CRATE upon my ear so mean, so base,
AS the rank jargon of that factous race
Who poor of heart and prodigal of words,
Formed to be slaves, yet struggling to be
lords,
Strut 70 tn, as patriots. from their negro
And shout for rights with rapine in their
HEARTS"
"a 4ho~ +ba vo,ncr man explains what
he'd sooner be than an American. lie would
sooner be a sultanS creature In cnmes
where liberty has never even been named
THAN thus to live where bastard Freedom
Her fuNtian flag in mockery over slaves;
Where-motley laws admitting no degree
Alike the bondage and the license suit
The brute-made ruler ana the nah-naue
Brute
From Washington, too Moore wrote to
DR. I homas Hume an epiStle in which,
Alter calling Americans weak ban barians.
sWarmlng over the country like Vermln on
the lions crest" he speaks or washington
thus:
..Rnt hold-observe yon little mount of
Where the breeze murmurs and the freely
There LET fhy fancy raise in bold relief
The sculptured image of that veteran chief
Who lost the rebels in the heros name,
And climbed Ger PROSTATE royalty 10 tame /;
Cast off their monarch that their mob
might reign
kew to this sentiment may be found in
the fact that when he wrote those lines
Mr.. Moore had job with the English gov
eminent. Irish patriots of to-day will find
it rather difficult &c indorse these remarks
of their favorite poet for 1T must be re-
membered that Moore. although an un-
emancipated Roman Catholic. was loyal to
the King" In this same epistle. address
ing Hume and speaking of Jefferson the
father of Democracy, Moore wrote:
IF thou hast got within thy free-born
breast
One pulse that beats more proudly than
the rest
With honest scorn for that inglorious soul
Which creeps and winds beneath mole's
control,
Which courts the rabble's smile, the rab-
blcs nod.
And rnakes-like Egypt-every beast its
There. in those walls-but burning tongue
forbear-
Rank must be reverenced. even the rank
that's there"
Thomas Jefferson's rank saved him from
the unuttered thought in the swelling heart
of the young poet. In the words of Colonel
Mulberry Sellers. what did Thomas Jeffer-
son ever do to Thomas Moore that Thomas
Moore should treat him so?
Henry s. Randall. in his Life of Jener-