Ashmole MS. 38. I add a few readings from Brit.
Mus. Add. MS. 22, 603, where it is entitled: _Herrick's Farewell to
Poetry_. The importance of the poem for Herrick's biography is alluded
to in the brief "Life" prefixed to vol. i.

For _some sleepy keys_ the Museum MS. reads, _the sleeping keys_; for
_yet forc't they are to go_ it has _and yet are forc't to go_; _drinking
to the odd Number of Nine_ for _Number of Wine_, as to which see below;
_turned her home_ for _twirled her home_; _dear soul_ for _rare soul_.
All these are possible, but _beloved Africa_, and the omission of the
two half lines, "'tis not need The scarecrow unto mankind," are pure
blunders.

_Drinking to the odd Number of Nine_. I introduce this into the text
from the Museum manuscript as agreeing with the

"Well, I can quaff, I see,
To th' number five
Or nine"

of _A Bacchanalian Verse_ (_Hesperides_ 653), on which see Note. Dr.
Grosart explains the Ashmole reading _Wine_ by the Note "_{oinos}_ and
_vinum_ both give five, the number of perfection"; but this seems too
far-fetched for Herrick.

_Kiss, so depart._ By a strange freak Ashmole MS. writes _Guesse_, and
the Museum MS. _Ghesse_; but the emendation _Kiss_ (adopted both by Dr.
Grosart and Mr. Hazlitt) cannot be doubted.

_Well doing's the fruit of doing well._ Seneca, _de Clem._ i. 1: Recte
factorum verus fructus [est] fecisse. Also _Ep._ 81: Recte facti fecisse
merces est. The latter, and Cicero, _de Finib._ II. xxii. 72, are quoted
by Montaigne, _Ess._ II. xvi.

_A Carol presented to Dr. Williams._ From Ashmole MS. 36, 298. For Dr.
Williams, see Note to _Hesperides_ 146. This poem was apparently written
in 1640, after the removal of the bishop's suspension.

_His Mistress to him at his Farewell._ From Add. MS. 11, 811, at the
British Museum, where it is signed "Ro. Herrick".

_Upon Parting._ From Harleian MS. 6917, at the British Museum.

_Upon Master Fletcher's Incomparable Plays._ Printed in Beaumont and
Fletcher's Works, 1647, and Beaumont's Poems, 1653.

_The Golden Pomp is come._ Ovid, "Aurea Pompa venit" (as in _Hesperides_
201).

_To be with juice of cedar washed all over._ Horace's "linenda cedro,"
as in _Hesperides_.

_Evadne._ See Note to _Hesperides_ 575.

_The New Charon._ First printed in "Lachrymae Musarum. The tears of the
Muses: exprest in Elegies written by divers persons of Nobility and
Worth, upon the death of the most hopefull Henry, Lord Hast