Introduction 



for the illustration it affords of the familiar intercourse between the 

 two men : 



[Date, probably early part of 1639.] 

 MY WORTHY FRIEND, 



I am not able to yield any reason ; no, not so much as 

 may satisfy myself, why a most ingenious letter of yours hath lain so 

 long by me (as it were in lavender) without an answer, save this only, 

 the pleasure I have taken in your style and conceptions, together with a 

 meditation of the subject you propound, may seem to have cast me into 

 a gentle slumber. But being now awaked, I do herein return you most 

 hearty thanks for the kind prosecution of your first motion, touching a 

 just office due to the memory of our ever memorable friend, to whose 

 good fame, though it be needless to add anything (and my age considered, 

 almost hopeless from my pen ;) yet I will endeavour to perform my 

 promise, if it were but even for this cause, that in saying somewhat of 

 the life of so deserving a man, I may perchance over-live mine own. 

 That which you add of Dr. King (now made Dean of Rochester, and 

 by that translated into my native soil) is a great spur unto me : with 

 whom I hope shortly to confer about it in my passage towards Boughton 

 Malherb, which was my genial air, and invite him to a friendship with 

 that family where his predecessor was familiarly acquainted. I shall 

 write to you at large by the next messenger (being at present a little in 

 business), and then I shall set down certain general heads, wherein I 

 desire information by your loving diligence ; hoping shortly to enjoy 

 your own ever welcome company in this approaching time of the Fly and 

 the Cork. And so I rest, 



Your very hearty poor friend to serve you, 



H. WOTTON, 



In addition to the Elegy, Walton had meanwhile written some 

 lines for the portrait of Donne in the second edition of Donne's 

 poems (1635),* and had also contributed complimentary verses to 

 'The Merchant's Map of Commerce, 1638 ;* but it is with his life of 

 Donne that his literary work really commences. It appears to have 

 won immediate and unanimous praise. Charles I. spoke of it with 

 approbation ; John Hales told Dr. King that " he had not seen a life 



* See Appendix. 

 1 



