tyle when he chose:
with Donne it was rather the skin--if not even the very
flesh and bone and all but spirit--than the cloak of his
thought. Nevertheless there is no exact contemporary of
his--and certainly none possessing anything like his
literary power--who deserves selection as a representative
of his own school and time better than he does; and there is
something in him which adds distinction to any company in
which he appears. As mentioned in the Introduction, his
verse-epistles were even more noteworthy, but in prose he is
noteworthy enough.

The batch of letters here chosen was most fortunately
preserved by Izaak Walton, who published the first of them
_in_ the life not of Donne but of George Herbert, while the
rest were "added" to it in 1670.[94] The lady to whom they
were written, Magdalen Newport by maiden name, was mother
not only of the pious and poetical George, but of Edward
Lord Herbert of Cherbury, himself not a very bad poet but by
no means in the usual sense pious, a very great coxcomb, and
a hero chiefly by his own report. His mother, however, seems
to have been one of those "elect ladies" who were among the
chief glories of England in the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries, and were fortunately numerous. After her
widowhood she lived at Oxford for some time, but seems to
have moved to London when Donne, about 1607, wrote these
letters. He was himself living at Mitcham (spelt "Michin" in
one letter), not yet famous for golf though perhaps already
for lavender. Later he visited her at Montgomery Castle, the
famous seat of the Herberts. She is said to have been very
beautiful, and the subtle touch of not in the least fatuous
or foppish "devotion" is most agreeable.

7. TO THE LADY MAGDALEN HERBERT

Madam,

Your favours to me are everywhere. I use them, and have them. I enjoy
them at London, and leave them there: and yet find them at Mitcham. Such
riddles as these become things inexpressible: and such is your goodness.
I was almost sorry to find your servant here this day, because I was
loath to have any witness of my not coming home last night, and indeed
of my coming this morning. But my not coming was excusable, because
earnest business detained me; and my coming this day is by example of
your St. Mary Magdalen, who rose early upon Sunday, to