the Grooms of the Privy-Chamber, which enabled him to rent a house near London, where privately he composed many of his dramatic pieces.  He was tutor to Lady Ann Clifford, and on the death of the great Spenser, he was appointed Poet Laureat to Queen Elizabeth.  Towards the end of his life he retired to a farm which he had at Beckington near Philips Norton in Somersetshire, where after some time spent in the service of the Muses, and in religious contemplation, he died in the year 1619.  He left no issue by his wife Justina, to whom he was married several years.  Wood says, that in the wall over his grave there is this inscription;

Here lies expecting the second coming of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, the dead body of Samuel Daniel esquire, that excellent poet and historian, who was tutor to Lady Ann Clifford in her youth, she that was daughter and heir to George Clifford earl of Cumberland; who in gratitude to him erected this monument to his memory a long time after, when she was Countess Dowager of Pembroke, Dorset and Montgomery.  He died in October, Anno 1619.

Mr. Daniel’s poetical works, consisting of dramatic and other pieces, are as follow;

1.  The Complaint of Rosamond.

2.  A Letter from Octavia to Marcus Antonius, 8vo. 1611.

These two pieces resemble each other, both in subject and stile, being written in the Ovidian manner, with great tenderness and variety of passion.  The measure is Stanzas of seven lines.  Let the following specimen shew the harmony and delicacy of his numbers, where he makes Rosamond speak of beauty in as expressive a manner as description can reach.

  Ah! beauty Syren, fair inchanting good,
  Sweet silent rhetoric of persuading eyes;
  Dumb eloquence whose power doth move the blood,
  More than the words or wisdom of the wife;
  Still harmony whose diapason lies, Within a brow; the key
      which passions move,
  To ravish sense, and play a world in love.

3.  Hymen’s Triumph, a Pastoral Tragi-Comedy presented at the Queen’s Court in the Strand, at her Majesty’s entertainment of the King, at the nuptials of lord Roxborough, London, 1623, 4to.  It is introduced by a pretty contrived Prologue by way of dialogue, in which Hymen is opposed by avarice, envy and jealousy; in this piece our author sometimes touches the passions with a very delicate hand.

4.  The Queen’s Arcadia, a Pastoral Tragi-Comedy, presented before her Majesty by the university of Oxford, London 1623, 4to.

5.  The Vision of the Twelve Goddesses, presented in a Masque the 8th of January at Hampton-Court, by the Queen’s most excellent Majesty and her Ladies.  London 1604, 8vo. and 1623, 4to.  It is dedicated to the Lady Lucy, countess of Bedford.  His design under the shapes, and in the persons of the Twelve Goddesses, was to shadow out the blessings which the nation enjoyed, under the peaceful reign of King James I. By Juno was represented Power; by Pallas Wisdom and Defence; by Venus, Love and Amity; by Vesta, Religion; by Diana, Chastity; by Proserpine, Riches; by Macaria, Felicity; by Concordia, the Union of Hearts; by Astraea, Justice; by Flora, the Beauties of the Earth; by Ceres, Plenty; and by Tathys, Naval Power.