Let the music of the spheres,
  Captivate their mortal ears;
  While Jove descends into this tower,
  In a golden streaming shower. 
  To disguise him from the eye
  Of Juno, who is apt to pry
  Into my pleasures:  I to day
  Have bid Ganymede go to play,
  And thus stole from Heaven to be
  Welcome on earth to Danae. 
  And see where the princely maid,
  On her easy couch is laid,
  Fairer than the Queen of Loves,
  Drawn about with milky doves.

Footnotes:  1.  Athen.  Oxon. p 376 2.  Wood, ubi supra.

* * * * *

JamesHowel, Esq;

Was born at Abernant in Carmarthenshire, the place where his father was minister, in the year 1594[1].  Howel himself, in one of his familiar epistles, says, that his ascendant was that hot constellation of Cancer about the middle of the Dog Days.  After he was educated in grammar learning in the free school of Hereford, he was sent to Jesus College in the beginning of 1610, took a degree in arts, and then quitted the university.  By the help of friends, and a small sum of money his father assisted him with, he travelled for three years into several countries, where he improved himself in the various languages; some years after his return, the reputation of his parts was so great, that he was made choice of to be sent into Spain, to recover of the Spanish monarch a rich English ship, seized by the Viceroy of Sardinia for his master’s use, upon some pretence of prohibited goods being found in it.

During his absence, he was elected Fellow of Jesus College, 1623, and upon his return, was patronized by Emanuel, lord Scroop, Lord President of the North, and by him was made his secretary[2].  As he resided in York, he was, by the Mayor and Aldermen of Richmond, chose a Burgess for their Corporation to sit in that Parliament, that began at Westminster in the year 1627.  Four years after, he went secretary to Robert, earl of Leicester, ambassador extraordinary from England to the King of Denmark, before whom he made several Latin speeches, shewing the occasion of their embassy, viz. to condole the death of Sophia, Queen Dowager of Denmark, Grandmother to Charles I. King of England.

Our author enjoyed many beneficial employments, and at length, about the beginning of the civil war, was made one of the clerks of the council, but being extravagant in his temper, all the money he got was not sufficient to preserve him from a Jail.  When the King was forced from the Parliament, and the Royal interest declined, Howel was arrested; by order of a certain committee, who owed him no good-will, and carried prisoner to the Fleet; and having now nothing to depend upon but his wits, he was obliged to write and translate books for a livelihood, which brought him in, says Wood, a comfortable subsistance, during his stay there; he is the first person we have met with, in the course of this work, who may be said to have made a trade of authorship, having written no less than 49 books on different subjects.