No More Learning

"

_Mr. Robert Herrick: his Farewell unto Poetry. _ Printed by Dr. Grosart
and Mr. Hazlitt from 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 "_? ? ? ? ? _ 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.