Sir George More, Chancellor of the Garter and Lieutenant of the Tower (to
whom the news of his daughter's secret marriage to Donne (1601) was "so
immeasurably unwelcome, and so transported him, that, as though his
passion of anger and inconsideration might exceed theirs of love and
errour," he had procured his son-in law's dismissal from the post of
Secretary to Sir Thomas Egerton), had, by the date of this letter, become
"so far reconciled, as to wish their happinesse, and not to deny them his
paternal blessing," though he still "refused to contribute any means that
might conduce to their livelihood."
The Donnes had accepted the invitation of Mrs. Donne's cousin, Sir Francis
Wooley, to be his guests, on his inheritance in 1602 of the estate of
Pyrford, in Surrey, "where they remained with much freedom to themselves,
and equal comfort to him for many years," says Walton. In reality their
residence at Pyrford extended from some time in 1602 to the winter of
1604-5. To this period the letter belongs. The "entreaty that you let goe
no copy of my Problems" may refer to some unrevised MS. of the
_Iuvenalia_. (See note to XXX.)