VI
POETS IN THE ENGLISH COURT, 1603-1625
"He leades the lawlesse poets of our times,
To smoother cadence, to exacter rimes."
—Sir John Beaumont, To the Glorious
Memory of . . . King James.
Of the two writers considered in the preceding chapter, Barclay held the rank of a groom of the privy chamber, and Donne, according to Walton, was one of the King's chaplains-in-ordinary. In general, patronage during the reign — aside from small gifts for dedications — was distributed in this way, either by means of a pension or a place in one of the households into which the court was divided. The royal family lived much apart; the establishments of the King and the Queen, of Prince Henry (prior to his death, November 6, 1612), and of Prince Charles (after his creation, November 4, 1616), were distinct from each other, and separate accounts were kept of wages, fees, annuities, and similar disbursals. A pension or even a nominal position in one of the households meant that the holder, if he were a man of letters, would regard its head as his special patron, to whom tribute in the form of verse or dedication might properly be directed, and would be in a kind of family relationship with others in the same service.
THE COURT OF PRINCE HENRY
Prince Henry's household was established immediately after his arrival from Scotland, and before the end of 1603 numbered one hundred forty-one members, fifty-six above
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