I may a poet come, though poor,
And eat with thee a savoury bit,
Paying but common thanks for it.'
If Herrick made some friends among members of his own profession, his love of music probably procured him many more. He addresses poems to William and Henry Lawes, both of whom set verses of his to music; he alludes also to Dr. John Wilson, to Gaulthier, to Lanière, and to Robert Ramsay, in terms of familiarity. The last named, who 'set' his version of the dialogue between Horace and Lydia, may have been a Cambridge friend, as he was organist of Trinity College (1628-1634). With another organist, John Parsons of Westminster Abbey, who died in 1623, Herrick must have been acquainted very shortly after his return from Cambridge. Evidence of the friendship remains in two charming little poems addressed to the musician's daughters, Dorothy and Thomasine:
'If thou ask me, dear, wherefore
I do write of thee no more,
I must answer, sweet, thy part
Less is here than in my heart,'
are the lines which have given the elder sister immortality, while the attractions of the second are for ever celebrated in the couplet,—
'Grow up in beauty, as thou dost begin