ll. 5-6. oreseest ... overseene. Donne is probably punning: 'Thou from the height of Parnassus lookest down upon London; I in London am too much overlooked, disregarded.' But it is not clear. He may mean 'am too much in men's eye, or kept too strictly under observation'. The first meaning seems to me the more probable.
Page 209. To Mr R. W.
l. 3. brother. W reads 'brethren', and Morpheus had many brothers; but of these only two had with himself the power of assuming what form they would, and of these two Phantasus took forms that lack life. Donne, therefore, probably means Phobetor, but a friend copying the poem thought to amend his mythology. See Ovid, Metam. xi. 635-41.
Page 210. To Mr R. W.
l. 18. Guyanaes harvest is nip'd in the spring. See introductory note to the Letters.
l. 23. businesse. The use of 'businesse' as a trisyllable with plural meaning is quite legitimate: 'Idle and discoursing men, that were not much affected, how businesse went, so they might talke of them.' Sermon, Judges XX. 15. p. 7.
Page 211. To Mr S. B.
Probably Samuel Brooke, the brother of Christopher. He officiated at Donne's marriage and was imprisoned. He was later Chaplain to Prince Henry, to James I, and to Charles I; professor of Divinity at Gresham College (1612-29) and Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, 1629. He wrote Latin plays, poems, and religious treatises. The tone of Donne's letter implies that he is a student at Cambridge. It was written therefore before 1601, probably, like several of these letters, while Donne was Egerton's secretary, and living in chambers with Christopher Brooke. A poem by Samuel Brooke, On Tears, is printed in Hannah's Courtly Poets.