MILTON STILL IN OFFICE: LETTER TO MR. HENRY DE BRASS, WITH MILTON'S OPINION OF SALLUST: LETTERS TO YOUNG RANELAGH AND HENRY OLDENBURG AT SAUMUR: MORUS IN NEW CIRCUMSTANCES: ELEVEN MOBE STATE-LETTERS OF MILTON FOR THE PROTECTOR (NOS. CI.-CXI.): ANDREW MARVELL BROUGHT IN AS ASSISTANT FOREIGN SECRETARY AT LAST (SEPT. 1657): JOHN DRYDEN NOW ALSO IN THE PROTECTOR'S EMPLOYMENT: BIRTH OF MILTON'S DAUGHTER BY HIS SECOND WIFE: SIX MORE STATE-LETTERS OF MILTON (NOS. CXII.-CXIII.): ANOTHER LETTER TO MR. HENRY DE BRASS, AND ANOTHER TO PETER HEIMBACH: COMMENT ON THE LATTER: DEATHS OF MILTON'S SECOND WIFE AND HER CHILD: HIS TWO NEPHEWS, EDWARD AND JOHN PHILLIPS, AT THIS DATE: MILTON'S LAST SIXTEEN STATE-LETTERS FOR OLIVER CROMWELL (NOS. CXVIII.-CXXXIII.), INCLUDING TWO TO CHARLES GUSTAVUS OF SWEDEN. TWO ON A NEW ALARM OF A PERSECUTION OF THE PIEDMONTESE PROTESTANTS, AND SEVERAL TO LOUIS XIV. AND CARDINAL MAZARIN: IMPORTANCE OF THIS LAST GROUP OF THE STATE-LETTERS, AND REVIEW OF THE WHOLE SERIES OF MILTON'S PERFORMANCES FOR CROMWELL: LAST DIPLOMATIC INCIDENTS OF THE PROTECTORATE, AND ANDREW MARVELL IN CONNEXION WITH THEM: INCIDENTS OF MILTON'S LITERARY LIFE IN THIS PERIOD: YOUNG GUNTZER'S _DISSERTATIO_ AND YOUNG KECK'S PHALAECIANS: MILTON'S EDITION OF RALEIGH'S _CABINET COUNCIL_: RESUMPTION OF THE OLD DESIGN OF _PARADISE LOST_ AND ACTUAL COMMENCEMENT OF THE POEM: CHANGE FROM THE DRAMATIC POEM TO THE EPIC: SONNET IN MEMORY OF HIS DECEASED WIFE. Through the Second Protectorate Milton remained in office just as before. He was not, however, as had been customary before at the commencement of each new period of his Secretaryship, sworn in afresh. Thurloe was sworn in, both as General Secretary and as full Councillor, and Scobell and Jessop were sworn in as Clerks;[1] but we hear of no such ceremony in the case of Milton. His Latin Secretaryship, we infer, was now regarded as an excrescence from the Whitehall establishment, rather than an integral part of it. An oath may have been administered to him privately, or his old general engagement may have sufficed. [Footnote 1: Council Order Books, July 13 and 14, 1657.] Our first trace of Milton after the new inauguration of Cromwell is in one of his Latin Familiar Epistles, addressed to some young foreigner in London, of whom I know nothing more than may be learnt from the letter itself:-- "To the Very Distinguished MR. HENRY DE BRASS.