Pen in the last man's coach to St. James's, and thence up to
the Duke of York's chamber, which as it is now fretted at
the top, and the chimney-piece made handsome, is one of the
noblest and best-proportioned rooms that ever, I think, I saw
in my life."
"May 20th, 1668. Up and with Colonell Middleton in a new
coach he hath made him, very handsome, to White Hall, where
the Duke of York having removed his lodgings for this year
to St. James's we walked thither; and there find the Duke of
York coming to White Hall, and so back to the Council Chamber,
where the Committee of the Navy sat."
In November, 1667, James fell ill of the smallpox in St. James's
Palace, when the gallery doors were locked up. On March 31st, 1671,
Anne Duchess of York, the daughter of Clarendon, died here. The
Princess Mary was married to William Prince of Orange in November,
1677, at eleven o'clock at night, in the Chapel Royal, and on July
28th, 1683, Princess Anne to Prince George of Denmark, when the pair
took up their residence at St. James's.
When James came to the crown he went to live at Whitehall Palace, but
he frequently stayed at St. James's. On June 9th, 1688, Queen Mary of
Modena was taken to the latter place, and on the following day James
Francis Edward, afterwards known as "The Pretender," was born in the
Old Bedchamber. This room was situated at the east end of the south
front. It had three doors, one leading to a private staircase at the
head of the bed, and two windows opposite the bed.[7]
The room was pulled down previous to the alterations made in the year
1822.
The anecdote of Charles II. and the chaplains of the Chapel Royal
is often quoted, but it is worth repeating, as it shows the ready
wit of the great preacher, Dr. South. A daily dinner was prepared
at the Palace for the chaplains, and one day the King notified his
intention of dining with them. There had been some talk of abolishing
this practice, and South seized the opportunity of saying grace to do
his best in opposition to the suggestion; so, instead of the regular
formula, which was "God save the King and bless the dinner," said "God
bless the King and save the dinner." Charles at once cried out, "And it
shall be saved."
The Duke of York and the King were fond of wandering about the park at
all hours, and as Charles often walked by himself, even as far as the
then secluded Constitution Hill, James having expressed fears for his
safety, the elder brother made the memorable reply: "No kind of danger,
James, for I am sure no man in England will take away my life to make
you king."
Pepys tells us on March 16th, 1661-2, that while he was walking in the
park he met the King and Duke coming "to see their fowl play."
Cosmo III., Grand Duke of Tuscany (then Hereditary Prince), made a
"Tour through England" in 1669, and it will be remembered that Macaulay
found the account of his travels a valuable help towards obtaining
a picture of the state of England in the middle of the seventeenth
century. Cosmo thus describes St. James's Park:--
"A large park enclosed on every side by a wall, and containing
a long, straight, and spacious walk, intended for the
amusement of the Mall, on each side of which grow large elms
whose shade render the promenade in that place in summer
infinitely pleasant and agreeable; close to it is a canal
of nearly the same length, on which are several species of
aquatic birds, brought up and rendered domestic--the work
of the Protector Cromwell; the rest of the park is left
uncultivated, and forms a wood for the retreat of deer and
other quadrupeds."
His Highness was not quite correct in giving the credit of the
collection of wild-fowl to Cromwell, as the water-fowl appear to have
been kept in the park from the reign of Elizabeth, and the ponds were
replenished after the Restoration.
Evelyn gives a long account in his _Diary_ of the zoological
collections (February 9th, 1664-65). He says:
"The parke was at this time stored with numerous flocks of
severall sorts of ordinary and extraordinary wild fowle,
breeding about the Decoy, which for being neere so greate a
citty, and among such a concourse of souldiers and people,
is a singular and diverting thing. There were also deere of
several countries, white; spotted like leopards; antelopes,
an elk, red deere, roebucks, staggs, guinea goates, Arabian
sheepe, etc. There were withy pots or nests for the wild fowle
to lay their eggs in, a little above y^e surface of y^e
water."
Charles II. was a saunterer by nature, and he appears to have been
quite happy in the park either chatting with Nell Gwyn, at the end of
the garden of her Pall Mall house, in feeding the fowl, or in playing
the game of Mall.
This game was popular from the end of the sixteenth to the beginning
of the eighteenth century, and then went out of fashion. At one time
there were few large towns without a mall, or prepared ground where
the game could be played. There is reason to believe that the game was
introduced into England from Scotland on the accession of James VI. to
the English throne, because the King names it in his "Basilicon Dōron"
among other exercises as suited for his son Henry, who was afterwards
Prince of Wales, and about the same time Sir R. Dallington, in his
_Method of Travel_ (1598), expresses his surprise that the sport was
not then introduced into England.
The game was played in long shaded alleys, and on dry gravel walks.
The mall in St. James's Park was nearly half a mile in length, and was
kept with the greatest care. Pepys relates how he went to talk with the
keeper of the mall, and how he learned the manner of mixing the earth
for the floor, over which powdered cockle-shells were strewn. All this
required such attention that a special person was employed for the
purpose, who was called the cockle-strewer. In dry weather the surface
was apt to turn to dust, and consequently to impede the flight of the
ball, so that the cockle-strewer's office was by no means a sinecure.
Richard Blome, writing in 1673, asserts that this mall was "said to
be the best in Christendom," but Evelyn claims the pre-eminence for
that at Tours, with its seven rows of tall elms, as "the noblest in
Europe for length and shade." The game is praised by Sir R. Dallington
"because it is a gentlemanlike sport, not violent, and yields good
occasion and opportunity of discourse as they walke from one marke to
the other," and Joseph Lauthier, who wrote a treatise on the subject,
entitled _Le Jeu de Mail_, Paris, 1717 (which is now extremely scarce),
uses the same form of recommendation.
The chief requisites for the game were mallets, balls, two arches or
hoops, one at either end of the mall, and a wooden border marked
so as to show the position of the balls when played. The mallets
were of different size and form to suit the various players, and
Lauthier directs that the weight and height of the mallet should be in
proportion to the strength and stature of the player. The balls were of
various sizes and weights, and each size had its distinct name. In damp
weather, when the soil was heavy, a lighter ball was required than when
the soil was sandy. A gauge was used to ascertain its weight, and the
weight of the mallet was adjusted to that of the ball. The arch or pass
was about two feet high and two inches wide. The one at the west end
of St. James's Park remained in its place for many years, and was not
cleared away until the beginning of the reign of George III. In playing
the game, the mallet was raised above the head and brought down with
great force so as to strike the ball to a considerable distance. The
poet Waller describes Charles II.'s stroke in the following lines:--
"Here a well-polished Mall gives us joy,
To see our prince his matchless force employ.
No sooner has he touch'd the flying ball,
But 'tis already more than half the Mall;
And such a fury from his arm has got,
As from a smoking culverin 'twere shot."
Considerable skill and practice were required in the player, who, while
attempting to make the ball skate along the ground with speed, had to
be careful that he did not strike it in such a manner as to raise it
from the ground. This is shown by what Charles Cotton writes:--
"But playing with the boy at Mall
(I rue the time and ever shall),
I struck the ball, I know not how,
(For that is not the play, you know),
A pretty height into the air."
This boy was, perhaps, a caddie, for it will be seen that the game was
a sort of cross between golf and croquet.
Lauthier describes four ways of playing at pall mall, viz.:--(1) the
_rouet_, or pool game; (2) _en partie_, a match game; (3) _à grands
coups_, at long shots; and (4) _chicane_, or hockey. Moreover, he
proposes a new game to be played like billiards.
We may now pass from St. James's Park to Hyde Park, which became a
place of public resort in the reigns of James I. and Charles I. It was
then considered to be quite a country place. Ben Jonson mentions in
the Prologue to his comedy, _The Staple of News_ (1625), the number of
coaches which congregated there, and Shirley describes the horse-races
in his comedy entitled _Hide Parke_ (1637).
The park, being Crown property, was sold by order of Parliament in 1652
for about £17,000 in three lots, the purchasers being Richard Wilcox,
John Tracy, and Anthony Deane. Cromwell was a frequent visitor, and on
one occasion when he was driving in the park his horses ran away, and
he was thrown off his coach.
After the Restoration the park was the daily resort of all the
gallantry of the court, and Pepys found driving there very pleasant,
although he complained of the dust. The Ring, which is described in
Grammont's _Memoirs_ as "the rendezvous of magnificence and beauty,"
was a small enclosure of trees round which the carriages circulated.
Pepys writes April 4th, 1663:--
"After dinner to Hide Park ... At the Park was the King and in
another coach my Lady Castlemaine, they greeting one another
at every tour."
This passage is illustrated in Wilson's _Memoirs_, 1719, where we are
told that when the coaches "have turned for some time round one way,
they face about and turn t'other."
John Macky, in his _Journey through England_ (1724), affirms that in
fine weather he had seen above three hundred coaches at a time making
"the Grand Tour."
Cosmo tells of the etiquette which was observed among the company:--
"The King and Queen are often there, and the duke and duchess,
towards whom at the first meeting and no more all persons show
the usual marks of respect, which are afterwards omitted,
although they should chance to meet again ever so often, every
one being at full liberty, and under no constraint whatever,
and to prevent the confusion and disorder which might arise
from the great number of lackies and footmen, these are not
permitted to enter Hyde Park, but stop at the gate waiting for
their masters."
Oldys refers to a poem, printed in sixteen pages, which was entitled
"The Circus, or British Olympicks: a Satyr on the Ring in Hyde Park."
He says that the poem satirizes many well-known fops under fictitious
names, and he raises the number of coaches seen on a fine evening from
Macky's three hundred to a thousand. The Ring was partly destroyed at
the time the Serpentine was formed by Caroline, Queen of George II.
Although the Ring has disappeared, Hyde Park has remained from the
Restoration period until the present day the most fashionable place in
London, but now the whole park has been utilized.
Charles II., in reviving the Stage, specially patronised it himself,
and it may be referred to here from its connection with the Court.
It has already been noticed that previous monarchs did not visit the
public theatres.
Pepys was an enthusiastic playgoer, and the _Diary_ contains a mass of
information respecting the Stage not elsewhere to be found, so that we
are able to trace the various advances made in the revival of the Stage
from the incipient attempt of Davenant before the Restoration to the
improvements in scenery introduced by the rivalry of the two managers,
Davenant and Killigrew. Immediately after the Restoration two companies
of actors were organized, who performed at two different houses. One
theatre was known as the King's House, called by Pepys "The Theatre,"
and the other as the Duke's House, called by Pepys "The Opera." Sir
William Davenant obtained a patent for his company as "The Duke's
Servants," named after the Duke of York, and Thomas Killigrew obtained
one for "The King's Servants."
Killigrew's Company first performed at the "Red Bull," Clerkenwell, and
on November 8th removed to Gibbons's Tennis Court in Bear Yard, which
was entered from Vere Street, Clare Market. Here the Company remained
till 1663, when they removed to Drury Lane Theatre, which had been
built for their reception, and was opened on May 7th.
Davenant's Company first performed at the Cockpit, Drury Lane. They
began to play at Salisbury Court Theatre on November 13th, 1660, and
went to Cobham House, Blackfriars, on the site afterwards occupied
by Apothecaries' Hall, in January, 1661. They then removed to the
theatre in Portugal Row, built on the site of Lisle's Tennis Court.
Rhodes, a bookseller, who had formerly been wardrobe keeper at the
Blackfriars, had managed in 1659 to obtain a licence from the State,
and John Downes affirms that his company acted at the Cockpit, but
apparently he was acting at the Salisbury Court Theatre before Davenant
went there. Killigrew, however, soon succeeded in suppressing Rhodes.
Davenant planned a new building in Dorset Gardens, which was close
to Salisbury Court, where the former theatre was situated. He died,
however, before it was finished, but the company removed there in 1671,
and the theatre was opened on the 9th of November with Dryden's play,
_Sir Martin Mar-all_, which he had improved from a rough draft by the
Duke of Newcastle. Pepys had seen it seven times in the years 1667-68.
The Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre remained shut up until February, 1672,
when the King's Company, burnt out of Drury Lane Theatre, made use of
it till March, 1674, by which time the new building in Brydges Street,
Covent Garden, was ready for their occupation.
When Tom Killigrew died in 1682 the King's and the Duke's companies
were united, and the Duke's servants removed from Dorset Gardens to
Drury Lane. The two companies performed together for the first time on
November 16th.
These constant changes are very confusing, and the recital of them is
not very entertaining, but it is necessary to make the matter clear
for the proper understanding of the history of the time. The plan of
the old theatres, with their platform stage, was no longer of use for
the altered arrangements introduced at the Restoration. Successive
improvements in the form of the houses were made, but we learn from
Pepys that it was some time before the roofing of the building was
water-tight.
The public theatres were open in the afternoon, three o'clock being the
usual hour for performance, and the plays were therefore partly acted
in the summer by daylight. It was thus necessary to have skylights, but
these were so slight that heavy rain came and wetted those below. On
June 1st, 1664, Pepys wrote:--
"Before the play was done it fell such a storm of hail that we
in the middle of the pit were fain to rise, and all the house
in a disorder."
Davenant was the original planner of the modern stage and its scenery,
but Killigrew did his part in the improvement carried out. He was
somewhat jealous of his brother manager, and on one occasion he
explained to Pepys what he himself had done:--
"Feb. 12th, 1666-67. The stage is now by his pains a thousand
times better and more glorious than ever heretofore. Now, wax
candles, and many of them; then not above 3 lbs. of tallow:
now all things civil, no rudeness anywhere; then as in a bear
garden: then two or three fiddlers, now nine or ten of the
best: then nothing but rushes upon the ground, and everything
else mean; and now all otherwise; then the Queen seldom and
the King never would come; now, not the King only for State
but all civil people do think they may come as well as any."
Killigrew complained that "the audience at his house was not above half
as much as it used to be before the late fire," but in the following
year (February 6th, 1667-8) there were crowds at the other house. Pepys
relates:--
"Home to dinner, and my wife being gone before, I to the Duke
of York's playhouse; where a new play of Etheridge's called
'She Would if she Could,' and though I was there by two
o'clock, there were 1,000 people put back that could not have
room in the pit."
Pepys's criticisms on the plays he saw acted at these theatres were not
always satisfactory, and often they were contradictory. At the same
time he was apparently judicious in the disposal of praise and blame
on the actors he saw. Betterton was his ideal of the perfect actor,
and, so far as it is possible to judge as to one who lived so long ago,
public opinion formed by those capable of judging from contemporary
report seems to be in agreement with that of Pepys.
Pepys was a great frequenter of taverns and inns, as were most of his
contemporaries. There are about one hundred and thirty London taverns
mentioned in the _Diary_, but time has swept away nearly all of these
houses, and it is difficult to find any place which Pepys frequented.
These taverns may be considered as a link between the Court end of
London and the city, for Pepys distributed his favours between the two
places. King Street, Westminster, was full of inns, and Pepys seems to
have frequented them all. Two of them--the "Dog" and the "Sun"--are
mentioned in Herrick's address to the shade of "Glorious Ben":--
"Ah, Ben!
Say how or when
Shall we thy guests
Meet at these feasts
Made at the Sun,
The Dog, the Triple Tunne?
Where we such clusters had
As made us nobly wild, not mad!
And yet such verse of thine
Outdid the meate, outdid the frolic wine."
The "Three Tuns" at Charing Cross, visited by Pepys, was probably the
same house whose sign Herrick changes to "Triple Tun."
Among the Westminster taverns may be mentioned "Heaven" and "Hell," two
places of entertainment at Westminster Hall; the "Bull Head" and the
"Chequers" and the "Swan" at Charing Cross; the "Cock" in Bow Street
and the "Fleece" in York Street, Covent Garden; the "Canary" house by
Exeter Change; and the "Blue Balls" in Lincoln's Inn Fields.
The majority of these taverns patronised by Pepys were, however, in
the city. There were several "Mitres" in London, but perhaps the most
interesting one was that kept in Fenchurch Street by Daniel Rawlinson,
a staunch royalist, who, when Charles I. was executed, hung his sign in
mourning. Thomas Hearne says that naturally made him suspected by the
Roundheads, but "endeared him so much to the Churchmen that he throve
amain and got a good estate." His son, Sir Thomas Rawlinson, was Lord
Mayor in 1700, and President of Bridewell Hospital. His two grandsons,
Thomas and Richard Rawlinson, hold an honourable place in the roll
of eminent book collectors. The "Samson" in St. Paul's Churchyard
was another famous house, as also the "Dolphin" in Tower Street, a
rendezvous of the Navy officers, which provided very good and expensive
dinners.
The "Cock" in Threadneedle Street was an old-established house when
Pepys visited it on March 7th, 1659-60, and it lasted till 1840, when
it was cleared away. In the eighteenth century it was a constant
practice for the frequenters of the "Cock" to buy a chop or steak at
the butcher's and bring it to be cooked, the charge for which was one
penny. Fox's friend, the notorious Duke of Norfolk, known as "Jockey of
Norfolk," often bought his chop and brought it here to be cooked, until
his rank was discovered.
The meetings of the Royal Society were held at Gresham College in
Bishopsgate Street, and then at Arundel House in the Strand, which was
lent to the Society by Henry Howard of Norfolk, afterwards Duke of
Norfolk. Cosmo of Tuscany visited the latter place for a meeting of the
Royal Society, and he gives in his _Travels_ an interesting account of
the manner in which the proceedings were carried out.
There are many references in Pepys's _Diary_ to the Lord Mayor and the
Rulers of the City, and of the customs carried out there.
The Lord Mayor, aldermen, and common councilmen visited Cosmo, who
was staying at Lord St. Alban's mansion in St. James's Square. His
Highness, having dined with the King at the Duke of Buckingham's, kept
the city magnates waiting for a time, but Colonel Gascoyne, "to make
the delay less tedious, had accommodated himself to the national taste
by ordering liquor and amusing them with drinking toasts, till it was
announced that His Highness was ready to give them audience." The
description of the audience is very interesting.
Pepys lived in the city at the Navy Office in Seething Lane (opposite
St. Olave's, Hart Street, the church he attended) during the whole of
the time he was writing his _Diary_, but when he was Secretary of the
Admiralty he went, in 1684, to live at the end of Buckingham Street,
Strand, in a house on the east side which looks on to the river.
Mr. John Eliot Hodgkin possesses the original lease (dated September
30th, 1687) from the governor and company of the New River for a supply
of water through a half-inch pipe, and four small cocks of brass led
from the main pipe in Villiers Street to Samuel Pepys's house in York
Buildings, also a receipt for two quarters' rent for the same.[8]
Two of the greatest calamities that could overtake any city occurred
in London during the writing of the _Diary_, and were fully described
by Pepys--viz., the Plague of 1665 and the Fire of 1666. Defoe's most
interesting history of the plague year was written in 1722 at second
hand, for the writer was only two years old when this scourge overran
London. Pepys wrote of what he saw, and as he stuck to his duty during
the whole time that the pestilence continued, he saw much that occurred.
England was first visited with the plague in 1348-49, which, since 1833
(when Hecker's work on the _Epidemics of the Middle Ages_ was first
published in English), has been styled the Black Death--a translation
of the German term "Der Schwarze Tod." This plague had the most
momentous effect upon the history of England on account of the fearful
mortality it caused. It paralysed industry, and permanently altered
the position of the labourer. The statistics of the writers of the
Middle Ages are of little value, and the estimates of those who died
are various, but the statement that half the population of England died
from the plague is probably not far from the truth. From 1348 to 1665
plague was continually occurring in London, but it has not appeared
since the last date, except on a small scale. Dr. Creighton gives
particulars of the visitations in London in 1603, 1625, and 1665, from
which it appears that the mortality in 1665 was more than double that
in 1603, and about a third more than that in 1625.
On the 7th of June, 1665, Pepys for the first time saw two or three
houses marked with the red cross, and the words "Lord, have mercy upon
us" upon the doors, and the sight made him feel so ill-at-ease that he
was forced to buy some roll tobacco to smell and chew.[9] On the 27th
of this month he writes: "The plague encreases mightily."