where Luellin and I dined on a breast of mutton all alone, discoursing
of the changes that we have seen and the happiness of them that have
estates of their own, and so parted, and I went by appointment to my
office and paid young Mr. Walton L500; it being very dark he took L300
by content. He gave me half a piece and carried me in his coach to
St. Clement’s, from whence I went to Mr. Crew’s and made even with Mr.
Andrews, and took in all my notes and gave him one for all. Then to
my Lady Wright and gave her my Lord’s letter which he bade me give her
privately. So home and then to Will’s for a little news, then came home
again and wrote to my Lord, and so to Whitehall and gave them to the
post-boy. Back again home and to bed.
29th. In the morning I went to Mr. Gunning’s, where he made an excellent
sermon upon the 2d of the Galatians, about the difference that fell
between St. Paul and St. Peter (the feast day of St. Paul being a day
or two ago), whereby he did prove, that, contrary to the doctrine of
the Roman Church, St. Paul did never own any dependance, or that he was
inferior to St. Peter, but that they were equal, only one a particular
charge of preaching to the Jews, and the other to the Gentiles. Here
I met with Mr. Moore, and went home with him to dinner to Mr. Crew’s,
where Mr. Spurrier being in town did dine with us. From thence I went
home and spent the afternoon in casting up my accounts, and do find
myself to be worth L40 and more, which I did not think, but am afraid
that I have forgot something. To my father’s to supper, where I heard by
my brother Tom how W. Joyce would the other day have Mr. Pierce and his
wife to the tavern after they were gone from my house, and that he had
so little manners as to make Tom pay his share notwithstanding that
he went upon his account, and by my father I understand that my uncle
Fenner and my aunt were much pleased with our entertaining them. After
supper home without going to see Mrs. Turner.
30th. This morning, before I was up, I fell a-singing of my song,
“Great, good, and just,” &c.
[This is the beginning of the Marquis of Montrose’s verses on the
execution of Charles I., which Pepys had set to music:
“Great, good, and just, could I but rate
My grief and thy too rigid fate,
I’d weep the world to such a strain
That it should deluge once again.
But since thy loud-tongued blood demands supplies
More from Briareus’ hands, than Argus eyes,
I’ll sing thy obsequies with trumpet sounds,
And write thy epitaph with blood and wounds.”]
and put myself thereby in mind that this was the fatal day, now ten
years since, his Majesty died. Scull the waterman came and brought me
a note from the Hope from Mr. Hawly with direction, about his money, he
tarrying there till his master be gone. To my office, where I received
money of the excise of Mr. Ruddyer, and after we had done went to Will’s
and staid there till 3 o’clock and then I taking my L12 10s. 0d. due to
me for my last quarter’s salary, I went with them by water to London to
the house where Signr. Torriano used to be and staid there a while with
Mr. Ashwell, Spicer and Ruddier. Then I went and paid L12 17s. 6d. due
from me to Captn. Dick Matthews according to his direction the last week
in a letter. After that I came back by water playing on my flageolette
and not finding my wife come home again from her father’s I went and sat
awhile and played at cards with Mrs. Jam, whose maid had newly got an
ague and was ill thereupon. So homewards again, having great need to
do my business, and so pretending to meet Mr. Shott the wood monger of
Whitehall I went and eased myself at the Harp and Ball, and thence home
where I sat writing till bed-time and so to bed. There seems now to be
a general cease of talk, it being taken for granted that Monk do resolve
to stand to the Parliament, and nothing else. Spent a little time this
night in knocking up nails for my hat and cloaks in my chamber.
31st. In the morning I fell to my lute till 9 o’clock. Then to my Lord’s
lodgings and set out a barrel of soap to be carried to Mrs. Ann. Here I
met with Nick Bartlet, one that had been a servant of my Lord’s at sea
and at Harper’s gave him his morning draft. So to my office where I
paid; L1200 to Mr. Frost and at noon went to Will’s to give one of the
Excise office a pot of ale that came to-day to tell over a bag of his
that wanted; L7 in it, which he found over in another bag. Then home and
dined with my wife when in came Mr. Hawly newly come from shipboard
from his master, and brought me a letter of direction what to do in
his lawsuit with Squib about his house and office. After dinner to
Westminster Hall, where all we clerks had orders to wait upon the
Committee, at the Star Chamber that is to try Colonel Jones,
[Colonel John Jones, impeached, with General Ludlow and Miles
Corbet, for treasonable practices in Ireland.]
and were to give an account what money we had paid him; but the
Committee did not sit to-day. Hence to Will’s, where I sat an hour or
two with Mr. Godfrey Austin, a scrivener in King Street. Here I met and
afterwards bought the answer to General Monk’s letter, which is a very
good one, and I keep it by me. Thence to Mrs. Jem, where I found her
maid in bed in a fit of the ague, and Mrs. Jem among the people below at
work and by and by she came up hot and merry, as if they had given her
wine, at which I was troubled, but said nothing; after a game at cards,
I went home and wrote by the post and coming back called in at Harper’s
and drank with Mr. Pulford, servant to Mr. Waterhouse, who tells me,
that whereas my Lord Fleetwood should have answered to the Parliament
to-day, he wrote a letter and desired a little more time, he being a
great way out of town. And how that he is quite ashamed of himself, and
confesses how he had deserved this, for his baseness to his brother.
And that he is like to pay part of the money, paid out of the Exchequer
during the Committee of Safety, out of his own purse again, which I am
glad of. Home and to bed, leaving my wife reading in Polixandre.
[“Polexandre,” by Louis Le Roy de Gomberville, was first published
in 1632. “The History of Polexander” was “done into English by W.
Browne,” and published in folio, London, 1647. It was the earliest
of the French heroic romances, and it appears to have been the model
for the works of Calprenede and Mdlle. de Scuderi; see Dunlop’s
“History of Fiction” for the plot of the romance.]
I could find nothing in Mr. Downing’s letter, which Hawly brought me,
concerning my office; but I could discern that Hawly had a mind that I
would get to be Clerk of the Council, I suppose that he might have the
greater salary; but I think it not safe yet to change this for a public
employment.