September 1st (Lord’s day). Up, and betimes by water from the Tower,
and called at the Old Swan for a glass of strong water, and sent word to
have little Michell and his wife come and dine with us to-day; and so,
taking in a gentleman and his lady that wanted a boat, I to Westminster.
Setting them on shore at Charing Cross, I to Mrs. Martin’s, where I
had two pair of cuffs which I bespoke, and there did sit and talk with
her.... and here I did see her little girle my goddaughter, which will
be pretty, and there having staid a little I away to Creed’s chamber,
and when he was ready away to White Hall, where I met with several
people and had my fill of talk. Our new Lord-keeper, Bridgeman, did this
day, the first time, attend the King to chapel with his Seal. Sir H.
Cholmly tells me there are hopes that the women will also have a rout,
and particularly that my Lady Castlemayne is coming to a composition
with the King to be gone; but how true this is, I know not. Blancfort is
made Privy-purse to the Duke of York; the Attorney-general is made Chief
justice, in the room of my Lord Bridgeman; the Solicitor-general is made
Attorney-general; and Sir Edward Turner made Solicitor-general. It is
pretty to see how strange every body looks, nobody knowing whence this
arises; whether from my Lady Castlemayne, Bab. May, and their faction;
or from the Duke of York, notwithstanding his great appearance of
defence of the Chancellor; or from Sir William Coventry, and some few
with him. But greater changes are yet expected. So home and by water to
dinner, where comes Pelting and young Michell and his wife, whom I have
not seen a great while, poor girle, and then comes Mr. Howe, and all
dined with me very merry, and spent all the afternoon, Pelting, Howe,
and I, and my boy, singing of Lock’s response to the Ten Commandments,
which he hath set very finely, and was a good while since sung before
the King, and spoiled in the performance, which occasioned his printing
them for his vindication, and are excellent good. They parted, in the
evening my wife and I to walk in the garden and there scolded a little,
I being doubtful that she had received a couple of fine pinners (one of
point de Gesne), which I feared she hath from some [one] or other of a
present; but, on the contrary, I find she hath bought them for me to pay
for them, without my knowledge. This do displease me much; but yet do so
much please me better than if she had received them the other way, that
I was not much angry, but fell to other discourse, and so to my chamber,
and got her to read to me for saving of my eyes, and then, having got a
great cold, I know not how, I to bed and lay ill at ease all the night.
2nd. This day is kept in the City as a publick fast for the fire this
day twelve months: but I was not at church, being commanded, with the
rest, to attend the Duke of York; and, therefore, with Sir J. Minnes
to St. James’s, where we had much business before the Duke of York,
and observed all things to be very kind between the Duke of York and W.
Coventry, which did mightily joy me. When we had done, Sir W. Coventry
called me down with him to his chamber, and there told me that he is
leaving the Duke of York’s service, which I was amazed at. But he tells
me that it is not with the least unkindness on the Duke of York’s
side, though he expects, and I told him he was in the right, it will be
interpreted otherwise, because done just at this time; “but,” says he,
“I did desire it a good while since, and the Duke of York did, with much
entreaty, grant it, desiring that I would say nothing of it, that he
might have time and liberty to choose his successor, without being
importuned for others whom he should not like:” and that he hath chosen
Mr. Wren, which I am glad of, he being a very ingenious man; and so Sir
W. Coventry says of him, though he knows him little; but particularly
commends him for the book he writ in answer to “Harrington’s Oceana,”
which, for that reason, I intend to buy. He tells me the true reason is,
that he, being a man not willing to undertake more business than he can
go through, and being desirous to have his whole time to spend upon the
business of the Treasury, and a little for his own ease, he did desire
this of the Duke of York. He assures me that the kindness with which he
goes away from the Duke of York is one of the greatest joys that ever
he had in the world. I used some freedom with him, telling him how the
world hath discoursed of his having offended the Duke of York, about
the late business of the Chancellor. He do not deny it, but says that
perhaps the Duke of York might have some reason for it, he opposing him
in a thing wherein he was so earnest but tells me, that, notwithstanding
all that, the Duke of York does not now, nor can blame him; for he tells
me that he was the man that did propose the removal of the Chancellor;
and that he did still persist in it, and at this day publickly owns it,
and is glad of it; but that the Duke of York knows that he did first
speak of it to the Duke of York, before he spoke to any mortal creature
besides, which was fair dealing: and the Duke of York was then of the
same mind with him, and did speak of it to the King; though since, for
reasons best known to himself, he was afterwards altered. I did then
desire to know what was the great matter that grounded his desire of the
Chancellor’s removal? He told me many things not fit to be spoken, and
yet not any thing of his being unfaithful to the King; but, ‘instar
omnium’, he told me, that while he was so great at the Council-board,
and in the administration of matters, there was no room for any body to
propose any remedy to what was amiss, or to compass any thing, though
never so good for the kingdom, unless approved of by the Chancellor, he
managing all things with that greatness which now will be removed, that
the King may have the benefit of others’ advice. I then told him that
the world hath an opinion that he hath joined himself with my Lady
Castlemayne’s faction in this business; he told me, he cannot help it,
but says they are in an errour: but for first he will never, while he
lives, truckle under any body or any faction, but do just as his own
reason and judgment directs; and, when he cannot use that freedom, he
will have nothing to do in public affairs but then he added, that he
never was the man that ever had any discourse with my Lady Castlemayne,
or with others from her, about this or any public business, or ever made
her a visit, or at least not this twelvemonth, or been in her lodgings
but when called on any business to attend the King there, nor hath had
any thing to do in knowing her mind in this business. He ended all with
telling me that he knows that he that serves a Prince must expect, and
be contented to stand, all fortunes, and be provided to retreat, and
that that he is most willing to do whenever the King shall please. And
so we parted, he setting me down out of his coach at Charing Cross, and
desired me to tell Sir W. Pen what he had told me of his leaving the
Duke of York’s service, that his friends might not be the last that know
it. I took a coach and went homewards; but then turned again, and to
White Hall, where I met with many people; and, among other things, do
learn that there is some fear that Mr. Bruncker is got into the King’s
favour, and will be cherished there; which will breed ill will between
the King and Duke of York, he lodging at this time in White Hall since
he was put away from the Duke of York: and he is great with Bab. May, my
Lady Castlemayne, and that wicked crew. But I find this denied by Sir
G. Carteret, who tells me that he is sure he hath no kindness from the
King; that the King at first, indeed, did endeavour to persuade the Duke
of York from putting him away; but when, besides this business of his
ill words concerning his Majesty in the business of the Chancellor, he
told him that he hath had, a long time, a mind to put him away for his
ill offices, done between him and his wife, the King held his peace, and
said no more, but wished him to do what he pleased with him; which was
very noble. I met with Fenn; and he tells me, as I do hear from some
others, that the business of the Chancellor’s had proceeded from
something of a mistake, for the Duke of York did first tell the King
that the Chancellor had a desire to be eased of his great trouble; and
that the King, when the Chancellor come to him, did wonder to hear him
deny it, and the Duke of York was forced to deny to the King that ever
he did tell him so in those terms: but the King did answer that he was
sure that he did say some such thing to him; but, however, since it had
gone so far, did desire him to be contented with it, as a thing very
convenient for him as well as for himself (the King), and so matters
proceeded, as we find. Now it is likely the Chancellor might, some time
or other, in a compliment or vanity, say to the Duke of York, that he
was weary of this burden, and I know not what; and this comes of it.
Some people, and myself among them, are of good hope from this change
that things are reforming; but there are others that do think but that
it is a hit of chance, as all other our greatest matters are, and that
there is no general plot or contrivance in any number of people what to
do next, though, I believe, Sir W. Coventry may in himself have further
designs; and so that, though other changes may come, yet they shall be
accidental and laid upon [not] good principles of doing good. Mr. May
shewed me the King’s new buildings, in order to their having of some old
sails for the closing of the windows this winter. I dined with Sir G.
Carteret, with whom dined Mr. Jack Ashburnham and Dr. Creeton, who
I observe to be a most good man and scholar. In discourse at dinner
concerning the change of men’s humours and fashions touching meats, Mr.
Ashburnham told us, that he remembers since the only fruit in request,
and eaten by the King and Queen at table as the best fruit, was the
Katharine payre, though they knew at the time other fruits of France
and our own country. After dinner comes in Mr. Townsend; and there I was
witness of a horrid rateing, which Mr. Ashburnham, as one of the Grooms
of the King’s Bedchamber, did give him for want of linen for the King’s
person; which he swore was not to be endured, and that the King would
not endure it, and that the King his father, would have hanged his
Wardrobe-man should he have been served so the King having at this day
no handkerchers, and but three bands to his neck, he swore. Mr. Townsend
answered want of money, and the owing of the linen-draper L5000; and
that he hath of late got many rich things made--beds, and sheets, and
saddles, and all without money, and he can go no further but still this
old man, indeed, like an old loving servant, did cry out for the King’s
person to be neglected. But, when he was gone, Townsend told me that
it is the grooms taking away the King’s linen at the quarter’s end, as
their fees, which makes this great want: for, whether the King can get
it or no, they will run away at the quarter’s end with what he hath had,
let the King get more as he can. All the company gone, Sir G. Carteret
and I to talk: and it is pretty to observe how already he says that
he did always look upon the Chancellor indeed as his friend, though he
never did do him any service at all, nor ever got any thing by him, nor
was he a man apt, and that, I think, is true, to do any man any kindness
of his own nature; though I do know that he was believed by all the
world to be the greatest support of Sir G. Carteret with the King of
any man in England: but so little is now made of it! He observes that
my Lord Sandwich will lose a great friend in him; and I think so too, my
Lord Hinchingbroke being about a match calculated purely out of respect
to my Lord Chancellor’s family. By and by Sir G. Carteret, and Townsend,
and I, to consider of an answer to the Commissioners of the Treasury
about my Lord Sandwich’s profits in the Wardrobe; which seem, as we make
them, to be very small, not L1000 a-year; but only the difference in
measure at which he buys and delivers out to the King, and then 6d. in
the pound from the tradesmen for what money he receives for him; but
this, it is believed, these Commissioners will endeavour to take away.
From him I went to see a great match at tennis, between Prince Rupert
and one Captain Cooke, against Bab. May and the elder Chichly; where the
King was, and Court; and it seems are the best players at tennis in the
nation. But this puts me in mind of what I observed in the morning, that
the King, playing at tennis, had a steele-yard carried to him, and I
was told it was to weigh him after he had done playing; and at noon
Mr. Ashburnham told me that it is only the King’s curiosity, which he
usually hath of weighing himself before and after his play, to see how
much he loses in weight by playing: and this day he lost 4 lbs. Thence
home and took my wife out to Mile End Green, and there I drank, and so
home, having a very fine evening. Then home, and I to Sir W. Batten and
[Sir] W. Pen, and there discoursed of Sir W. Coventry’s leaving the Duke
of York, and Mr. Wren’s succeeding him. They told me both seriously,
that they had long cut me out for Secretary to the Duke of York, if ever
[Sir] W. Coventry left him; which, agreeing with what I have heard from
other hands heretofore, do make me not only think that something of that
kind hath been thought on, but do comfort me to see that the world hath
such an esteem of my qualities as to think me fit for any such thing.
Though I am glad, with all my heart, that I am not so; for it would
never please me to be forced to the attendance that that would require,
and leave my wife and family to themselves, as I must do in such a case;
thinking myself now in the best place that ever man was in to please his
own mind in, and, therefore, I will take care to preserve it. So to bed,
my cold remaining though not so much upon me. This day Nell, an old tall
maid, come to live with us, a cook maid recommended by Mr. Batelier.
3rd. All the morning, business at the office, dined at home, then in the
afternoon set my wife down at the Exchange, and I to St. James’s, and
there attended the Duke of York about the list of ships that we propose
to sell: and here there attended Mr. Wren the first time, who hath not
yet, I think, received the Duke of York’s seal and papers. At our coming
hither, we found the Duke and Duchesse all alone at dinner, methought
melancholy; or else I thought so, from the late occasion of the
Chancellor’s fall, who, they say, however, takes it very contentedly.
Thence I to White Hall a little, and so took up my wife at the ‘Change,
and so home, and at the office late, and so home to supper and to bed,
our boy ill.
4th. By coach to White Hall to the Council-chamber; and there met with
Sir W. Coventry going in, who took me aside, and told me that he was
just come from delivering up his seal and papers to Mr. Wren; and told
me he must now take his leave of me as a naval man, but that he shall
always bear respect to his friends there, and particularly to myself,
with great kindness; which I returned to him with thanks, and so, with
much kindness parted: and he into, the Council. I met with Sir Samuel
Morland, who chewed me two orders upon the Exchequer, one of L600, and
another of L400, for money assigned to him, which he would have me lend
him money upon, and he would allow 12 per cent. I would not meddle with
them, though they are very good; and would, had I not so much money out
already on public credit. But I see by this his condition all trade will
be bad. I staid and heard Alderman Barker’s case of his being abused by
the Council of Ireland, touching his lands there: all I observed there
is the silliness of the King, playing with his dog all the while, and
not minding the business,
[Lord Rochester wrote
“His very dog at council board
Sits grave and wise as any lord.”
Poems, 1697; p. 150.--The king’s dogs were constantly stolen from
him, and he advertised for their return. Some of these amusing
advertisements are printed in “Notes and Queries” (seventh series,
vol. vii., p. 26).]
and what he said was mighty weak; but my Lord Keeper I observe to be a
mighty able man. The business broke off without any end to it, and so
I home, and thence with my wife and W. Hewer to Bartholomew fayre, and
there Polichinelli, where we saw Mrs. Clerke and all her crew; and so
to a private house, and sent for a side of pig, and eat it at an
acquaintance of W. Hewer’s, where there was some learned physic and
chymical books, and among others, a natural “Herball” very fine. Here
we staid not, but to the Duke of York’s play house, and there saw
“Mustapha,” which, the more I see, the more I like; and is a most
admirable poem, and bravely acted; only both Betterton and Harris could
not contain from laughing in the midst of a most serious part from the
ridiculous mistake of one of the men upon the stage; which I did not
like. Thence home, where Batelier and his sister Mary come to us and sat
and talked, and so, they gone, we to supper and to bed.
5th. Up, and all the morning at the office, where we sat till noon, and
then I home to dinner, where Mary Batelier and her brother dined
with us, who grows troublesome in his talking so much of his going to
Marseilles, and what commissions he hath to execute as a factor, and a
deal of do of which I am weary. After dinner, with Sir W. Pen, my
wife, and Mary Batelier to the Duke of York’s house, and there saw
“Heraclius,” which is a good play; but they did so spoil it with their
laughing, and being all of them out, and with the noise they made within
the theatre, that I was ashamed of it, and resolve not to come thither
again a good while, believing that this negligence, which I never
observed before, proceeds only from their want of company in the pit,
that they have no care how they act. My wife was ill, and so I was
forced to go out of the house with her to Lincoln’s Inn walks, and there
in a corner she did her business, and was by and by well, and so into
the house again, but sick of their ill acting. So home and to the
office, where busy late, then home to supper and to bed. This morning
was told by Sir W. Batten, that he do hear from Mr. Grey, who hath good
intelligence, that our Queen is to go into a nunnery, there to spend her
days; and that my Lady Castlemayne is going into France, and is to have
a pension of L4000 a-year. This latter I do more believe than the other,
it being very wise in her to do it, and save all she hath, besides
easing the King and kingdom of a burden and reproach.
6th. Up, and to Westminster to the Exchequer, and then into the Hall,
and there bought “Guillim’s Heraldry” for my wife, and so to the Swan,
and thither come Doll Lane, and je did toucher her, and drank, and so
away, I took coach and home, where I find my wife gone to Walthamstow by
invitation with Sir W. Batten, and so I followed, taking up Mrs. Turner,
and she and I much discourse all the way touching the baseness of Sir
W. Pen and sluttishness of his family, and how the world do suspect that
his son Lowther, who is sick of a sore mouth, has got the pox. So we
come to Sir W. Batten’s, where Sir W. Pen and his Lady, and we and Mrs.
Shipman, and here we walked and had an indifferent good dinner, the
victuals very good and cleanly dressed and good linen, but no fine meat
at all. After dinner we went up and down the house, and I do like it
very well, being furnished with a great deal of very good goods. And
here we staid, I tired with the company, till almost evening, and then
took leave, Turner and I together again, and my wife with [Sir] W. Pen.
At Aldgate I took my wife into our coach, and so to Bartholomew fair,
and there, it being very dirty, and now night, we saw a poor fellow,
whose legs were tied behind his back, dance upon his hands with his arse
above his head, and also dance upon his crutches, without any legs upon
the ground to help him, which he did with that pain that I was sorry to
see it, and did pity him and give him money after he had done. Then we
to see a piece of clocke-work made by an Englishman--indeed, very good,
wherein all the several states of man’s age, to 100 years old, is shewn
very pretty and solemne; and several other things more cheerful, and so
we ended, and took a link, the women resolving to be dirty, and walked
up and down to get a coach; and my wife, being a little before me, had
been like to be taken up by one, whom we saw to be Sam Hartlib. My wife
had her wizard on: yet we cannot say that he meant any hurt; for it was
as she was just by a coach-side, which he had, or had a mind to take up;
and he asked her, “Madam, do you go in this coach?” but, soon as he
saw a man come to her (I know not whether he knew me) he departed away
apace. By and by did get a coach, and so away home, and there to supper,
and to bed.
7th. Up, and to the office, where all the morning. At noon home to
dinner, where Goodgroome was teaching my wife, and dined with us, and
I did tell him of my intention to learn to trill, which he will not
promise I shall obtain, but he will do what can be done, and I am
resolved to learn. All the afternoon at the office, and towards night
out by coach with my wife, she to the ‘Change, and I to see the price of
a copper cisterne for the table, which is very pretty, and they demand
L6 or L7 for one; but I will have one. Then called my wife at the
‘Change, and bought a nightgown for my wife: cost but 24s., and so out
to Mile End to drink, and so home to the office to end my letters, and
so home to supper and to bed.
8th (Lord’s day). Up, and walked to St. James’s; but there I find Sir W.
Coventry gone from his chamber, and Mr. Wren not yet come thither. But
I up to the Duke of York, and there, after being ready, my Lord Bruncker
and I had an audience, and thence with my Lord Bruncker to White Hall,
and he told me, in discourse, how that, though it is true that Sir W.
Coventry did long since propose to the Duke of York the leaving his
service, as being unable to fulfill it, as he should do, now he hath
so much public business, and that the Duke of York did bid him to say
nothing of it, but that he would take time to please himself in another
to come in his place; yet the Duke’s doing it at this time, declaring
that he hath found out another, and this one of the Chancellor’s
servants, he cannot but think was done with some displeasure, and that
it could not well be otherwise, that the Duke of York should keep one
in that place, that had so eminently opposed him in the defence of his
father-in-law, nor could the Duchesse ever endure the sight of him,
to be sure. But he thinks that the Duke of York and he are parted
upon clear terms of friendship. He tells me he do believe that my Lady
Castlemayne is compounding with the King for a pension, and to leave the
Court; but that her demands are mighty high: but he believes the King is
resolved, and so do every body else I speak with, to do all possible to
please the Parliament; and he do declare that he will deliver every body
up to them to give an account of their actions: and that last Friday,
it seems, there was an Act of Council passed, to put out all Papists in
office, and to keep out any from coming in. I went to the King’s Chapel
to the closet, and there I hear Cresset sing a tenor part along with the
Church musick very handsomely, but so loud that people did laugh at him,
as a thing done for ostentation. Here I met Sir G. Downing, who would
speak with me, and first to inquire what I paid for my kid’s leather
gloves I had on my hand, and shewed me others on his, as handsome, as
good in all points, cost him but 12d. a pair, and mine me 2s. He told
me he had been seven years finding out a man that could dress English
sheepskin as it should be--and, indeed, it is now as good, in all
respects, as kid, and he says will save L100,000 a-year, that goes out
to France for kid’s skins. Thus he labours very worthily to advance our
own trade, but do it with mighty vanity and talking. But then he told me
of our base condition, in the treaty with Holland and France, about our
prisoners, that whereas before we did clear one another’s prisoners, man
for man, and we upon the publication of the peace did release all our’s,
300 at Leith, and others in other places for nothing, the Dutch do
keep theirs, and will not discharge them with[out] paying their debts
according to the Treaty. That his instruments in Holland, writing to
our Embassadors about this to Bredagh, they answer them that they do not
know of any thing that they have done therein, but left it just as
it was before. To which, when they answer, that by the treaty their
Lordships had [not] bound our countrymen to pay their debts in prison,
they answer they cannot help it, and we must get them off as cheap as
we can. On this score, they demand L1100 for Sir G. Ascue, and L5000 for
the one province of Zealand, for the prisoners that we have therein. He
says that this is a piece of shame that never any nation committed, and
that our very Lords here of the Council, when he related this matter to
them, did not remember that they had agreed to this article; and swears
that all their articles are alike, as the giving away Polleroon, and
Surinam, and Nova Scotia, which hath a river 300 miles up the country,
with copper mines more than Swedeland, and Newcastle coals, the only
place in America that hath coals that we know of; and that Cromwell did
value those places, and would for ever have made much of them; but
we have given them away for nothing, besides a debt to the King of
Denmarke. But, which is most of all, they have discharged those very
particular demands of merchants of the Guinny Company and others, which
he, when he was there, had adjusted with the Dutch, and come to an
agreement in writing, and they undertaken to satisfy, and that this was
done in black and white under their hands; and yet we have forgiven all
these, and not so much as sent to Sir G. Downing to know what he had
done, or to confer with him about any one point of the treaty, but
signed to what they would have, and we here signed to whatever in grosse
was brought over by Mr. Coventry. And [Sir G. Downing] tells me, just in
these words, “My Lord Chancellor had a mind to keep himself from being
questioned by clapping up a peace upon any terms.” When I answered that
there was other privy-councillors to be advised with besides him, and
that, therefore, this whole peace could not be laid to his charge,
he answered that nobody durst say any thing at the council-table but
himself, and that the King was as much afeard of saying any thing there
as the meanest privy-councillor; and says more, that at this day the
King, in familiar talk, do call the Chancellor “the insolent man,” and
says that he would not let him speak himself in Council: which is very
high, and do shew that the Chancellor is like to be in a bad state,
unless he can defend himself better than people think. And yet Creed
tells me that he do hear that my Lord Cornbury do say that his father do
long for the coming of the Parliament, in order to his own vindication,
more than any one of his enemies. And here it comes into my head to set
down what Mr. Rawlinson, whom I met in Fenchurch Street on Friday last,
looking over his ruines there, told me, that he was told by one of my
Lord Chancellor’s gentlemen lately (--------byname), that a grant coming
to him to be sealed, wherein the King hath given her [Lady Castlemaine],
or somebody by her means, a place which he did not like well of, he did
stop the grant; saying, that he thought this woman would sell everything
shortly: which she hearing of, she sent to let him know that she had
disposed of this place, and did not doubt, in a little time, to dispose
of his. This Rawlinson do tell me my Lord Chancellor’s own gentleman did
tell him himself. Thence, meeting Creed, I with him to the Parke,
there to walk a little, and to the Queen’s Chapel and there hear their
musique, which I liked in itself pretty well as to the composition,
but their voices are very harsh and rough that I thought it was some
instruments they had that made them sound so. So to White Hall, and saw
the King and Queen at dinner; and observed (which I never did before),
the formality, but it is but a formality, of putting a bit of bread
wiped upon each dish into the mouth of every man that brings a dish; but
it should be in the sauce. Here were some Russes come to see the King
at dinner: among others, the interpreter, a comely Englishman, in the
Envoy’s own clothes; which the Envoy, it seems, in vanity did send to
show his fine clothes upon this man’s back, which is one, it seems, of
a comelier presence than himself: and yet it is said that none of their
clothes are their own, but taken out of the King’s own Wardrobe; and
which they dare not bring back dirty or spotted, but clean, or are
in danger of being beaten, as they say: insomuch that, Sir Charles
Cotterell says, when they are to have an audience they never venture to
put on their clothes till he appears to come to fetch them; and, as soon
as ever they come home, put them off again. I to Sir G. Carteret’s
to dinner; where Mr. Cofferer Ashburnham; who told a good story of a
prisoner’s being condemned at Salisbury for a small matter. While he was
on the bench with his father-in-law, judge Richardson, and while they
were considering to transport him to save his life, the fellow flung
a great stone at the judge, that missed him, but broke through the
wainscoat. Upon this, he had his hand cut off, and was hanged presently!
Here was a gentleman, one Sheres, one come lately from my Lord Sandwich,
with an express; but, Lord! I was almost ashamed to see him, lest he
should know that I have not yet wrote one letter to my Lord since his
going. I had no discourse with him, but after dinner Sir G. Carteret and
I to talk about some business of his, and so I to Mrs. Martin, where was
Mrs. Burroughs, and also fine Mrs. Noble, my partner in the christening
of Martin’s child, did come to see it, and there we sat and talked an
hour, and then all broke up and I by coach home, and there find Mr.
Pelling and Howe, and we to sing and good musique till late, and then to
supper, and Howe lay at my house, and so after supper to bed with much
content, only my mind a little troubled at my late breach of vowes,
which however I will pay my forfeits, though the badness of my eyes,
making me unfit to read or write long, is my excuse, and do put me
upon other pleasures and employment which I should refrain from in
observation of my vowes.
9th. Up; and to the office, where all the morning, and at noon comes
Creed to dine with me. After dinner, he and I and my wife to the
Bear-Garden, to see a prize fought there. But, coming too soon, I left
them there and went on to White Hall, and there did some business with
the Lords of the Treasury; and here do hear, by Tom Killigrew and
Mr. Progers, that for certain news is come of Harman’s having spoiled
nineteen of twenty-two French ships, somewhere about the Barbadoes,
I think they said; but wherever it is, it is a good service, and very
welcome. Here I fell in talk with Tom Killigrew about musick, and he
tells me that he will bring me to the best musick in England (of which,
indeed, he is master), and that is two Italians and Mrs. Yates, who, he
says, is come to sing the Italian manner as well as ever he heard any:
says that Knepp won’t take pains enough, but that she understands her
part so well upon the stage, that no man or woman in the House do the
like. Thence I by water to the Bear-Garden, where now the yard was full
of people, and those most of them seamen, striving by force to get in,
that I was afeard to be seen among them, but got into the ale-house, and
so by a back-way was put into the bull-house, where I stood a good while
all alone among the bulls, and was afeard I was among the bears, too;
but by and by the door opened, and I got into the common pit; and there,
with my cloak about my face, I stood and saw the prize fought, till one
of them, a shoemaker, was so cut in both his wrists that he could not
fight any longer, and then they broke off: his enemy was a butcher. The
sport very good, and various humours to be seen among the rabble that is
there. Thence carried Creed to White Hall, and there my wife and I took
coach and home, and both of us to Sir W. Batten’s, to invite them to
dinner on Wednesday next, having a whole buck come from Hampton Court,
by the warrant which Sir Stephen Fox did give me. And so home to supper
and to bed, after a little playing on the flageolet with my wife, who do
outdo therein whatever I expected of her.
10th. Up, and all the morning at the Office, where little to do but
bemoan ourselves under the want of money; and indeed little is, or can
be done, for want of money, we having not now received one penny for any
service in many weeks, and none in view to receive, saving for paying of
some seamen’s wages. At noon sent to by my Lord Bruncker to speak with
him, and it was to dine with him and his Lady Williams (which I have not
now done in many months at their own table) and Mr. Wren, who is come
to dine with them, the first time he hath been at the office since his
being the Duke of York’s Secretary. Here we sat and eat and talked and
of some matters of the office, but his discourse is as yet but weak in
that matter, and no wonder, he being new in it, but I fear he will not
go about understanding with the impatience that Sir W. Coventry did.
Having dined, I away, and with my wife and Mercer, set my wife down at
the ‘Change, and the other at White Hall, and I to St. James’s, where we
all met, and did our usual weekly business with the Duke of York. But,
Lord! methinks both he and we are mighty flat and dull over what we
used to be, when Sir W. Coventry was among us. Thence I into St. James’s
Park, and there met Mr. Povy; and he and I to walk an hour or more in
the Pell Mell, talking of the times. He tells me, among other things,
that this business of the Chancellor do breed a kind of inward distance
between the King and the Duke of York, and that it cannot be avoided;
for though the latter did at first move it through his folly, yet he is
made to see that he is wounded by it, and is become much a less man than
he was, and so will be: but he tells me that they are, and have always
been, great dissemblers one towards another; and that their parting
heretofore in France is never to be thoroughly reconciled between them.
He tells me that he believes there is no such thing like to be, as a
composition with my Lady Castlemayne, and that she shall be got out of
the way before the Parliament comes; for he says she is as high as ever
she was, though he believes the King is as weary of her as is possible,
and would give any thing to remove her, but he is so weak in his passion
that he dare not do it; that he do believe that my Lord Chancellor will
be doing some acts in the Parliament which shall render him popular;
and that there are many people now do speak kindly of him that did not
before; but that, if he do do this, it must provoke the King, and that
party that removed him. He seems to doubt what the King of France will
do, in case an accommodation shall be made between Spain and him for
Flanders, for then he will have nothing more easy to do with his army
than to subdue us. Parted with him at White Hall, and, there I took
coach and took up my wife and Mercer, and so home and I to the office,
where ended my letters, and then to my chamber with my boy to lay up
some papers and things that lay out of order against to-morrow, to make
it clear against the feast that I am to have. Here Mr. Pelling come to
sit with us, and talked of musique and the musicians of the town, and so
to bed, after supper.
11th. Up, and with Mr. Gawden to the Exchequer. By the way, he tells me
this day he is to be answered whether he must hold Sheriffe or no; for
he would not hold unless he may keep it at his office, which is out of
the city (and so my Lord Mayor must come with his sword down, whenever
he comes thither), which he do, because he cannot get a house fit for
him in the city, or else he will fine for it. Among others that they
have in nomination for Sheriffe, one is little Chaplin, who was his
servant, and a very young man to undergo that place; but as the city
is now, there is no great honour nor joy to be had, in being a public
officer. At the Exchequer I looked after my business, and when done went
home to the ‘Change, and there bought a case of knives for dinner, and a
dish of fruit for 5s., and bespoke other things, and then home, and here
I find all things in good order, and a good dinner towards. Anon comes
Sir W. Batten and his lady, and Mr. Griffith, their ward, and Sir W. Pen
and his lady, and Mrs. Lowther, who is grown, either through pride or
want of manners, a fool, having not a word to say almost all dinner;
and, as a further mark of a beggarly, proud fool, hath a bracelet of
diamonds and rubies about her wrist, and a sixpenny necklace about
her neck, and not one good rag of clothes upon her back; and Sir John
Chichly in their company, and Mrs. Turner. Here I had an extraordinary
good and handsome dinner for them, better than any of them deserve or
understand, saving Sir John Chichly and Mrs. Turner, and not much mirth,
only what I by discourse made, and that against my genius. After dinner
I took occasion to break up the company soon as I could, and all parted,
Sir W. Batten and I by water to White Hall, there to speak with the
Commissioners of the Treasury, who are mighty earnest for our hastening
all that may be the paying off of the Seamen, now there is money, and
are considering many other thins for easing of charge, which I am glad
of, but vexed to see that J. Duncomb should be so pressing in it as if
none of us had like care with him. Having done there, I by coach to
the Duke of York’s playhouse, and there saw part of “The Ungratefull
Lovers;” and sat by Beck Marshall, who is very handsome near hand. Here
I met Mrs. Turner and my wife as we agreed, and together home, and there
my wife and I part of the night at the flageolet, which she plays now
any thing upon almost at first sight and in good time. But here come Mr.
Moore, and sat and discoursed with me of publique matters: the sum of
which is, that he do doubt that there is more at the bottom than the
removal of the Chancellor; that is, he do verily believe that the King
do resolve to declare the Duke of Monmouth legitimate, and that we shall
soon see it. This I do not think the Duke of York will endure without
blows; but his poverty, and being lessened by having the Chancellor
fallen and [Sir] W. Coventry gone from him, will disable him from being
able to do any thing almost, he being himself almost lost in the esteem
of people; and will be more and more, unless my Lord Chancellor, who is
already begun to be pitied by some people, and to be better thought of
than was expected, do recover himself in Parliament. He would seem to
fear that this difference about the Crowne (if there be nothing
else) will undo us. He do say that, that is very true; that my Lord
[Chancellor] did lately make some stop of some grants of L2000 a-year
to my Lord Grandison, which was only in his name, for the use of my Lady
Castlemaine’s children; and that this did incense her, and she did speak
very scornful words, and sent a scornful message to him about it. He
gone, after supper, I to bed, being mightily pleased with my wife’s
playing so well upon the flageolet, and I am resolved she shall learn
to play upon some instrument, for though her eare be bad, yet I see she
will attain any thing to be done by her hand.
12th. Up, and at the office all the morning till almost noon, and then
I rode from the office (which I have not done five times I think since
I come thither) and to the Exchequer for some tallies for Tangier; and
that being done, to the Dog taverne, and there I spent half a piece upon
the clerks, and so away, and I to Mrs. Martin’s, but she not at home,
but staid and drunk with her sister and landlady, and by that time it
was time to go to a play, which I did at the Duke’s house, where “Tu
Quoque” was the first time acted, with some alterations of Sir W.
Davenant’s; but the play is a very silly play, methinks; for I, and
others that sat by me, Mr. Povy and Mr. Progers, were weary of it; but
it will please the citizens. My wife also was there, I having sent for
her to meet me there, and W. Hewer. After the play we home, and there
I to the office and despatched my business, and then home, and mightily
pleased with my wife’s playing on the flageolet, she taking out any
tune almost at first sight, and keeping time to it, which pleases me
mightily. So to supper and to bed.
13th. Called up by people come to deliver in ten chaldron of coals,
brought in one of our prizes from Newcastle. The rest we intend to sell,
we having above ten chaldron between us. They sell at about 28s. or 29s.
per chaldron; but Sir W. Batten hath sworn that he was a cuckold that
sells under 30s., and that makes us lay up all but what we have for our
own spending, which is very pleasant; for I believe we shall be glad to
sell them for less. To the office, and there despatched business till
ten o’clock, and then with Sir W. Batten and my wife and Mrs. Turner by
hackney-coach to Walthamstow, to Mr. Shipman’s to dinner, where Sir W.
Pen and my Lady and Mrs. Lowther (the latter of which hath got a sore
nose, given her, I believe, from her husband, which made me I could not
look upon her with any pleasure), and here a very good and plentifull
wholesome dinner, and, above all thing, such plenty of milk meats, she
keeping a great dairy, and so good as I never met with. The afternoon
proved very foul weather, the morning fair. We staid talking till
evening, and then home, and there to my flageolet with my wife, and so
to bed without any supper, my belly being full and dinner not digested.
It vexed me to hear how Sir W. Pen, who come alone from London, being to
send his coachman for his wife and daughter, and bidding his coachman in
much anger to go for them (he being vexed, like a rogue, to do anything
to please his wife), his coachman Tom was heard to say a pox, or God rot
her, can she walk hither? These words do so mad me that I could find in
my heart to give him or my Lady notice of them.
14th. Up, and to the office, where all the morning busy. At noon comes
Mr. Pierce and dined with me to advise about several matters of his
relating to the office and his purse, and here he told me that the King
and Duke of York and the whole Court is mighty joyful at the Duchesse of
York’s being brought to bed this day, or yesterday, of a son; which will
settle men’s minds mightily. And he tells me that he do think that what
the King do, of giving the Duke of Monmouth the command of his
Guards, and giving my Lord Gerard L12,000 for it, is merely to find an
employment for him upon which he may live, and not out of any design to
bring him into any title to the Crowne; which Mr. Moore did the other
day put me into great fear of. After dinner, he gone, my wife to the
King’s play-house to see “The Northerne Castle,” which I think I never
did see before. Knipp acted in it, and did her part very extraordinary
well; but the play is but a mean, sorry play; but the house very full of
gallants. It seems, it hath not been acted a good while. Thence to the
Exchange for something for my wife, and then home and to the office, and
then home to our flageolet, and so to bed, being mightily troubled in
mind at the liberty I give myself of going to plays upon pretence of the
weakness of my eyes, that cannot continue so long together at work at my
office, but I must remedy it.
15th (Lord’s day). Up to my chamber, there to set some papers to rights.
By and by to church, where I stood, in continual fear of Mrs. Markham’s
coming to church, and offering to come into our pew, to prevent which,
soon as ever I heard the great door open, I did step back, and clap my
breech to our pew-door, that she might be forced to shove me to come
in; but as God would have it, she did not come. Mr. Mills preached, and
after sermon, by invitation, he and his wife come to dine with me, which
is the first time they have been in my house; I think, these five years,
I thinking it not amiss, because of their acquaintance in our country,
to shew them some respect. Mr. Turner and his wife, and their son the
Captain, dined with me, and I had a very good dinner for them, and very
merry, and after dinner, he [Mr. Mills] was forced to go, though it
rained, to Stepney, to preach. We also to church, and then home, and
there comes Mr. Pelling, with two men, by promise, one Wallington and
Piggott, the former whereof, being a very little fellow, did sing a most
excellent bass, and yet a poor fellow, a working goldsmith, that goes
without gloves to his hands. Here we sung several good things, but I am
more and more confirmed that singing with many voices is not singing,
but a sort of instrumental musique, the sense of the words being lost
by not being heard, and especially as they set them with Fuges of words,
one after another, whereas singing properly, I think, should be but with
one or two voices at most and the counterpoint. They supped with me, and
so broke, up, and then my wife and I to my chamber, where, through the
badness of my eyes, she was forced to read to me, which she do very
well, and was Mr. Boyle’s discourse upon the style of the Scripture,’
which is a very fine piece, and so to bed.
16th. Up, and several come to me, among others Mr. Yeabsly of Plymouth,
to discourse about their matters touching Tangier, and by and by Sir
H. Cholmly, who was with me a good while; who tells me that the Duke
of York’s child is christened, the Duke of Albemarle and the Marquis
of Worcester’ godfathers, and my Lady Suffolke godmother; and they have
named it Edgar, which is a brave name. But it seems they are more joyful
in the Chancellor’s family, at the birth of this Prince, than in wisdom
they should, for fear it should give the King cause of jealousy. Sir
H. Cholmly do not seem to think there is any such thing can be in the
King’s intention as that of raising the Duke of Monmouth to the Crowne,
though he thinks there may possibly be some persons that would, and
others that would be glad to have the Queen removed to some monastery,
or somewhere or other, to make room for a new wife; for they will all
be unsafe under the Duke of York. He says the King and Parliament will
agree; that is, that the King will do any thing that they will have him.
We together to the Exchequer about our Tangier orders, and so parted at
the New Exchange, where I staid reading Mrs. Phillips’s poems till my
wife and Mercer called me to Mrs. Pierces, by invitation to dinner,
where I find her painted, which makes me loathe her, and the nastiest
poor dinner that made me sick, only here I met with a Fourth Advice to
the Painter upon the coming in of the Dutch to the River and end of the
war, that made my heart ake to read, it being too sharp, and so true.
Here I also saw a printed account of the examinations taken, touching
the burning of the City of London, shewing the plot of the Papists
therein; which, it seems, hath been ordered and to have been burnt by
the hands of the hangman, in Westminster Palace. I will try to get one
of them. After dinner she showed us her closet, which is pretty, with
her James’s picture done by Hales, but with a mighty bad hand, which is
his great fault that he do do negligently, and the drapery also not
very good. Being tired of being here, and sick of their damned sluttish
dinner, my wife and Mercer and I away to the King’s play-house, to see
the “Scornfull Lady;” but it being now three o’clock there was not one
soul in the pit; whereupon, for shame, we would not go in, but, against
our wills, went all to see “Tu Quoque” again, where there is a pretty
store of company, and going with a prejudice the play appeared better
to us. Here we saw Madam Morland, who is grown mighty fat, but is very
comely. But one of the best arts of our sport was a mighty pretty lady
that sat behind, that did laugh so heartily and constantly, that it did
me good to hear her. Thence to the King’s house, upon a wager of mine
with my wife, that there would be no acting there today, there being
no company: so I went in and found a pretty good company there, and saw
their dance at the end of he play, and so to the coach again, and to the
Cock ale house, and there drank in our coach, and so home, and my wife
read to me as last night, and so to bed vexed with our dinner to-day,
and myself more with being convinced that Mrs. Pierce paints, so that
henceforth to be sure I shall loathe her.
17th. Up, and at the office all the morning, where Mr. Wren come to us
and sat with us, only to learn, and do intend to come once or twice a
week and sit with us. In the afternoon walked to the Old Swan, the way
mighty dirty, and there called at Michell’s, and there had opportunity
para kiss su moher, but elle did receive it with a great deal of seeming
regret, which did vex me. But however I do not doubt overcoming her as
I did the moher of the monsieur at Deptford. So thence by water to
Westminster, to Burgess, and there did receive my orders for L1500 more
for Tangier. Thence to the Hall, and there talked a little with Mrs.
Michell, and so to Mrs. Martin’s to pay for my cuffs and drink with
her.... And by and by away by coach and met with Sir H. Cholmly, and
with him to the Temple, and there in Playford’s shop did give him some
of my Exchequer orders and took his receipts, and so parted and home,
and there to my business hard at the office, and then home, my wife
being at Mrs. Turner’s, who and her husband come home with her, and here
staid and talked and staid late, and then went away and we to bed. But
that which vexed me much this evening is that Captain Cocke and Sir W.
Batten did come to me, and sat, and drank a bottle of wine, and told me
how Sir W. Pen hath got an order for the “Flying Greyhound” for himself,
which is so false a thing, and the part of a knave, as nothing almost
can be more. This vexed me; but I resolve to bring it before the Duke,
and try a pull for it.
18th. Up betimes and to Captain Cocke, in his coach which he sent for
me, and he not being ready I walked in the Exchange, which is now made
pretty, by having windows and doors before all their shops, to keep
out the cold. By and by to him, and he being ready, he and I out in his
coach to my Lord Chancellor’s; there to Mr. Wren’s chamber, who did tell
us the whole of Sir W. Pen’s having the order for this ship of ours,
and we went with him to St. James’s, and there I did see the copy of it,
which is built upon a suggestion of his having given the King a ship
of his, “The Prosperous,” wherein is such a cheat as I have the best
advantage in the world over him, and will make him do reason, or lay him
on his back. This I was very glad of, and having done as far as I could
in it we returned, and I home, and there at the office all the morning,
and at noon with my Lord Bruncker to the Treasurer’s office to look over
the clerks who are there making up the books, but in such a manner as it
is a shame to see. Then home to dinner, and after dinner, my mind mighty
full of this business of Sir W. Pen’s, to the office, and there busy all
the afternoon. This evening Sir W. Batten and [Sir] W. Pen and I met at
[Sir] W. Batten’s house, and there I took an opportunity to break the
business, at which [Sir] W. Pen is much disturbed, and would excuse it
the most he can, but do it so basely, that though he do offer to let go
his pretence to her, and resign up his order for her, and come in only
to ask his share of her (which do very well please me, and give me
present satisfaction), yet I shall remember him for a knave while I
live. But thus my mind is quieted for the present more than I thought
I should be, and am glad that I shall have no need of bidding him open
defiance, which I would otherwise have done, and made a perpetual war
between us. So to the office, and there busy pretty late, and so home
and to supper with my wife, and so to bed.
19th. Up, and all the morning at the office. At noon home to dinner, W.
Hewer and I and my wife, when comes my cozen, Kate Joyce, and an aunt of
ours, Lettice, formerly Haynes, and now Howlett, come to town to see her
friends, and also Sarah Kite, with her little boy in her armes, a very
pretty little boy. The child I like very well, and could wish it my own.
My wife being all unready, did not appear. I made as much of them as
I could such ordinary company; and yet my heart was glad to see them,
though their condition was a little below my present state, to be
familiar with. She tells me how the lifeguard, which we thought a little
while since was sent down into the country about some insurrection,
was sent to Winchcombe, to spoil the tobacco there, which it seems the
people there do plant contrary to law, and have always done, and still
been under force and danger of having it spoiled, as it hath been
oftentimes, and yet they will continue to plant it.
[Winchcombe St. Peter, a market-town in Gloucestershire. Tobacco
was first cultivated in this parish, after its introduction into
England, in 1583, and it proved, a considerable source of profit to
the inhabitants, till the trade was placed under restrictions. The
cultivation was first prohibited during the Commonwealth, and
various acts were passed in the reign of Charles II. for the same
purpose. Among the king’s pamphlets in the British Museum is a
tract entitled “Harry Hangman’s Honour, or Glostershire Hangman’s
Request to the Smokers and Tobacconists of London,” dated June 11th,
1655. The author writes: “The very planting of tobacco hath proved
the decay of my trade, for since it hath been planted in
Glostershire, especially at Winchcomb, my trade hath proved nothing
worth.” He adds: “Then ‘twas a merry world with me, for indeed
before tobacco was there planted, there being no kind of trade to
employ men, and very small tillage, necessity compelled poor men to
stand my friends by stealing of sheep and other cattel, breaking of
hedges, robbing of orchards, and what not.”]
The place, she says, is a miserable poor place. They gone, I to the
office, where all the afternoon very busy, and at night, when my eyes
were weary of the light, I and my wife to walk in the garden, and then
home to supper and pipe, and then to bed.
20th. At the office doing business all the morning. At noon expected
Creed to have come to dine with me and brought Mr. Sheres (the gentleman
lately come from my Lord Sandwich) with him; but they come not, so
there was a good dinner lost. After dinner my wife and Jane about some
business of hers abroad, and then I to the office, where, having done
my business, I out to pay some debts: among others to the taverne at the
end of Billiter Lane, where my design was to see the pretty mistress of
the house, which I did, and indeed is, as I always thought, one of the
modestest, prettiest, plain women that ever I saw. Thence was met in the
street by Sir W. Pen, and he and I by coach to the King’s playhouse, and
there saw “The Mad Couple,” which I do not remember that I have seen; it
is a pretty pleasant play. Thence home, and my wife and I to walk in the
garden, she having been at the same play with Jane, in the 18d. seat, to
shew Jane the play, and so home to supper and to bed.
21st. All the morning at the office, dined at home, and expected Sheres
again, but he did not come, so another dinner lost by the folly of
Creed. After having done some business at the office, I out with my
wife to Sheres’s lodging and left an invitation for him to dine with
me tomorrow, and so back and took up my wife at the Exchange, and then
kissed Mrs. Smith’s pretty hand, and so with my wife by coach to take
some ayre (but the way very dirty) as far as Bow, and so drinking (as
usual) at Mile End of Byde’s ale, we home and there busy at my letters
till late, and so to walk by moonshine with my wife, and so to bed. The
King, Duke of York, and the men of the Court, have been these four or
five days a-hunting at Bagshot.
22nd (Lord’s day). At my chamber all the morning making up some
accounts, to my great content. At noon comes Mr. Sheres, whom I find a
good, ingenious man, but do talk a little too much of his travels. He
left my Lord Sandwich well, but in pain to be at home for want of money,
which comes very hardly. Most of the afternoon talking of Spain, and
informing him against his return how things are here, and so spent most
of the afternoon, and then he parted, and then to my chamber busy till
my eyes were almost blind with writing and reading, and I was fain to
get the boy to come and write for me, and then to supper, and Pelling
come to me at supper, and then to sing a Psalm with him, and so parted
and to bed, after my wife had read some thing to me (to save my eyes)
in a good book. This night I did even my accounts of the house, which
I have to my great shame omitted now above two months or more, and
therefore am content to take my wife’s and mayd’s accounts as they give
them, being not able to correct them, which vexes me; but the fault
being my own, contrary to my wife’s frequent desires, I cannot find
fault, but am resolved never to let them come to that pass again. The
truth is, I have indulged myself more in pleasure for these last two
months than ever I did in my life before, since I come to be a person
concerned in business; and I doubt, when I come to make up my accounts,
I shall find it so by the expence.
23rd. Up, and walked to the Exchange, there to get a coach but failed,
and so was forced to walk a most dirty walk to the Old Swan, and there
took boat, and so to the Exchange, and there took coach to St. James’s
and did our usual business with the Duke of York. Thence I walked over
the Park to White Hall and took water to Westminster, and there, among
other things, bought the examinations of the business about the Fire of
London, which is a book that Mrs. Pierce tells me hath been commanded to
be burnt. The examinations indeed are very plain. Thence to the Excise
office, and so to the Exchange, and did a little business, and so home
and took up my wife, and so carried her to the other end, where I ‘light
at my Lord Ashly’s, by invitation, to dine there, which I did, and
Sir H. Cholmly, Creed, and Yeabsly, upon occasion of the business of
Yeabsly, who, God knows, do bribe him very well for it; and it is pretty
to see how this great man do condescend to these things, and do all he
can in his examining of his business to favour him, and yet with great
cunning not to be discovered but by me that am privy to it. At table it
is worth remembering that my Lord tells us that the House of Lords is
the last appeal that a man can make, upon a poynt of interpretation of
the law, and that therein they are above the judges; and that he did
assert this in the Lords’ House upon the late occasion of the quarrel
between my Lord Bristoll and the Chancellor, when the former did accuse
the latter of treason, and the judges did bring it in not to be treason:
my Lord Ashly did declare that the judgment of the judges was nothing
in the presence of their Lordships, but only as far as they were the
properest men to bring precedents; but not to interpret the law to their
Lordships, but only the inducements of their persuasions: and this the
Lords did concur in. Another pretty thing was my Lady Ashly’s speaking
of the bad qualities of glass-coaches; among others, the flying open
of the doors upon any great shake: but another was, that my Lady
Peterborough being in her glass-coach, with the glass up, and seeing a
lady pass by in a coach whom she would salute, the glass was so clear,
that she thought it had been open, and so ran her head through the
glass, and cut all her forehead! After dinner, before we fell to the
examination of Yeabsly’s business, we were put into my Lord’s room
before he could come to us, and there had opportunity to look over his
state of his accounts of the prizes; and there saw how bountiful the
King hath been to several people and hardly any man almost, Commander of
the Navy of any note, but hath had some reward or other out of it; and
many sums to the Privy-purse, but not so many, I see, as I thought
there had been: but we could not look quite through it. But several
Bedchamber-men and people about the Court had good sums; and, among
others, Sir John Minnes and Lord Bruncker have L200 a-piece for looking
to the East India prizes, while I did their work for them. By and by my
Lord come, and we did look over Yeabsly’s business a little; and I find
how prettily this cunning Lord can be partial and dissemble it in this
case, being privy to the bribe he is to receive. This done; we away, and
with Sir H. Cholmly to Westminster; who by the way told me how merry
the king and Duke of York and Court were the other day, when they were
abroad a-hunting. They come to Sir G. Carteret’s house at Cranbourne,
and there were entertained, and all made drunk; and that all being
drunk, Armerer did come to the King, and swore to him, “By God, Sir,”
says he, “you are not so kind to the Duke of York of late as you used
to be.”--“Not I?” says the King. “Why so?”--“Why,” says he, “if you are,
let us drink his health.”--“Why, let us,” says the King. Then he fell
on his knees, and drank it; and having done, the King began to drink it.
“Nay, Sir,” says Armerer, “by God you must do it on your knees!” So he
did, and then all the company: and having done it, all fell a-crying
for joy, being all maudlin and kissing one another, the King the Duke
of York, and the Duke of York the King: and in such a maudlin pickle as
never people were: and so passed the day. But Sir H. Cholmly tells me,
that the King hath this good luck, that the next day he hates to have
any body mention what he had done the day before, nor will suffer any
body to gain upon him that way; which is a good quality. Parted with Sir
H. Cholmly at White Hall, and there I took coach and took up my wife at
Unthanke’s, and so out for ayre, it being a mighty pleasant day, as far
as Bow, and so drank by the way, and home, and there to my chamber till
by and by comes Captain Cocke about business; who tells me that Mr.
Bruncker is lost for ever, notwithstanding my Lord Bruncker hath advised
with him, Cocke, how he might make a peace with the Duke of York and
Chancellor, upon promise of serving him in the Parliament but Cocke says
that is base to offer, and will have no success neither. He says
that Mr. Wren hath refused a present of Tom Wilson’s for his place of
Store-keeper of Chatham, and is resolved never to take any thing; which
is both wise in him, and good to the King’s service. He stayed with me
very late, here being Mrs. Turner and W. Batelier drinking and laughing,
and then to bed.
24th. Up, and to the Office, where all the morning very busy. At noon
home, where there dined with me Anthony Joyce and his wife, and Will
and his wife, and my aunt Lucett, that was here the other day, and Sarah
Kite, and I had a good dinner for them, and were as merry as I could
be in that company where W. Joyce is, who is still the same impertinent
fellow that ever he was. After dinner I away to St. James’s, where we
had an audience of the Duke of York of many things of weight, as the
confirming an establishment of the numbers of men on ships in peace and
other things of weight, about which we stayed till past candle-light,
and so Sir W. Batten and W. Pen and I fain to go all in a hackney-coach
round by London Wall, for fear of cellars, this being the first time I
have been forced to go that way this year, though now I shall begin to
use it. We tired one coach upon Holborne-Conduit Hill, and got another,
and made it a long journey home. Where to the office and then home, and
at my business till twelve at night, writing in short hand the draught
of a report to make to the King and Council to-morrow, about the reason
of not having the book of the Treasurer made up. This I did finish
to-night to the spoiling of my eyes, I fear. This done, then to bed.
This evening my wife tells me that W. Batelier hath been here to-day,
and brought with him the pretty girl he speaks of, to come to serve
my wife as a woman, out of the school at Bow. My wife says she is
extraordinary handsome, and inclines to have her, and I am glad of
it--at least, that if we must have one, she should be handsome. But I
shall leave it wholly to my wife, to do what she will therein.
25th. Up as soon as I could see and to the office to write over fair
with Mr. Hater my last night’s work, which I did by nine o’clock, and
got it signed, and so with Sir H. Cholmly, who come to me about his
business, to White Hall: and thither come also my Lord Bruncker: and we
by and by called in, and our paper read; and much discourse thereon by
Sir G. Carteret, my Lord Anglesey, Sir W. Coventry, and my Lord Ashly,
and myself: but I could easily discern that they none of them understood
the business; and the King at last ended it with saying lazily, “Why,”
says he, “after all this discourse, I now come to understand it; and
that is, that there can nothing be done in this more than is possible,”
which was so silly as I never heard: “and therefore,” says he, “I would
have these gentlemen to do as much as possible to hasten the Treasurer’s
accounts; and that is all.” And so we broke up: and I confess I went
away ashamed, to see how slightly things are advised upon there. Here
I saw the Duke of Buckingham sit in Council again, where he was
re-admitted, it seems, the last Council-day: and it is wonderful to
see how this man is come again to his places, all of them, after the
reproach and disgrace done him: so that things are done in a most
foolish manner quite through. The Duke of Buckingham did second Sir W.
Coventry in the advising the King that he would not concern himself in
the owning or not owning any man’s accounts, or any thing else, wherein
he had not the same satisfaction that would satisfy the Parliament;
saying, that nothing would displease the Parliament more than to find
him defending any thing that is not right, nor justifiable to the utmost
degree but methought he spoke it but very poorly. After this, I walked
up and down the Gallery till noon; and here I met with Bishop Fuller,
who, to my great joy, is made, which I did not hear before, Bishop
of Lincoln. At noon I took coach, and to Sir G. Carteret’s, in
Lincoln’s-Inn-Fields, to the house that is my Lord’s, which my Lord lets
him have: and this is the first day of dining there. And there dined
with him and his lady my Lord Privy-seale, who is indeed a very sober
man; who, among other talk, did mightily wonder at the reason of the
growth of the credit of banquiers, since it is so ordinary a thing for
citizens to break, out of knavery. Upon this we had much discourse; and
I observed therein, to the honour of this City, that I have not heard of
one citizen of London broke in all this war, this plague, this fire,
and this coming up of the enemy among us; which he owned to be very
considerable.
[This remarkable fact is confirmed by Evelyn, in a letter to Sir
Samuel Tuke, September 27th, 1666. See “Correspondence,” vol.
iii., p. 345, edit. 1879.]
After dinner I to the King’s playhouse, my eyes being so bad since last
night’s straining of them, that I am hardly able to see, besides the
pain which I have in them. The play was a new play; and infinitely full:
the King and all the Court almost there. It is “The Storme,” a play
of Fletcher’s;’ which is but so-so, methinks; only there is a most
admirable dance at the end, of the ladies, in a military manner, which
indeed did please me mightily. So, it being a mighty wet day and night,
I with much ado got a coach, and, with twenty stops which he made, I got
him to carry me quite through, and paid dear for it, and so home, and
there comes my wife home from the Duke of York’s playhouse, where she
hath been with my aunt and Kate Joyce, and so to supper, and betimes to
bed, to make amends for my last night’s work and want of sleep.
26th. Up, and to my chamber, whither Jonas Moore comes, and, among other
things, after our business done, discoursing of matters of the office,
I shewed him my varnished things, which he says he can outdo much, and
tells me the mighty use of Napier’s bones;
[John Napier or Neper (1550-1617), laird of Merchiston (now
swallowed up in the enlarged Edinburgh of to-day, although the old
castle still stands), and the inventor of logarithms. He published
his “Rabdologiae seu numerationis per virgulas libri duo” in 1617,
and the work was reprinted and translated into Italian (1623) and
Dutch (1626). In 1667 William Leybourn published “The Art of
Numbering by Speaking Rods, vulgarly termed Napier’s Bones.”]
so that I will have a pair presently. To the office, where busy all
the morning sitting, and at noon home to dinner, and then with my wife
abroad to the King’s playhouse, to shew her yesterday’s new play, which
I like as I did yesterday, the principal thing extraordinary being the
dance, which is very good. So to Charing Cross by coach, about my wife’s
business, and then home round by London Wall, it being very dark and
dirty, and so to supper, and, for the ease of my eyes, to bed, having
first ended all my letters at the office.
27th. Up, and to the office, where very busy all the morning. While I
was busy at the Office, my wife sends for me to come home, and what was
it but to see the pretty girl which she is taking to wait upon her: and
though she seems not altogether so great a beauty as she had before told
me, yet indeed she is mighty pretty; and so pretty, that I find I shall
be too much pleased with it, and therefore could be contented as to my
judgement, though not to my passion, that she might not come, lest I may
be found too much minding her, to the discontent of my wife. She is
to come next week. She seems, by her discourse, to be grave beyond her
bigness and age, and exceeding well bred as to her deportment, having
been a scholar in a school at Bow these seven or eight years. To the
office again, my head running on this pretty girl, and there till noon,
when Creed and Sheres come and dined with me; and we had a great deal
of pretty discourse of the ceremoniousness of the Spaniards, whose
ceremonies are so many and so known, that, Sheres tells me, upon all
occasions of joy or sorrow in a Grandee’s family, my Lord Embassador is
fain to send one with an ‘en hora buena’, if it be upon a marriage, or
birth of a child, or a ‘pesa me’, if it be upon the death of a child,
or so. And these ceremonies are so set, and the words of the compliment,
that he hath been sent from my Lord, when he hath done no more than send
in word to the Grandee that one was there from the Embassador; and he
knowing what was his errand, that hath been enough, and he never spoken
with him: nay, several Grandees having been to marry a daughter, have
wrote letters to my Lord to give him notice, and out of the greatness of
his wisdom to desire his advice, though people he never saw; and then my
Lord he answers by commending the greatness of his discretion in making
so good an alliance, &c., and so ends. He says that it is so far from
dishonour to a man to give private revenge for an affront, that the
contrary is a disgrace; they holding that he that receives an affront
is not fit to appear in the sight of the world till he hath revenged
himself; and therefore, that a gentleman there that receives an affront
oftentimes never appears again in the world till he hath, by some
private way or other, revenged himself: and that, on this account,
several have followed their enemies privately to the Indys, thence to
Italy, thence to France and back again, watching for an opportunity to
be revenged. He says my Lord was fain to keep a letter from the Duke of
York to the Queen of Spain a great while in his hands, before he could
think fit to deliver it, till he had learnt whether the Queen would
receive it, it being directed to his cozen. He says that many ladies in
Spain, after they are found to be with child, do never stir out of their
beds or chambers till they are brought to bed: so ceremonious they are
in that point also. He tells me of their wooing by serenades at the
window, and that their friends do always make the match; but yet that
they have opportunities to meet at masse at church, and there they make
love: that the Court there hath no dancing, nor visits at night to see
the King or Queen, but is always just like a cloyster, nobody stirring
in it: that my Lord Sandwich wears a beard now, turned up in the Spanish
manner. But that which pleases me most indeed is, that the peace which
he hath made with Spain is now printed here, and is acknowledged by all
the merchants to be the best peace that ever England had with them: and
it appears that the King thinks it so, for this is printed before the
ratification is gone over; whereas that with France and Holland was
not in a good while after, till copys come over of it in English out of
Holland and France, that it was a reproach not to have it printed here.
This I am mighty glad of; and is the first and only piece of good news,
or thing fit to be owned, that this nation hath done several years.
After dinner I to the office, and they gone, anon comes Pelling, and he
and I to Gray’s Inne Fields, thinking to have heard Mrs. Knight sing at
her lodgings, by a friend’s means of his;
[Mrs. Knight, a celebrated singer and mistress of Charles II. There
is in Waller’s “Poems” a song sung by her to the queen on her
birthday. In her portrait, engraved by Faber, after Kneller, she is
represented in mourning, and in a devout posture before a crucifix.
Evelyn refers to her singing as incomparable, and adds that she had
“the greatest reach of any English woman; she had been lately
roaming in Italy, and was much improv’d in that quality” (“Diary,”
December 2nd, 1674).]
but we come too late; so must try another time. So lost our labour, and
I by coach home, and there to my chamber, and did a great deal of good
business about my Tangier accounts, and so with pleasure discoursing
with my wife of our journey shortly to Brampton, and of this little
girle, which indeed runs in my head, and pleases me mightily, though I
dare not own it, and so to supper and to bed.
28th. Up, having slept not so much to-night as I used to do, for my
thoughts being so full of this pretty little girle that is coming to
live with us, which pleases me mightily. All the morning at the Office,
busy upon an Order of Council, wherein they are mightily at a loss what
to advise about our discharging of seamen by ticket, there being no
money to pay their wages before January, only there is money to pay
them since January, provided by the Parliament, which will be a horrid
disgrace to the King and Crowne of England that no man shall reckon
himself safe, but where the Parliament takes care. And this did move Mr.
Wren at the table to-day to say, that he did believe if ever there be
occasion more to raise money, it will become here, as it is in Poland,
that there are two treasurers--one for the King, and the other for the
kingdom. At noon dined at home, and Mr. Hater with me, and Mr. Pierce,
the surgeon, dropped in, who I feared did come to bespeak me to be
godfather to his son, which I am unwilling now to be, having ended my
liking to his wife, since I find she paints. After dinner comes Sir Fr.
Hollis to me about business; and I with him by coach to the Temple, and
there I ‘light; all the way he telling me romantic lies of himself and
his family, how they have been Parliamentmen for Grimsby, he and his
forefathers, this 140 years; and his father is now: and himself, at
this day, stands for to be, with his father, by the death of his
fellow-burgess; and that he believes it will cost him as much as it did
his predecessor, which was L300 in ale, and L52 in buttered ale; which
I believe is one of his devilish lies. Here I ‘light and to the Duke of
York’s playhouse, and there saw a piece of “Sir Martin Marrall,” with
great delight, though I have seen it so often, and so home, and there
busy late, and so home to my supper and bed.
29th (Lord’s day). Up, and put off first my summer’s silk suit, and put
on a cloth one. Then to church, and so home to dinner, my wife and I
alone to a good dinner. All the afternoon talking in my chamber with my
wife, about my keeping a coach the next year, and doing some things to
my house, which will cost money--that is, furnish our best chamber
with tapestry, and other rooms with pictures. In the evening read
good books--my wife to me; and I did even my kitchen accounts. Then to
supper, and so to bed.
30th. By water to White Hall, there to a committee of Tangier, but they
not met yet, I went to St. James’s, there thinking to have opportunity
to speak to the Duke of York about the petition I have to make to him
for something in reward for my service this war, but I did waive it.
Thence to White Hall, and there a Committee met, where little was done,
and thence to the Duke of York to Council, where we the officers of the
Navy did attend about the business of discharging the seamen by tickets,
where several of the Lords spoke and of our number none but myself,
which I did in such manner as pleased the King and Council. Speaking
concerning the difficulty of pleasing of seamen and giving them
assurance to their satisfaction that they should be paid their arrears
of wages, my Lord Ashly did move that an assignment for money on the
Act might be put into the hands of the East India Company, or City of
London, which he thought the seamen would believe. But this my Lord
Anglesey did very handsomely oppose, and I think did carry it that it
will not be: and it is indeed a mean thing that the King should so far
own his own want of credit as to borrow theirs in this manner. My Lord
Anglesey told him that this was the way indeed to teach the Parliament
to trust the King no more for the time to come, but to have a kingdom’s
Treasurer distinct from the King’s. Home at noon to dinner, where I
expected to have had our new girle, my wife’s woman, but she is not yet
come. I abroad after dinner to White Hall, and there among other things
do hear that there will be musique to-morrow night before the King. So
to Westminster, where to the Swan.... and drank and away to the Hall,
and thence to Mrs. Martin’s, to bespeak some linen, and there je did
avoir all with her, and drank, and away, having first promised my
goddaughter a new coat-her first coat. So by coach home, and there find
our pretty girl Willet come, brought by Mr. Batelier, and she is very
pretty, and so grave as I never saw a little thing in my life. Indeed
I think her a little too good for my family, and so well carriaged as I
hardly ever saw. I wish my wife may use her well. Now I begin to be
full of thought for my journey the next week, if I can get leave, to
Brampton. Tonight come and sat with me Mr. Turner and his wife and tell
me of a design of sending their son Franke to the East Indy Company’s
service if they can get him entertainment, which they are promised by
Sir Andr. Rickard, which I do very well like of. So the company broke up
and to bed.