DIARY OF JOHN EVELYN.

I was born at Wotton, in the County of Surrey, about twenty minutes past

two in the morning, being on Tuesday the 31st and last of October, 1620,

after my father had been married about seven years,[4] and that my mother

had borne him three children; viz, two daughters and one son, about the

33d year of his age, and the 23d of my mother's.

[Footnote 4: He was married at St. Thomas's, Southwark, 27th

January, 1613. My sister Eliza was born at nine at night, 28th

November, 1614; Jane at four in the morning, 16th February, 1616; my

brother George at nine at night, Wednesday, 18th June, 1617; and my

brother Richard, 9th November, 1622.--_Note by Evelyn._]

[Sidenote: WOTTON]

My father, named Richard, was of a sanguine complexion, mixed with a dash

of choler: his hair inclining to light, which, though exceedingly thick,

became hoary by the time he had attained to thirty years of age; it was

somewhat curled toward the extremities; his beard, which he wore a little

peaked, as the mode was, of a brownish color, and so continued to the

last, save that it was somewhat mingled with gray hairs about his cheeks,

which, with his countenance, were clear and fresh-colored; his eyes

extraordinary quick and piercing; an ample forehead,--in sum, a very

well-composed visage and manly aspect: for the rest, he was but low of

stature, yet very strong. He was, for his life, so exact and temperate,

that I have heard he had never been surprised by excess, being ascetic

and sparing. His wisdom was great, and his judgment most acute; of solid

discourse, affable, humble, and in nothing affected; of a thriving, neat,

silent, and methodical genius, discreetly severe, yet liberal upon all

just occasions, both to his children, to strangers, and servants; a lover

of hospitality; and, in brief, of a singular and Christian moderation in

all his actions; not illiterate, nor obscure, as, having continued

Justice of the Peace and of the Quorum, he served his country as High

Sheriff, being, as I take it, the last dignified with that office for

Sussex and Surrey together, the same year, before their separation. He

was yet a studious decliner of honors and titles; being already in that

esteem with his country, that they could have added little to him besides

their burden. He was a person of that rare conversation that, upon

frequent recollection, and calling to mind passages of his life and

discourse, I could never charge him with the least passion, or

inadvertency. His estate was esteemed about £4000 per annum, well wooded,

and full of timber.

My mother's name was Eleanor, sole daughter and heiress of John

Standsfield, Esq., of an ancient and honorable family (though now

extinct) in Shropshire, by his wife Eleanor Comber, of a good and

well-known house in Sussex. She was of proper personage; of a brown

complexion; her eyes and hair of a lovely black; of constitution more

inclined to a religious melancholy, or pious sadness; of a rare memory,

and most exemplary life; for economy and prudence, esteemed one of the

most conspicuous in her country: which rendered her loss much deplored,

both by those who knew, and such as only heard of her.

Thus much, in brief, touching my parents; nor was it reasonable I should

speak less of them to whom I owe so much.

The place of my birth was Wotton, in the parish of Wotton, or Blackheath,

in the county of Surrey, the then mansion-house of my father, left him by

my grandfather, afterward and now my eldest brother's. It is situated in

the most southern part of the shire; and, though in a valley, yet really

upon part of Leith Hill, one of the most eminent in England for the

prodigious prospect to be seen from its summit, though by few observed.

From it may be discerned twelve or thirteen counties, with part of the

sea on the coast of Sussex, in a serene day. The house is large and

ancient, suitable to those hospitable times, and so sweetly environed

with those delicious streams and venerable woods, as in the judgment of

strangers as well as Englishmen it may be compared to one of the most

pleasant seats in the nation, and most tempting for a great person and a

wanton purse to render it conspicuous. It has rising grounds, meadows,

woods, and water, in abundance.

The distance from London little more than twenty miles, and yet so

securely placed, as if it were one hundred; three miles from Dorking,

which serves it abundantly with provision as well of land as sea; six

from Guildford, twelve from Kingston. I will say nothing of the air,

because the pre-eminence is universally given to Surrey, the soil being

dry and sandy; but I should speak much of the gardens, fountains, and

groves that adorn it, were they not as generally known to be among the

most natural, and (till this later and universal luxury of the whole

nation, since abounding in such expenses) the most magnificent that

England afforded; and which indeed gave one of the first examples to that

elegancy, since so much in vogue, and followed in the managing of their

waters, and other elegancies of that nature. Let me add, the contiguity

of five or six manors, the patronage of the livings about it, and what

Themistocles pronounced for none of the least advantages--the good

neighborhood. All which conspire here to render it an honorable and

handsome royalty, fit for the present possessor, my worthy brother, and

his noble lady, whose constant liberality gives them title both to the

place and the affections of all that know them. Thus, with the poet:

_Nescio quâ natale solum dulcedine cunctos

Ducit, et immemores non sinit esse sui._

I had given me the name of my grandfather, my mother's father, who,

together with a sister of Sir Thomas Evelyn, of Long Ditton, and Mr.

Comber, a near relation of my mother, were my susceptors. The solemnity

(yet upon what accident I know not, unless some indisposition in me) was

performed in the dining-room by Parson Higham, the present incumbent of

the parish, according to the forms prescribed by the then glorious Church

of England.

I was now (in regard to my mother's weakness, or rather custom of persons

of quality) put to nurse to one Peter, a neighbor's wife and tenant, of a

good, comely, brown, wholesome complexion, and in a most sweet place

toward the hills, flanked with wood and refreshed with streams; the

affection to which kind of solitude I sucked in with my very milk. It

appears, by a note of my father's, that I sucked till 17th of January,

1622, or at least I came not home before.[5]

[Footnote 5: The whole of this passage, so characteristic of the

writer's tastes and genius, and both the paragraphs before and after

it, are printed for the first time in this edition. Portions of the

preceding description of Wotton are also first taken from the

original; and it may not be out of place to add that, more

especially in the first fifty pages of this volume, a very large

number of curious and interesting additions are made to Evelyn's

text from the Manuscript of the Diary at Wotton.]

1623. The very first thing that I can call to memory, and from which time

forward I began to observe, was this year (1623) my youngest brother,

being in his nurse's arms, who, being then two days and nine months

younger than myself, was the last child of my dear parents.

1624. I was not initiated into any rudiments until near four years of

age, and then one Frier taught us at the church-porch of Wotton; and I do

perfectly remember the great talk and stir about Il Conde Gondomar, now

Ambassador from Spain (for near about this time was the match of our

Prince with the Infanta proposed); and the effects of that comet, 1618,

still working in the prodigious revolutions now beginning in Europe,

especially in Germany, whose sad commotions sprang from the Bohemians'

defection from the Emperor Matthias; upon which quarrel the Swedes broke

in, giving umbrage to the rest of the princes, and the whole Christian

world cause to deplore it, as never since enjoying perfect tranquillity.

1625. I was this year (being the first of the reign of King Charles) sent

by my father to Lewes, in Sussex, to be with my grandfather, Standsfield,

with whom I passed my childhood. This was the year in which the

pestilence was so epidemical, that there died in London 5,000 a week, and

I well remember the strict watches and examinations upon the ways as we

passed; and I was shortly after so dangerously sick of a fever that (as I

have heard) the physicians despaired of me.

1626. My picture was drawn in oil by one Chanterell, no ill painter.

1627. My grandfather, Standsfield, died this year, on the 5th of

February: I remember perfectly the solemnity at his funeral. He was

buried in the parish church of All Souls, where my grandmother, his

second wife, erected him a pious monument. About this time, was the

consecration of the Church of South Malling, near Lewes, by Dr. Field,

Bishop of Oxford (one Mr. Coxhall preached, who was afterward minister);

the building whereof was chiefly procured by my grandfather, who having

the impropriation, gave £20 a year out of it to this church. I afterward

sold the impropriation. I laid one of the first stones at the building of

the church.

1628-30. It was not till the year 1628, that I was put to learn my Latin

rudiments, and to write, of one Citolin, a Frenchman, in Lewes. I very

well remember that general muster previous to the Isle of Rhè's

expedition, and that I was one day awakened in the morning with the news

of the Duke of Buckingham being slain by that wretch, Felton, after our

disgrace before La Rochelle. And I now took so extraordinary a fancy to

drawing and designing, that I could never after wean my inclinations from

it, to the expense of much precious time, which might have been more

advantageously employed. I was now put to school to one Mr. Potts, in the

Cliff at Lewes, from whom, on the 7th of January, 1630, being the day

after Epiphany, I went to the free-school at Southover, near the town, of

which one Agnes Morley had been the foundress, and now Edward Snatt was

the master, under whom I remained till I was sent to the University.[6]

This year, my grandmother (with whom I sojourned) being married to one

Mr. Newton, a learned and most religious gentleman, we went from the

Cliff to dwell at his house in Southover. I do most perfectly remember

the jubilee which was universally expressed for the happy birth of the

Prince of Wales, 29th of May, now Charles II., our most gracious

Sovereign.

[Footnote 6: Long afterward, Evelyn was in the habit of paying great

respect to his old teacher.]

1631. There happened now an extraordinary dearth in England, corn bearing

an excessive price; and, in imitation of what I had seen my father do, I

began to observe matters more punctually, which I did use to set down in

a blank almanac. The Lord of Castlehaven's arraignment for many shameful

exorbitances was now all the talk, and the birth of the Princess Mary,

afterward Princess of Orange.

21st October, 1632. My eldest sister was married to Edward Darcy, Esq.,

who little deserved so excellent a person, a woman of so rare virtue. I

was not present at the nuptials; but I was soon afterward sent for into

Surrey, and my father would willingly have weaned me from my fondness of

my too indulgent grandmother, intending to have placed me at Eton; but,

not being so provident for my own benefit, and unreasonably terrified

with the report of the severe discipline there, I was sent back to Lewes;

which perverseness of mine I have since a thousand times deplored. This

was the first time that ever my parents had seen all their children

together in prosperity. While I was now trifling at home, I saw London,

where I lay one night only. The next day, I dined at Beddington, where I

was much delighted with the gardens and curiosities. Thence, we returned

to the Lady Darcy's, at Sutton; thence to Wotton; and, on the 16th of

August following, 1633, back to Lewes.

3d November, 1633. This year my father was appointed Sheriff, the last,

as I think, who served in that honorable office for Surrey and Sussex,

before they were disjoined. He had 116 servants in liveries, every one

liveried in green satin doublets; divers gentlemen and persons of quality

waited on him in the same garb and habit, which at that time (when thirty

or forty was the usual retinue of the High Sheriff) was esteemed a great

matter. Nor was this out of the least vanity that my father exceeded (who

was one of the greatest decliners of it); but because he could not refuse

the civility of his friends and relations, who voluntarily came

themselves, or sent in their servants. But my father was afterward most

unjustly and spitefully molested by that jeering judge, Richardson, for

reprieving the execution of a woman, to gratify my Lord of Lindsey, then

Admiral: but out of this he emerged with as much honor as trouble. The

king made this year his progress into Scotland, and Duke James was born.

15th December, 1634: My dear sister, Darcy, departed this life, being

arrived to her 20th year of age; in virtue advanced beyond her years, or

the merit of her husband, the worst of men. She had been brought to bed

the 2d of June before, but the infant died soon after her, the 24th of

December. I was therefore sent for home the second time, to celebrate the

obsequies of my sister; who was interred in a very honorable manner in

our dormitory joining to the parish church, where now her monument

stands.

1635. But my dear mother being now dangerously sick, I was, on the 3d of

September following, sent for to Wotton. Whom I found so far spent, that,

all human assistance failing, she in a most heavenly manner departed this

life upon the 29th of the same month, about eight in the evening of

Michaelmas-day. It was a malignant fever which took her away, about the

37th of her age, and 22d of her marriage, to our irreparable loss and the

regret of all that knew her. Certain it is, that the visible cause of her

indisposition proceeded from grief upon the loss of her daughter, and the

infant that followed it; and it is as certain, that when she perceived

the peril whereto its excess had engaged her, she strove to compose

herself and allay it; but it was too late, and she was forced to succumb.

Therefore summoning all her children then living (I shall never forget

it), she expressed herself in a manner so heavenly, with instructions so

pious and Christian, as made us strangely sensible of the extraordinary

loss then imminent; after which, embracing every one of us she gave to

each a ring with her blessing and dismissed us. Then, taking my father by

the hand, she recommended us to his care; and, because she was extremely

zealous for the education of my younger brother, she requested my father

that he might be sent with me to Lewes; and so having importuned him that

what he designed to bestow on her funeral, he would rather dispose among

the poor, she labored to compose herself for the blessed change which she

now expected. There was not a servant in the house whom she did not

expressly send for, advise, and infinitely affect with her counsel. Thus

she continued to employ her intervals, either instructing her relations,

or preparing of herself.

Though her physicians, Dr. Meverell, Dr. Clement, and Dr. Rand, had given

over all hopes of her recovery, and Sir Sanders Duncombe had tried his

celebrated and famous powder, yet she was many days impairing, and

endured the sharpest conflicts of her sickness with admirable patience

and most Christian resignation, retaining both her intellectuals and

ardent affections for her dissolution, to the very article of her

departure. When near her dissolution, she laid her hand on every one of

her children; and taking solemn leave of my father, with elevated heart

and eyes, she quietly expired, and resigned her soul to God. Thus ended

that prudent and pious woman, in the flower of her age, to the

inconsolable affliction of her husband, irreparable loss of her children,

and universal regret of all that knew her. She was interred, as near as

might be, to her daughter Darcy, the 3d of October, at night, but with no

mean ceremony.

It was the 3d of the ensuing November, after my brother George was gone

back to Oxford, ere I returned to Lewes, when I made way, according to

instructions received of my father, for my brother Richard, who was sent

the 12th after.

1636. This year being extremely dry, the pestilence much increased in

London, and divers parts of England.

13th February, 1637: I was especially admitted (and, as I remember, my

other brother) into the Middle Temple, London, though absent, and as yet

at school. There were now large contributions to the distressed

Palatinates.

The 10th of December my father sent a servant to bring us necessaries,

and the plague beginning now to cease, on the 3d of April, 1637, I left

school, where, till about the last year, I have been extremely remiss in

my studies; so as I went to the University rather out of shame of abiding

longer at school, than for any fitness, as by sad experience I found:

which put me to re-learn all that I had neglected, or but perfunctorily

gained.

[Sidenote: OXFORD]

10th May, 1637. I was admitted a Fellow-commoner of Baliol College,

Oxford; and, on the 29th, I was matriculated in the vestry of St. Mary's,

where I subscribed the Articles, and took the oaths: Dr. Baily, head of

St. John's, being vice-chancellor, afterward bishop. It appears by a

letter of my father's, that he was upon treaty with one Mr. Bathurst

(afterward Doctor and President), of Trinity College, who should have

been my tutor; but, lest my brother's tutor, Dr. Hobbs, more zealous in

his life than industrious to his pupils, should receive it as an affront,

and especially for that Fellow-commoners in Baliol were no more exempt

from exercise than the meanest scholars there, my father sent me thither

to one Mr. George Bradshaw (_nomen invisum!_ yet the son of an excellent

father, beneficed in Surrey). I ever thought my tutor had parts enough;

but as his ambition made him much suspected of the College, so his grudge

to Dr. Lawrence, the governor of it (whom he afterward supplanted), took

up so much of his time, that he seldom or never had the opportunity to

discharge his duty to his scholars. This I perceiving, associated myself

with one Mr. James Thicknesse (then a young man of the foundation,

afterward a Fellow of the house), by whose learned and friendly

conversation I received great advantage. At my first arrival, Dr.

Parkhurst was master: and after his decease, Dr. Lawrence, a chaplain of

his Majesty's and Margaret Professor, succeeded, an acute and learned

person; nor do I much reproach his severity, considering that the

extraordinary remissness of discipline had (till his coming) much

detracted from the reputation of that College.

There came in my time to the College one Nathaniel Conopios, out of

Greece, from Cyrill, the patriarch of Constantinople, who, returning many

years after, was made (as I understand) Bishop of Smyrna. He was the

first I ever saw drink coffee; which custom came not into England till

thirty years after.[7]

[Footnote 7: Evelyn should have said "till twenty years after," not

thirty. Coffee was introduced into England, and coffee-houses set

up, in 1658.]

After I was somewhat settled there in my formalities (for then was the

University exceedingly regular, under the exact discipline of William

Laud, Archbishop of Canterbury, then Chancellor), I added, as benefactor

to the library of the College, these books--"_ex dono Johannis Evelyni,

hujus Coll. Socio-Commensalis, filii Richardi Evelyni, è com. Surriæ,

armig^r_."--

"_Zanchii Opera_," vols. 1, 2, 3.

"_Granado in Thomam Aquinatem_," vols. 1, 2, 3.

"_Novarini Electa Sacra_" and "_Cresolii Anthologia Sacra_"; authors, it

seems, much desired by the students of divinity there.

Upon the 2d of July, being the first Sunday of the month, I first

received the blessed Sacrament of the Lord's Supper in the college

chapel, one Mr. Cooper, a Fellow of the house, preaching; and at this

time was the Church of England in her greatest splendor, all things

decent, and becoming the Peace, and the persons that governed. The most

of the following week I spent in visiting the Colleges, and several

rarities of the University, which do very much affect young comers.

18th July, 1637. I accompanied my eldest brother, who then quitted

Oxford, into the country; and, on the 9th of August, went to visit my

friends at Lewes, whence I returned the 12th to Wotton. On the 17th of

September, I received the blessed Sacrament at Wotton church, and 23d of

October went back to Oxford.

5th November, 1637. I received again the Holy Communion in our college

chapel, one Prouse, a Fellow (but a mad one), preaching.

9th December, 1637. I offered at my first exercise in the Hall, and

answered my opponent; and, upon the 11th following, declaimed in the

chapel before the Master, Fellows, and Scholars, according to the custom.

The 15th after, I first of all opposed in the Hall.

The Christmas ensuing, being at a Comedy which the gentlemen of Exeter

College presented to the University, and standing, for the better

advantage of seeing, upon a table in the Hall, which was near to another,

in the dark, being constrained by the extraordinary press to quit my

station, in leaping down to save myself I dashed my right leg with such

violence against the sharp edge of the other board, as gave me a hurt

which held me in cure till almost Easter, and confined me to my study.

22d January, 1638. I would needs be admitted into the dancing and

vaulting schools; of which late activity one Stokes, the master, did

afterward set forth a pretty book, which was published, with many witty

elogies before it.

4th February, 1638. One Mr. Wariner preached in our chapel; and, on the

25th, Mr. Wentworth, a kinsman of the Earl of Strafford; after which

followed the blessed Sacrament.

13th April, 1638. My father ordered that I should begin to manage my own

expenses, which till then my tutor had done; at which I was much

satisfied.

[Sidenote: PORTSMOUTH]

9th July, 1638. I went home to visit my friends, and, on the 26th, with

my brother and sister to Lewes, where we abode till the 31st; and thence

to one Mr. Michael's, of Houghton, near Arundel, where we were very well

treated; and, on the 2d of August, to Portsmouth, and thence, having

surveyed the fortifications (a great rarity in that blessed halcyon time

in England), we passed into the Isle of Wight, to the house of my Lady

Richards, in a place called Yaverland; but were turned the following day

to Chichester, where, having viewed the city and fair cathedral, we

returned home.

About the beginning of September, I was so afflicted with a quartan ague,

that I could by no means get rid of it till the December following. This

was the fatal year wherein the rebellious Scots opposed the King, upon

the pretense of the introduction of some new ceremonies and the Book of

Common Prayer, and madly began our confusions, and their own destruction,

too, as it proved in event.

14th January, 1639. I came back to Oxford, after my tedious

indisposition, and to the infinite loss of my time; and now I began to

look upon the rudiments of music, in which I afterward arrived to some

formal knowledge, though to small perfection of hand, because I was so

frequently diverted with inclinations to newer trifles.

20th May, 1639. Accompanied with one Mr. J. Crafford (who afterward being

my fellow-traveler in Italy, there changed his religion), I took a

journey of pleasure to see the Somersetshire baths, Bristol, Cirencester,

Malmesbury, Abington, and divers other towns of lesser note; and returned

the 25th.

8th October, 1639. I went back to Oxford.

14th December, 1639. According to injunctions from the Heads of Colleges,

I went (among the rest) to the Confirmation at St. Mary's, where, after

sermon, the Bishop of Oxford laid his hands upon us, with the usual form

of benediction prescribed: but this received (I fear) for the more part

out of curiosity, rather than with that due preparation and advice which

had been requisite, could not be so effectual as otherwise that admirable

and useful institution might have been, and as I have since deplored it.

21st January, 1640. Came my brother, Richard, from school, to be my

chamber-fellow at the University. He was admitted the next day and

matriculated the 31st.

[Sidenote: LONDON]

11th April, 1640. I went to London to see the solemnity of his Majesty's

riding through the city in state to the Short Parliament, which began the

13th following,--a very glorious and magnificent sight, the King circled

with his royal diadem and the affections of his people: but the day after

I returned to Wotton again, where I stayed, my father's indisposition

suffering great intervals, till April 27th, when I was sent to London to

be first resident at the Middle Temple: so as my being at the University,

in regard of these avocations, was of very small benefit to me. Upon May

the 5th following, was the Parliament unhappily dissolved; and, on the

20th I returned with my brother George to Wotton, who, on the 28th of the

same month, was married at Albury to Mrs. Caldwell (an heiress of an

ancient Leicestershire family, where part of the nuptials were

celebrated).

10th June, 1640. I repaired with my brother to the term, to go into our

new lodgings (that were formerly in Essex-court), being a very handsome

apartment just over against the Hall-court, but four pair of stairs high,

which gave us the advantage of the fairer prospect; but did not much

contribute to the love of that impolished study, to which (I suppose) my

father had designed me, when he paid £145 to purchase our present lives,

and assignments afterward.

London, and especially the Court, were at this period in frequent

disorders, and great insolences were committed by the abused and too

happy City: in particular, the Bishop of Canterbury's Palace at Lambeth

was assaulted by a rude rabble from Southwark, my Lord Chamberlain

imprisoned and many scandalous libels and invectives scattered about the

streets, to the reproach of Government, and the fermentation of our since

distractions: so that, upon the 25th of June, I was sent for to Wotton,

and the 27th after, my father's indisposition augmenting, by advice of

the physicians he repaired to the Bath.

7th July, 1640. My brother George and I, understanding the peril my

father was in upon a sudden attack of his infirmity, rode post from

Guildford toward him, and found him extraordinary weak; yet so as that,

continuing his course, he held out till the 8th of September, when I

returned home with him in his litter.

15th October, 1640. I went to the Temple, it being Michaelmas Term.

30th December, 1640. I saw his Majesty (coming from his Northern

Expedition) ride in pomp and a kind of ovation, with all the marks of a

happy peace, restored to the affections of his people, being conducted

through London with a most splendid cavalcade; and on the 3d of November

following (a day never to be mentioned without a curse), to that long

ungrateful, foolish, and fatal Parliament, the beginning of all our

sorrows for twenty years after, and the period of the most happy monarch

in the world: _Quis talia fando!_

But my father being by this time entered into a dropsy, an indisposition

the most unsuspected, being a person so exemplarily temperate, and of

admirable regimen, hastened me back to Wotton, December the 12th; where,

the 24th following, between twelve and one o'clock at noon, departed this

life that excellent man and indulgent parent, retaining his senses and

piety to the last, which he most tenderly expressed in blessing us, whom

he now left to the world and the worst of times, while he was taken from

the evil to come.

1641. It was a sad and lugubrious beginning of the year, when on the 2d

of January, 1640-1, we at night followed the mourning hearse to the

church at Wotton; when, after a sermon and funeral oration by the

minister, my father was interred near his formerly erected monument, and

mingled with the ashes of our mother, his dear wife. Thus we were bereft

of both our parents in a period when we most of all stood in need of

their counsel and assistance, especially myself, of a raw, vain,

uncertain, and very unwary inclination: but so it pleased God to make

trial of my conduct in a conjuncture of the greatest and most prodigious

hazard that ever the youth of England saw; and, if I did not amidst all

this impeach my liberty nor my virtue with the rest who made shipwreck of

both, it was more the infinite goodness and mercy of God than the least

providence or discretion of mine own, who now thought of nothing but the

pursuit of vanity, and the confused imaginations of young men.

15th April, 1641. I repaired to London to hear and see the famous trial

of the Earl of Strafford, Lord-Deputy of Ireland, who, on the 22d of

March, had been summoned before both Houses of Parliament, and now

appeared in Westminster-hall,[8] which was prepared with scaffolds for

the Lords and Commons, who, together with the King, Queen, Prince, and

flower of the noblesse, were spectators and auditors of the greatest

malice and the greatest innocency that ever met before so illustrous an

assembly. It was Thomas, Earl of Arundel and Surrey, Earl Marshal of

England, who was made High Steward upon this occasion; and the sequel is

too well known to need any notice of the event.

[Footnote 8: On the 15th of April Strafford made his eloquent

defense, which it seems to have been Evelyn's good fortune to be

present at. And here the reader may remark the fact, not without

significance, that between the entries on this page of the Diary

which relate to Lord Strafford, the young Prince of Orange came over

to make love to the Princess Royal, then twelve years old; and that

the marriage was subsequently celebrated amid extraordinary Court

rejoicings and festivities, in which the King took a prominent part,

during the short interval which elapsed between the sentence and

execution of the King's great and unfortunate minister.]

On the 27th of April, came over out of Holland the young Prince of

Orange, with a splendid equipage, to make love to his Majesty's eldest

daughter, the now Princess Royal.

That evening, was celebrated the pompous funeral of the Duke of Richmond,

who was carried in effigy, with all the ensigns of that illustrious

family, in an open chariot, in great solemnity, through London to

Westminster Abbey.

On the 12th of May, I beheld on Tower-hill the fatal stroke which severed

the wisest head in England from the shoulders of the Earl of Strafford,

whose crime coming under the cognizance of no human law or statute, a new

one was made, not to be a precedent, but his destruction. With what

reluctancy the King signed the execution, he has sufficiently expressed;

to which he imputes his own unjust suffering--to such exorbitancy were

things arrived.

On the 24th of May, I returned to Wotton; and, on the 28th of June, I

went to London with my sister, Jane, and the day after sat to one

Vanderborcht for my picture in oil, at Arundel-house, whose servant that

excellent painter was, brought out of Germany when the Earl returned from

Vienna (whither he was sent Ambassador-extraordinary, with great pomp and

charge, though without any effect, through the artifice of the Jesuited

Spaniard who governed all in that conjuncture). With Vanderborcht, the

painter, he brought over Winceslaus Hollar, the sculptor, who engraved

not only the unhappy Deputy's trial in Westminster-hall, but his

decapitation; as he did several other historical things, then relating to

the accidents happening during the Rebellion in England, with great

skill; besides many cities, towns, and landscapes, not only of this

nation, but of foreign parts, and divers portraits of famous persons then

in being; and things designed from the best pieces of the rare paintings

and masters of which the Earl of Arundel was possessor, purchased and

collected in his travels with incredible expense: so as, though Hollar's

were but etched in aquafortis, I account the collection to be the most

authentic and useful extant. Hollar was the son of a gentleman near

Prague, in Bohemia, and my very good friend, perverted at last by the

Jesuits at Antwerp to change his religion; a very honest, simple,

well-meaning man, who at last came over again into England, where he

died. We have the whole history of the king's reign, from his trial in

Westminster-hall and before, to the restoration of King Charles II.,

represented in several sculptures, with that also of Archbishop Laud, by

this indefatigable artist; besides innumerable sculptures in the works of

Dugdale, Ashmole, and other historical and useful works. I am the more

particular upon this for the fruit of that collection, which I wish I had

entire.

This picture[9] I presented to my sister, being at her request, on my

resolution to absent myself from this ill face of things at home, which

gave umbrage to wiser than myself that the medal was reversing, and our

calamities but yet in their infancy: so that, on the 15th of July, having

procured a pass at the Custom-house, where I repeated my oath of

allegiance, I went from London to Gravesend, accompanied with one Mr.

Caryll, a Surrey gentleman, and our servants, where we arrived by six

o'clock that evening, with a purpose to take the first opportunity of a

passage for Holland. But the wind as yet not favorable, we had time to

view the Block-house of that town, which answered to another over against

it at Tilbury, famous for the rendezvous of Queen Elizabeth, in the year

1588, which we found stored with twenty pieces of cannon, and other

ammunition proportionable. On the 19th of July, we made a short excursion

to Rochester, and having seen the cathedral went to Chatham to see the

Royal Sovereign, a glorious vessel of burden lately built there, being

for defense and ornament, the richest that ever spread cloth before the

wind. She carried an hundred brass cannon, and was 1,200 tons; a rare

sailer, the work of the famous Phineas Pett, inventor of the

frigate-fashion of building, to this day practiced. But what is to be

deplored as to this vessel is, that it cost his Majesty the affections of

his subjects, perverted by the malcontent of great ones, who took

occasion to quarrel for his having raised a very slight tax for the

building of this, and equipping the rest of the navy, without an act of

Parliament; though, by the suffrages of the major part of the Judges the

King might legally do in times of imminent danger, of which his Majesty

was best apprised. But this not satisfying a jealous party, it was

condemned as unprecedented, and not justifiable as to the Royal

prerogative; and, accordingly, the Judges were removed out of their

places, fined, and imprisoned.[10]

[Footnote 9: His own portrait.]

[Footnote 10: In such manner Evelyn refers to the tax of Ship-money.

But compare this remarkable passage, now first printed from the

original, with the tone in which, eight years later, he spoke of the

only chance by which monarchy in England might be saved; namely,

that of "doing nothing as to government but what shall be approved

by the old way of a free parliament, and the known laws of the

land."]

We returned again this evening, and on the 21st of July embarked in a

Dutch frigate, bound for Flushing, convoyed and accompanied by five other

stout vessels, whereof one was a man-of-war. The next day at noon, we

landed at Flushing.

[Sidenote: DE VERE]

Being desirous to overtake the Leagure,[11] which was then before Genep,

ere the summer should be too far spent, we went this evening from

Flushing to Middleburg, another fine town in this island, to De Vere,

whence the most ancient and illustrious Earls of Oxford derive their

family, who have spent so much blood in assisting the state during their

wars. From De Vere we passed over many towns, houses, and ruins of

demolished suburbs, etc., which have formerly been swallowed up by the

sea; at what time no less than eight of those islands had been

irrecoverably lost.

[Footnote 11: The meaning of this expression is, that they should be

in time to witness the siege.]

The next day we arrived at Dort, the first town of Holland, furnished

with all German commodities, and especially Rhenish wines and timber. It

hath almost at the extremity a very spacious and venerable church; a

stately senate house, wherein was holden that famous synod against the

Arminians in 1618; and in that hall hangeth a picture of "The Passion,"

an exceeding rare and much-esteemed piece.

From Dort, being desirous to hasten toward the army, I took wagon this

afternoon to Rotterdam, whither we were hurried in less than an hour,

though it be ten miles distant; so furiously do those Foremen drive. I

went first to visit the great church, the Doole, the Bourse, and the

public statue of the learned Erasmus, of brass. They showed us his house,

or rather the mean cottage, wherein he was born, over which there are

extant these lines, in capital letters:

ÆDIBUS HIS ORTUS, MUNDUM DECORAVIT ERASMUS

ARTIBUS INGENIO, RELIGIONE, FIDE.

The 26th of July I passed by a straight and commodious river through

Delft to the Hague; in which journey I observed divers leprous poor

creatures dwelling in solitary huts on the brink of the water, and

permitted to ask the charity of passengers, which is conveyed to them in

a floating box that they cast out.

Arrived at the Hague, I went first to the Queen of Bohemia's court, where

I had the honor to kiss her Majesty's hand, and several of the

Princesses', her daughters. Prince Maurice was also there, newly come out

of Germany; and my Lord Finch, not long before fled out of England from

the fury of the Parliament. It was a fasting day with the Queen for the

unfortunate death of her husband, and the presence chamber had been hung

with black velvet ever since his decease.

[Sidenote: NIMEGUEN]

The 28th of July I went to Leyden; and the 29th to Utrecht, being thirty

English miles distant (as they reckon by hours). It was now Kermas, or a

fair, in this town, the streets swarming with boors and rudeness, so

that early the next morning, having visited the ancient Bishop's court,

and the two famous churches, I satisfied my curiosity till my return, and

better leisure. We then came to Rynen, where the Queen of Bohemia hath a

neat and well built palace, or country house, after the Italian manner,

as I remember; and so, crossing the Rhine, upon which this villa is

situated, lodged that night in a countryman's house. The 31st to

Nimeguen; and on the 2d of August we arrived at the Leagure, where was

then the whole army encamped about Genep, a very strong castle situated

on the river Waal; but, being taken four or five days before, we had only

a sight of the demolitions. The next Sunday was the thanksgiving sermons

performed in Colonel Goring's regiment (eldest son of the since Earl of

Norwich) by Mr. Goffe, his chaplain (now turned Roman, and

father-confessor to the Queen-mother). The evening was spent in firing

cannon and other expressions of military triumphs.

Now, according to the compliment, I was received a volunteer in the

company of Captain Apsley, of whose Captain-lieutenant, Honywood (Apsley

being absent), I received many civilities.

The 3d of August, at night, we rode about the lines of circumvallation,

the general being then in the field. The next day I was accommodated with

a very spacious and commodious tent for my lodging; as before I was with

a horse, which I had at command, and a hut which during the excessive

heats was a great convenience; for the sun piercing the canvas of the

tent, it was during the day unsufferable, and at night not seldom

infested with mists and fogs, which ascended from the river.

6th August, 1641. As the turn came about, we were ordered to watch on a

horn-work near our quarters, and trail a pike, being the next morning

relieved by a company of French. This was our continual duty till the

castle was refortified, and all danger of quitting that station secured;

whence I went to see a Convent of Franciscan Friars, not far from our

quarters, where we found both the chapel and refectory full, crowded with

the goods of such poor people as at the approach of the army had fled

with them thither for sanctuary. On the day following, I went to view all

the trenches, approaches, and mines, etc. of the besiegers; and, in

particular, I took special notice of the wheel-bridge, which engine his

Excellency had made to run over the moat when they stormed the castle; as

it is since described (with all the other particulars of this siege) by

the author of that incomparable work, "Hollandia Illustrata." The walls

and ramparts of earth, which a mine had broken and crumbled, were of

prodigious thickness.

Upon the 8th of August, I dined in the horse-quarters with Sir Robert

Stone and his lady, Sir William Stradling, and divers Cavaliers; where

there was very good cheer, but hot service for a young drinker, as then I

was; so that, being pretty well satisfied with the confusion of armies

and sieges (if such that of the United Provinces may be called, where

their quarters and encampments are so admirably regular, and orders so

exactly observed, as few cities, the best governed in time of peace,

exceed it for all conveniences), I took my leave of the Leagure and

Camerades; and, on the 12th of August, I embarked on the "Waal," in

company with three grave divines, who entertained us a great part of our

passage with a long dispute concerning the lawfulness of church-music. We

now sailed by Teil, where we landed some of our freight; and about five

o'clock we touched at a pretty town named Bommell, that had divers

English in garrison. It stands upon Contribution-land, which subjects the

environs to the Spanish incursions. We sailed also by an exceeding strong

fort called Lovestein, famous for the escape of the learned Hugo Grotius,

who, being in durance as a capital offender, as was the unhappy

Barneveldt, by the stratagem of his lady, was conveyed in a trunk

supposed to be filled with books only. We lay at Gorcum, a very strong

and considerable frontier.

13th August, 1641. We arrived late at Rotterdam, where was their annual

mart or fair, so furnished with pictures (especially landscapes and

drolleries, as they call those clownish representations), that I was

amazed. Some of these I bought and sent into England. The reason of this

store of pictures, and their cheapness, proceeds from their want of land

to employ their stock, so that it is an ordinary thing to find a common

farmer lay out two or three thousand pounds in this commodity. Their

houses are full of them, and they vend them at their fairs to very great

gains. Here I first saw an elephant, who was extremely well disciplined

and obedient. It was a beast of a monstrous size, yet as flexible and

nimble in the joints, contrary to the vulgar tradition, as could be

imagined from so prodigious a bulk and strange fabric; but I most of all

admired the dexterity and strength of its proboscis, on which it was able

to support two or three men, and by which it took and reached whatever

was offered to it; its teeth were but short, being a female, and not old.

I was also shown a pelican, or _onocratulas_ of Pliny, with its large

gullets, in which he kept his reserve of fish; the plumage was white,

legs red, flat, and film-footed, likewise a cock with four legs, two

rumps and vents: also a hen which had two large spurs growing out of her

sides, penetrating the feathers of her wings.

17th August, 1641. I passed again through Delft, and visited the church

in which was the monument of Prince William of Nassau,--the first of the

Williams, and savior (as they call him) of their liberty, which cost him

his life by a vile assassination. It is a piece of rare art, consisting

of several figures, as big as the life, in copper. There is in the same

place a magnificent tomb of his son and successor, Maurice. The

senate-house hath a very stately portico, supported with choice columns

of black marble, as I remember, of one entire stone. Within, there hangs

a weighty vessel of wood, not unlike a butter-churn, which the

adventurous woman that hath two husbands at one time is to wear on her

shoulders, her head peeping out at the top only, and so led about the

town, as a penance for her incontinence. From hence, we went the next day

to Ryswick, a stately country-house of the Prince of Orange, for nothing

more remarkable than the delicious walks planted with lime trees, and the

modern paintings within.

[Sidenote: HAGUE]

[Sidenote: AMSTERDAM]

19th August, 1641. We returned to the Hague, and went to visit the Hoff,

or Prince's Court, with the adjoining gardens full of ornament, close

walks, statues, marbles, grots, fountains, and artificial music. There is

to this palace a stately hall, not much inferior to ours of Westminster,

hung round with colors and other trophies taken from the Spaniards;[12]

and the sides below are furnished with shops. Next day (the 20th) I

returned to Delft, thence to Rotterdam, the Hague, and Leyden, where

immediately I mounted a wagon, which that night, late as it was, brought

us to Haerlem. About seven in the morning after I came to Amsterdam,

where being provided with a lodging, the first thing I went to see was a

Synagogue of the Jews (being Saturday), whose ceremonies, ornaments,

lamps, law, and schools, afforded matter for my contemplation. The women

were secluded from the men, being seated in galleries above, shut with

lattices, having their heads muffled with linen, after a fantastical and

somewhat extraordinary fashion; the men, wearing a large calico mantle,

yellow colored, over their hats, all the while waving their bodies, while

at their devotions. From thence, I went to a place without the town,

called Overkirk, where they have a spacious field assigned them to bury

their dead, full of sepulchers with Hebraic inscriptions, some of them

stately and costly. Looking through one of these monuments, where the

stones were disjointed, I perceived divers books and papers lie about a

corpse; for it seems, when any learned Rabbi dies, they bury some of his

books with him. With the help of a stick, I raked out several, written in

Hebrew characters, but much impaired. As we returned, we stepped in to

see the Spin-house, a kind of bridewell, where incorrigible and lewd

women are kept in discipline and labor, but all neat. We were shown an

hospital for poor travelers and pilgrims, built by Queen Elizabeth of

England; and another maintained by the city.

[Footnote 12: Westminster hall used to be so in Term time, and

during the sitting of Parliament, as late as the beginning of the

reign of George III.]

The State or Senate-house of this town, if the design be perfected, will

be one of the most costly and magnificent pieces of architecture in

Europe, especially for the materials and the carvings. In the Doole is

painted, on a very large table, the bust of Marie de Medicis, supported

by four royal diadems, the work of one Vanderdall, who hath set his name

thereon, 1st September, 1638.

On Sunday, I heard an English sermon at the Presbyterian congregation,

where they had chalked upon a slate the psalms that were to be sung, so

that all the congregation might see them without the bidding of a clerk.

I was told, that after such an age no minister was permitted to preach,

but had his maintenance continued during life.

I purposely changed my lodgings, being desirous to converse with the

sectaries that swarmed in this city, out of whose spawn came those almost

innumerable broods in England afterward. It was at a Brownist's house,

where we had an extraordinary good table. There was in pension with us my

Lord Keeper, Finch, and one Sir J. Fotherbee. Here I also found an

English Carmelite, who was going through Germany with an Irish gentleman.

I now went to see the Weese-house, a foundation like our Charter-house,

for the education of decayed persons, orphans, and poor children, where

they are taught several occupations. The girls are so well brought up to

housewifery, that men of good worth, who seek that chiefly in a woman,

frequently take their wives from this hospital. Thence to the Rasp-house,

where the lusty knaves are compelled to work; and the rasping of brasil

and logwood for the dyers is very hard labor. To the Dool-house, for

madmen and fools. But none did I so much admire, as an Hospital for their

lame and decrepit soldiers and seamen, where the accommodations are very

great, the building answerable; and, indeed, for the like public

charities the provisions are admirable in this country, where, as no idle

vagabonds are suffered (as in England they are), there is hardly a child

of four or five years old, but they find some employment for it.

It was on a Sunday morning that I went to the Bourse, or Exchange, after

their sermons were ended, to see the Dog-market, which lasts till two in

the afternoon, in this place of convention of merchants from all parts of

the world. The building is not comparable to that of London, built by

that worthy citizen, Sir Thomas Gresham, yet in one respect exceeding it,

that vessels of considerable burden ride at the very quay contiguous to

it; and indeed it is by extraordinary industry that as well this city, as

generally all the towns of Holland, are so accommodated with graffs,

cuts, sluices, moles, and rivers, made by hand, that nothing is more

frequent than to see a whole navy, belonging to this mercantile people,

riding at anchor before their very doors: and yet their streets even,

straight, and well paved, the houses so uniform and planted with lime

trees, as nothing can be more beautiful.

The next day we were entertained at a kind of tavern, called the

Briloft, appertaining to a rich Anabaptist, where, in the upper rooms of

the house, were divers pretty waterworks, rising 108 feet from the

ground. Here were many quaint devices, fountains, artificial music,

noises of beasts, and chirping of birds; but what pleased me most was a

large pendant candlestick, branching into several sockets, furnished all

with ordinary candles to appearance, out of the wicks spouting out

streams of water, instead of flames. This seemed then and was a rarity,

before the philosophy of compressed air made it intelligible. There was

likewise a cylinder that entertained the company with a variety of

chimes, the hammers striking upon the brims of porcelain dishes, suited

to the tones and notes, without cracking any of them. Many other

waterworks were shown.

The Kaiser's or Emperor's Graft, which is an ample and long street,

appearing like a city in a forest; the lime trees planted just before

each house, and at the margin of that goodly aqueduct so curiously

wharfed with Klincard brick, which likewise paves the streets, than which

nothing can be more useful and neat. This part of Amsterdam is built and

gained upon the main sea, supported by piles at an immense charge, and

fitted for the most busy concourse of traffickers and people of commerce

beyond any place, or mart, in the world. Nor must I forget the port of

entrance into an issue of this town, composed of very magnificent pieces

of architecture, some of the ancient and best manner, as are divers

churches.

The turrets, or steeples, are adorned after a particular manner and

invention; the chimes of bells are so rarely managed, that being curious

to know whether the motion was from any engine, I went up to that of St.

Nicholas, where I found one who played all sorts of compositions from the

tablature before him, as if he had fingered an organ; for so were the

hammers fastened with wires to several keys put into a frame twenty feet

below the bells, upon which (by the help of a wooden instrument, not much

unlike a weaver's shuttle, that guarded his hand) he struck on the keys

and played to admiration. All this while, through the clattering of the

wires, din of the too nearly sounding bells, and noise that his wooden

gloves made, the confusion was so great, that it was impossible for the

musician, or any that stood near him, to hear anything at all; yet, to

those at a distance, and especially in the streets, the harmony and the

time were the most exact and agreeable.

The south church is richly paved with black and white marble,--the west

is a new fabric; and generally all the churches in Holland are furnished

with organs, lamps, and monuments, carefully preserved from the fury and

impiety of popular reformers, whose zeal has foolishly transported them

in other places rather to act like madmen than religious.

[Sidenote: HAERLEM]

Upon St. Bartholomew's day, I went among the booksellers, and visited the

famous Hondius and Bleaw's shop, to buy some maps, atlases, and other

works of that kind. At another shop, I furnished myself with some shells

and Indian curiosities; and so, toward the end of August, I returned

again to Haerlem by the river, ten miles in length, straight as a line,

and of competent breadth for ships to sail by one another. They showed us

a cottage where, they told us, dwelt a woman who had been married to her

twenty-fifth husband, and being now a widow, was prohibited to marry in

future; yet it could not be proved that she had ever made away with any

of her husbands, though the suspicion had brought her divers times to

trouble.

Haerlem is a very delicate town and hath one of the fairest churches of

the Gothic design I had ever seen. There hang in the steeple, which is

very high, two silver bells, said to have been brought from Damietta, in

Egypt, by an earl of Holland, in memory of whose success they are rung

out every evening. In the nave hang the goodliest branches of brass for

tapers that I have seen, esteemed of great value for the curiosity of the

workmanship; also a fair pair of organs, which I could not find they made

use of in divine service, or so much as to assist them in singing psalms,

but only for show, and to recreate the people before and after their

devotions, while the burgomasters were walking and conferring about their

affairs. Near the west window hang two models of ships, completely

equipped, in memory of that invention of saws under their keels, with

which they cut through the chain of booms, which barred the port of

Damietta. Having visited this church, the fish-market, and made some

inquiry about the printing-house, the invention whereof is said to have

been in this town, I returned to Leyden.

[Sidenote: LEYDEN]

At Leyden, I was carried up to the castle, or Pyrgus, built on a very

steep artificial mount, cast up (as reported) by Hengist the Saxon, on

his return out of England, as a place to retire to, in case of any sudden

inundations.

The churches are many and fair; in one of them lies buried the learned

and illustrious Joseph Scaliger, without any extraordinary inscription,

who, having left the world a monument of his worth more lasting than

marble, needed nothing more than his own name; which I think is all

engraven on his sepulcher. He left his library to this University.

28th August, 1641. I went to see the college and schools, which are

nothing extraordinary, and was complimented with a _matricula_ by the

_magnificus_ Professor, who first in Latin demanded of me where my

lodging in the town was, my name, age, birth, and to what Faculty I

addicted myself; then, recording my answers in a book, he administered an

oath to me that I should observe the statutes and orders of the

University while I stayed, and then delivered me a ticket, by virtue

whereof I was made excise-free; for all which worthy privileges, and the

pains of writing, he accepted of a rix-dollar.

Here was now the famous Dan. Heinsius, whom I so longed to see, as well

as the no less famous printer, Elzevir's printing-house and shop,

renowned for the politeness of the character and editions of what he has

published through Europe. Hence to the physic-garden, well stored with

exotic plants, if the catalogue presented to me by the gardener be a

faithful register.

But, among all the rarities of this place, I was much pleased with a

sight of their anatomy-school, theater, and repository adjoining, which

is well furnished with natural curiosities; skeletons, from the whale and

elephant to the fly and spider; which last is a very delicate piece of

art, to see how the bones (if I may so call them of so tender an insect)

could be separated from the mucilaginous parts of that minute animal.

Among a great variety of other things, I was shown the knife newly taken

out of a drunken Dutchman's guts, by an incision in his side, after it

had slipped from his fingers into his stomach. The pictures of the

chirurgeon and his patient, both living, were there.

There is without the town a fair Mall, curiously planted.

Returning to my lodging, I was showed the statue, cut in stone, of the

happy monk, whom they report to have been the first inventor of

typography, set over the door; but this is much controverted by others,

who strive for the glory of it, besides John Gutenberg.

I was brought acquainted with a Burgundian Jew, who had married an

apostate Kentish woman. I asked him divers questions: he told me, among

other things, that the World should never end; that our souls

transmigrated, and that even those of the most holy persons did penance

in the bodies of brutes after death,--and so he interpreted the

banishment and savage life of Nebuchadnezzar: that all the Jews should

rise again, and be led to Jerusalem; that the Romans only were the

occasion of our Savior's death, whom he affirmed (as the Turks do) to be

a great prophet, but not the Messiah. He showed me several books of their

devotion, which he had translated into English, for the instruction of

his wife; he told me that when the Messiah came, all the ships, barks,

and vessels of Holland should, by the power of certain strange

whirlwinds, be loosed from their anchors, and transported in a moment to

all the desolate ports and havens throughout the world, wherever the

dispersion was, to convey their brethren and tribes to the Holy City;

with other such like stuff. He was a merry drunken fellow, but would by

no means handle any money (for something I purchased of him), it being

Saturday; but desired me to leave it in the window, meaning to receive it

on Sunday morning.

1st September, 1641. I went to Delft and Rotterdam, and two days after

back to the Hague, to bespeak a suit of horseman's armor, which I caused

to be made to fit me. I now rode out of town to see the monument of the

woman, pretended to have been a countess of Holland, reported to have had

as many children at one birth, as there are days in the year. The basins

were hung up in which they were baptized, together with a large

description of the matter-of-fact in a frame of carved work, in the

church of Lysdun, a desolate place. As I returned, I diverted to see one

of the Prince's Palaces, called the Hoff Van Hounsler's Dyck, a very fair

cloistered and quadrangular building. The gallery is prettily painted

with several huntings, and at one end a gordian knot, with rustical

instruments so artificially represented, as to deceive an accurate eye to

distinguish it from actual relievo. The ceiling of the staircase is

painted with the "Rape of Ganymede," and other pendant figures, the work

of F. Covenberg, of whose hand I bought an excellent drollery, which I

afterward parted with to my brother George of Wotton, where it now hangs.

To this palace join a fair garden and park, curiously planted with limes.

8th September, 1641. Returned to Rotterdam, through Delftshaven and

Sedan, where were at that time Colonel Goring's winter quarters. This

town has heretofore been very much talked of for witches.

10th September, 1641. I took a wagon for Dort, to be present at the

reception of the Queen-mother, Marie de Medicis, Dowager of France, widow

of Henry the Great, and mother to the French King, Louis XIII., and the

Queen of England, whence she newly arrived, tossed to and fro by the

various fortune of her life. From this city, she designed for Cologne,

conducted by the Earl of Arundel and the Herr Van Bredrod. At this

interview, I saw the Princess of Orange, and the lady her daughter,

afterward married to the House of Brandenburgh. There was little

remarkable in this reception befitting the greatness of her person; but

an universal discontent, which accompanied that unlucky woman wherever

she went.

12th September, 1641. I went toward Bois-le-Duc, where we arrived on the

16th, at the time when the new citadel was advancing, with innumerable

hands, and incomparable inventions for draining off the waters out of the

fens and morasses about it, being by buckets, mills, cochleas, pumps, and

the like; in which the Hollanders are the most expert in Europe. Here

were now sixteen companies and nine troops of horse. They were also

cutting a new river, to pass from the town to a castle not far from it.

Here we split our skiff, falling foul upon another through negligence of

the master, who was fain to run aground, to our no little hazard. At our

arrival, a soldier conveyed us to the Governor, where our names were

taken, and our persons examined very strictly.

17th September, 1641. I was permitted to walk the round and view the

works, and to visit a convent of religious women of the order of St.

Clara (who by the capitulation were allowed to enjoy their monastery and

maintenance undisturbed, at the surrender of the town twelve years

since), where we had a collation and very civil entertainment. They had a

neat chapel, in which the heart of the Duke of Cleves, their founder,

lies inhumed under a plate of brass. Within the cloister is a garden, and

in the middle of it an overgrown lime tree, out of whose stem, near the

root, issue five upright and exceeding tall suckers, or bolls, the like

whereof for evenness and height I had not observed.

The chief church of this city is curiously carved within and without,

furnished with a pair of organs, and a most magnificent font of copper.

18th September, 1641. I went to see that most impregnable town and fort

of Hysdune, where I was exceedingly obliged to one Colonel Crombe, the

lieutenant-governor, who would needs make me accept the honor of being

captain of the watch, and to give the word this night. The fortification

is very irregular, but esteemed one of the most considerable for strength

and situation in the Netherlands. We departed toward Gorcum. Here Sir

Kenelm Digby, traveling toward Cologne, met us.

The next morning, the 19th, we arrived at Dort, passing by the Decoys,

where they catch innumerable quantities of fowl.

[Sidenote: ROTTERDAM]

22d September, 1641. I went again to Rotterdam to receive a pass which I

expected from Brussels, securing me through Brabant and Flanders,

designing to go into England through those countries. The Cardinal

Infante, brother to the King of Spain, was then governor. By this pass,

having obtained another from the Prince of Orange, upon the 24th of

September I departed through Dort; but met with very bad tempestuous

weather, being several times driven back, and obliged to lie at anchor

off Keele, other vessels lying there waiting better weather. The 25th and

26th we made other essays; but were again repulsed to the harbor, where

lay sixty vessels waiting to sail. But, on the 27th, we, impatient of the

time and inhospitableness of the place, sailed again with a contrary and

impetuous wind and a terrible sea, in great jeopardy; for we had much

ado to keep ourselves above water, the billows breaking desperately on

our vessel: we were driven into Williamstadt, a place garrisoned by the

English, where the governor had a fair house. The works, and especially

the counterscarp, are curiously hedged with quick, and planted with a

stately row of limes on the rampart. The church is of a round structure,

with a cupola, and the town belongs entirely to the Prince of Orange, as

does that of Breda, and some other places.

28th September, 1641. Failing of an appointment, I was constrained to

return to Dort for a bill of exchange; but it was the 1st of October ere

I could get back. At Keele, I numbered 141 vessels, who durst not yet

venture out; but, animated by the master of a stout bark, after a small

encounter of weather, we arrived by four that evening at Steenbergen. In

the passage we sailed over a sea called the Plaats, an exceeding

dangerous water, by reason of two contrary tides which meet there very

impetuously. Here, because of the many shelves, we were forced to tide it

along the Channel; but, ere we could gain the place, the ebb was so far

spent, that we were compelled to foot it at least two long miles, through

a most pelting shower of rain.

2d October, 1641. With a gentleman of the Rhyngraves, I went in a cart,

or tumbrel (for it was no better; no other accommodation could be

procured), of two wheels and one horse, to Bergen-op-Zoom, meeting by the

way divers parties of his Highness's army now retiring toward their

winter quarters; the convoy skiffs riding by thousands along the harbor.

The fort was heretofore built by the English.

The next morning I embarked for Lillo, having refused a convoy of horse

which was offered me. The tide being against us, we landed short of the

fort on the beach, where we marched half leg deep in mud, ere we could

gain the dyke, which, being five or six miles from Lillo, we were forced

to walk on foot very wet and discomposed; and then entering a boat we

passed the ferry, and came to the castle. Being taken before the

Governor, he demanded my pass, to which he set his hand, and asked two

rix-dollars for a fee, which methought appeared very exorbitant in a

soldier of his quality. I told him that I had already purchased my pass

of the commissaries at Rotterdam; at which, in a great fury, snatching

the paper out of my hand, he flung it scornfully under the table, and

bade me try whether I could get to Antwerp without his permission: but I

had no sooner given him the dollars, then he returned the passport

surlily enough, and made me pay fourteen Dutch shillings to the cantone,

or searcher, for my contempt, which I was glad to do for fear of further

trouble, should he have discovered my Spanish pass, in which the States

were therein treated by the name of rebels. Besides all these exactions,

I gave the commissary six shillings, to the soldiers something, and, ere

perfectly clear of this frontier, thirty-one stivers to the man-of-war,

who lay blocking up the river between Lillo and the opposite sconce

called Lifkinshoeck.

[Sidenote: ANTWERP]

4th October, 1641. We sailed by several Spanish forts, out of one of

which, St. Mary's port, came a Don on board us, to whom I showed my

Spanish pass, which he signed, and civilly dismissed us. Hence, sailing

by another man-of-war, to which we lowered our topsails, we at length

arrived at Antwerp.

The lodgings here are very handsome and convenient. I lost little time;

but, with the aid of one Mr. Lewkner, our conductor, we visited divers

churches, colleges, and monasteries. The Church of the Jesuits is most

sumptuous and magnificent; a glorious fabric without and within, wholly

incrusted with marble, inlaid and polished into divers representations of

histories, landscapes, and flowers. On the high altar is placed the

statue of the Blessed Virgin and our Savior in white marble, with a boss

in the girdle set with very fair and rich sapphires, and divers other

stones of price. The choir is a glorious piece of architecture: the

pulpit supported by four angels, and adorned with other carvings, and

rare pictures by Rubens, now lately dead, and divers votive tables and

relics. Hence, to the Vroù Kirk, or Nôtre Dame of Antwerp: it is a very

venerable fabric, built after the Gothic manner, especially the tower,

which I ascended, the better to take a view of the country adjacent;

which, happening on a day when the sun shone exceedingly bright, and

darted his rays without any interruption, afforded so bright a reflection

to us who were above, and had a full prospect of both land and water

about it, that I was much confirmed in my opinion of the moon's being of

some such substance as this earthly globe: perceiving all the subjacent

country, at so small an horizontal distance, to repercuss such a light as

I could hardly look against, save where the river, and other large water

within our view, appeared of a more dark and uniform color; resembling

those spots in the moon supposed to be seas there, according to Hevelius,

and as they appear in our late telescopes. I numbered in this church

thirty privileged altars, that of St. Sebastian adorned with a painting

of his martyrdom.

We went to see the Jerusalem Church, affirmed to have been founded by one

who, upon divers great wagers, passed to and fro between that city and

Antwerp, on foot, by which he procured large sums of money, which he

bestowed on this pious structure.[13] Hence, to St. Mary's Chapel, where

I had some conference with two English Jesuits, confessors to Colonel

Jaye's regiment. These fathers conducted us to the Cloister of Nuns,

where we heard a Dutch sermon upon the exposure of the Host. The

Senate-house of this city is a very spacious and magnificent building.

[Footnote 13: This notice, slipped by accident into the entries

which refer to Antwerp, belongs to those of Bruges.]

5th October, 1641. I visited the Jesuits' School, which, for the fame of

their method, I greatly desired to see. They were divided into four

classes, with several inscriptions over each: as, first, _Ad majorem Dei

gloriam_; over the second, _Princeps diligentiæ_; the third, _Imperator

Byzantiorum_; over the fourth and uppermost, _Imperator Romanorum_. Under

these, the scholars and pupils and their places, or forms with titles and

priority according to their proficiency. Their dormitory and lodgings

above were exceedingly neat. They have a prison for the offenders and

less diligent; and, in an ample court, to recreate themselves in, is an

aviary, and a yard, where eagles, vultures, foxes, monkeys, and other

animals are kept, to divert the boys withal at their hours of remission.

To this school join the music and mathematical schools, and lastly a

pretty, neat chapel. The great street is built after the Italian mode, in

the middle whereof is erected a glorious crucifix of white and black

marble, greater than the life. This is a very fair and noble street,

clean, well paved, and sweet to admiration.

The Oesters house, belonging to the East India Company, is a stately

palace, adorned with more than 300 windows. From hence, walking into the

Gun-garden, I was allowed to see as much of the citadel as is permitted

to strangers. It is a matchless piece of modern fortification,

accommodated with lodgments for the soldiers and magazines. The graffs,

ramparts, and platforms are stupendous. Returning by the shop of

Plantine, I bought some books, for the namesake only of that famous

printer.

But there was nothing about this city which more ravished me than those

delicious shades and walks of stately trees, which render the fortified

works of the town one of the sweetest places in Europe; nor did I ever

observe a more quiet, clean, elegantly built and civil place, than this

magnificent and famous city of Antwerp. In the evening, I was invited to

Signor Duerte's, a Portuguese by nation, an exceeding rich merchant,

whose palace I found to be furnished like a prince's. His three daughters

entertained us with rare music, vocal and instrumental, which was

finished with a handsome collation. I took leave of the ladies and of

sweet Antwerp, as late as it was, embarking for Brussels on the Scheldt

in a vessel, which delivered us to a second boat (in another river) drawn

or towed by horses. In this passage, we frequently changed our barge, by

reason of the bridges thwarting our course. Here I observed numerous

families inhabiting their vessels and floating dwellings, so built and

divided by cabins, as few houses on land enjoyed better accommodation;

stored with all sorts of utensils, neat chambers, a pretty parlor, and

kept so sweet, that nothing could be more refreshing. The rivers on which

they are drawn are very clear and still waters, and pass through a most

pleasant country on both the banks. We had in our boat a very good

ordinary, and excellent company. The cut is straight as a line for twenty

English miles. What I much admired was, near the midway, another

artificial river, which intersects this at right angles, but on an

eminence of ground, and is carried in an aqueduct of stone so far above

the other as that the waters neither mingle, nor hinder one another's

passage.

We came to a town called Villefrow, where all the passengers went on

shore to wash at a fountain issuing out of a pillar, and then came

aboard again. On the margin of this long tract are abundance of shrines

and images, defended from the injuries of the weather by niches of stone

wherein they are placed.

[Sidenote: BRUSSELS]

7th October, 1641. We arrived at Brussels at nine in the morning. The

Stadt-house, near the market place, is, for the carving in freestone, a

most laborious and finished piece, well worthy observation. The

flesh-shambles are also built of stone. I was pleased with certain small

engines, by which a girl, or boy, was able to draw up, or let down, great

bridges, which in divers parts of this city crossed the channel for the

benefit of passengers. The walls of this town are very entire, and full

of towers at competent distances. The cathedral is built upon a very high

and exceeding steep ascent, to which we mounted by fair steps of stone.

Hence I walked to a convent of English Nuns, with whom I sat discoursing

most part of the afternoon.

8th October, 1641. Being the morning I came away, I went to see the

Prince's Court, an ancient, confused building, not much unlike the Hofft,

at the Hague: there is here likewise a very large hall, where they vend

all sorts of wares. Through this we passed by the chapel, which is indeed

rarely arched, and in the middle of it was the hearse, or catafalque, of

the late Archduchess, the wise and pious Clara Eugenia. Out of this we

were conducted to the lodgings, tapestried with incomparable arras, and

adorned with many excellent pieces of Rubens, old and young Breugel,

Titian, and Stenwick, with stories of most of the late actions in the

Netherlands.

By an accident we could not see the library. There is a fair terrace

which looks to the vineyard, in which, on pedestals, are fixed the

statues of all the Spanish kings of the house of Austria. The opposite

walls are painted by Rubens, being an history of the late tumults in

Belgia: in the last piece, the Archduchess shuts a great pair of gates

upon Mars, who is coming out of hell, armed, and in a menacing posture;

which, with that other of the Infanta taking leave of Don Philip IV., is

a most incomparable table.

From hence, we walked into the park, which for being entirely within the

walls of the city is particularly remarkable: nor is it less pleasant

than if in the most solitary recesses; so naturally is it furnished with

whatever may render it agreeable, melancholy, and country-like. Here is a

stately heronry, divers springs of water, artificial cascades, rocks,

grots; one whereof is composed of the extravagant roots of trees,

cunningly built and hung together with wires. In this park are both

fallow and red deer.

From hence, we were led into the Menage, and out of that into a most

sweet and delicious garden, where was another grot of more neat and

costly materials, full of noble statues, and entertaining us with

artificial music; but the hedge of water, in form of lattice-work, which

the fountaineer caused to ascend out of the earth by degrees, exceedingly

pleased and surprised me; for thus, with a pervious wall, or rather a

palisade hedge of water, was the whole parterre environed.

There is likewise a fair aviary; and in the court next it are kept divers

sorts of animals, rare and exotic fowl, as eagles, cranes, storks,

bustards, pheasants of several kinds, and a duck having four wings. In

another division of the same close are rabbits of an almost perfect

yellow color.

There was no Court now in the palace; the Infante Cardinal, who was the

Governor of Flanders, being dead but newly, and every one in deep

mourning.

At near eleven o'clock, I repaired to his Majesty's agent, Sir Henry de

Vic, who very courteously received me, and accommodated me with a coach

and six horses, which carried me from Brussels to Ghent, where it was to

meet my Lord of Arundel, Earl Marshal of England, who had requested me

when I was at Antwerp to send it for him, if I went not thither myself.

Thus taking leave of Brussels and a sad Court, yet full of gallant

persons (for in this small city, the acquaintance being universal, ladies

and gentlemen, I perceived had great diversions, and frequent meetings),

I hastened toward Ghent. On the way, I met with divers little wagons,

prettily contrived, and full of peddling merchandise, drawn by mastiff

dogs, harnessed completely like so many coach horses; in some four, in

others six, as in Brussels itself I had observed. In Antwerp I saw, as I

remember, four dogs draw five lusty children in a chariot: the master

commands them whither he pleases, crying his wares about the streets.

After passing through Ouse, by six in the evening, I arrived at Ghent.

This is a city of so great a circumference, that it is reported to be

seven leagues round; but there is not half of it now built, much of it

remaining in fields and desolate pastures even within the walls, which

have strong gates toward the west, and two fair churches.

Here I beheld the palace wherein John of Gaunt and Charles V. were born;

whose statue[14] stands in the market-place, upon a high pillar, with his

sword drawn, to which (as I was told) the magistrates and burghers were

wont to repair upon a certain day every year with ropes about their

necks, in token of submission and penance for an old rebellion of theirs;

but now the hemp is changed into a blue ribbon. Here is planted the

basilisco, or great gun, so much talked of. The Lys and the Scheldt

meeting in this vast city, divide it into twenty-six islands, which are

united by many bridges, somewhat resembling Venice. This night I supped

with the Abbot of Andoyne, a pleasant and courteous priest.

[Footnote 14: That of Charles V.]

8th October, 1641. I passed by a boat to Bruges, taking in at a redoubt a

convoy of fourteen musketeers, because the other side of the river, being

Contribution-land, was subject to the inroads and depredations of the

bordering States. This river was cut by the famous Marquis Spinola, and

is in my judgment a wonderful piece of labor, and a worthy public work,

being in some places forced through the main rock, to an incredible

depth, for thirty miles. At the end of each mile is built a small

redoubt, which communicates a line to the next, and so the whole way,

from whence we received many volleys of shot, in compliment to my Lord

Marshal, who was in our vessel, a passenger with us. At five that

evening, we were met by the magistrates of Bruges, who came out to convey

my Lord to his lodgings, at whose cost he was entertained that night.

The morning after we went to see the Stadt-house and adjoining aqueduct,

the church, and market-place, where we saw cheeses and butter piled up in

heaps; also the fortifications and graffs, which are extremely large.

The 9th, we arrived at Ostend by a straight and artificial river. Here,

with leave of the captain of the watch, I was carried to survey the

river and harbor, with fortifications on one side thereof: the east and

south are mud and earth walls. It is a very strong place, and lately

stood a memorable siege three years, three months, three weeks, and three

days. I went to see the church of St. Peter, and the cloisters of the

Franciscans.

10th October, 1641. I went by wagon, accompanied with a jovial

commissary, to Dunkirk, the journey being made all on the sea sands. On

our arrival, we first viewed the court of guards, the works, the

townhouse, and the new church; the latter is very beautiful within; and

another, wherein they showed us an excellent piece of "Our Savior's

Bearing the Cross." The harbor, in two channels, coming up to the town,

was choked with a multitude of prizes.

From hence, the next day, I marched three English miles toward the packet

boat, being a pretty frigate of six guns, which embarked us for England

about three in the afternoon.

[Sidenote: DOVER]

At our going off, the fort, against which our pinnace anchored saluted my

Lord Marshal with twelve great guns, which we answered with three. Not

having the wind favorable, we anchored that night before Calais. About

midnight, we weighed; and, at four in the morning, though not far from

Dover, we could not make the pier till four that afternoon, the wind

proving contrary and driving us westward: but at last we got on shore,

October the 12th.

From Dover, I that night rode post to Canterbury. Here I visited the

cathedral, then in great splendor; those famous windows being entire,

since demolished by the fanatics. The next morning by Sittingbourne, I

came to Rochester, and thence to Gravesend, where a light-horseman (as

they call it) taking us in, we spent our tide as far as Greenwich. From

hence, after we had a little refreshed ourselves at the College (for by

reason of contagion then in London we balked the inns), we came to

London, landing at Arundel stairs. Here I took leave of his Lordship, and

retired to my lodgings in the Middle Temple, being about two in the

morning, the 14th of October.

16th October, 1641. I went to see my brother at Wotton. On the 31st of

that month (unfortunate for the Irish Rebellion, which broke out on the

23d), I was one and twenty years of age.

7th November, 1641. After receiving the Sacrament at Wotton church, I

visited my Lord Marshal at Albury.

23d November, 1641. I returned to London; and, on the 25th, saw his

Majesty ride through the City after his coming out of Scotland, and a

Peace proclaimed, with great acclamations and joy of the giddy people.

15th December, 1641. I was elected one of the Comptrollers of the Middle

Temple revellers, as the fashion of the young students and gentlemen was,

the Christmas being kept this year with great solemnity; but, being

desirous to pass it in the country, I got leave to resign my staff of

office, and went with my brother Richard to Wotton.

10th January, 1642. I gave a visit to my cousin Hatton, of Ditton.

19th January, 1642. I went to London, where I stayed till 5th of March,

studying a little, but dancing and fooling more.

3d October, 1642. To Chichester, and hence the next day to see the siege

of Portsmouth; for now was that bloody difference between the King and

Parliament broken out, which ended in the fatal tragedy so many years

after. It was on the day of its being rendered to Sir William Waller;

which gave me an opportunity of taking my leave of Colonel Goring, the

governor, now embarking for France. This day was fought that signal

battle at Edgehill. Thence I went to Southampton and Winchester, where I

visited the castle, school, church, and King Arthur's Round Table; but

especially the church, and its Saxon kings' monuments, which I esteemed a

worthy antiquity.

The 12th of November was the battle of Brentford, surprisingly fought;

and to the great consternation of the City, had his Majesty (as it was

believed he would) pursued his advantage. I came in with my horse and

arms just at the retreat; but was not permitted to stay longer than the

15th, by reason of the army marching to Gloucester; which would have left

both me and my brothers exposed to ruin, without any advantage to his

Majesty.

[Sidenote: LONDON]

7th December, 1642. I went from Wotton to London, to see the so much

celebrated line of communication, and on the 10th returned to Wotton,

nobody knowing of my having been in his Majesty's army.

10th March, 1643. I went to Hartingford-berry to visit my cousin,

Keightly.

11th March, 1643. I went to see my Lord of Salisbury's Palace at

Hatfield, where the most considerable rarity, besides the house (inferior

to few then in England for its architecture), were the garden and

vineyard, rarely well watered and planted. They also showed us the

picture of Secretary Cecil, in Mosaic work, very well done by some

Italian hand.

I must not forget what amazed us exceedingly in the night before, namely,

a shining cloud in the air, in shape resembling a sword, the point

reaching to the north; it was as bright as the moon, the rest of the sky

being very serene. It began about eleven at night, and vanished not till

above one, being seen by all the south of England. I made many journeys

to and from London.

15th April, 1643. To Hatfield, and near the town of Hertford I went to

see Sir J. Harrison's house new built. Returning to London, I called to

see his Majesty's house and gardens at Theobald's, since demolished by

the rebels.

2d May, 1643. I went from Wotton to London, where I saw the furious and

zealous people demolish that stately Cross in Cheapside.