Book: Diary of Samuel Pepys, March/April 1662/63
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Samuel Pepys >> Diary of Samuel Pepys, March/April 1662/63
23rd. St. George's day and Coronacion, the King and Court being at
Windsor, at the installing of the King of Denmark by proxy and the Duke of
Monmouth. I up betimes, and with my father, having a fire made in my
wife's new closet above, it being a wet and cold day, we sat there all the
morning looking over his country accounts ever since his going into the
country. I find his spending hitherto has been (without extraordinary
charges) at full L100 per annum, which troubles me, and I did let him
apprehend it, so as that the poor man wept, though he did make it well
appear to me that he could not have saved a farthing of it. I did tell him
how things stand with us, and did shew my distrust of Pall, both for her
good nature and housewifery, which he was sorry for, telling me that
indeed she carries herself very well and carefully, which I am glad to
hear, though I doubt it was but his doting and not being able to find her
miscarriages so well nowadays as he could heretofore have done. We
resolve upon sending for Will Stankes up to town to give us a right
understanding in all that we have in Brampton, and before my father goes
to settle every thing so as to resolve how to find a living for my father
and to pay debts and legacies, and also to understand truly how Tom's
condition is in the world, that we may know what we are like to expect of
his doing ill or well. So to dinner, and after dinner to the office,
where some of us met and did a little business, and so to Sir W. Batten's
to see a little picture drawing of his by a Dutchman which is very well
done. So to my office and put a few things in order, and so home to spend
the evening with my father. At cards till late, and being at supper, my
boy being sent for some mustard to a neat's tongue, the rogue staid half
an hour in the streets, it seems at a bonfire, at which I was very angry,
and resolve to beat him to-morrow.
24th. Up betimes, and with my salt eel
[A salt eel is a rope's end cut from the piece to be used on the
back of a culprit. "Yeow shall have salt eel for supper" is an
emphatic threat.]
went down in the parler and there got my boy and did beat him till I was
fain to take breath two or three times, yet for all I am afeard it will
make the boy never the better, he is grown so hardened in his tricks,
which I am sorry for, he being capable of making a brave man, and is a boy
that I and my wife love very well. So made me ready, and to my office,
where all the morning, and at noon home, whither came Captain Holland, who
is lately come home from sea, and has been much harassed in law about the
ship which he has bought, so that it seems in a despair he endeavoured to
cut his own throat, but is recovered it; and it seems whether by that or
any other persuasion (his wife's mother being a great zealot) he is turned
almost a Quaker, his discourse being nothing but holy, and that
impertinent, that I was weary of him. At last pretending to go to the
Change we walked thither together, and there I left him and home to
dinner, sending my boy by the way to enquire after two dancing masters at
our end of the town for my wife to learn, of whose names the boy brought
word. After dinner all the afternoon fiddling upon my viallin (which I
have not done many a day) while Ashwell danced above in my upper best
chamber, which is a rare room for musique, expecting this afternoon my
wife to bring my cozen Scott and Stradwick, but they came not, and so in
the evening we by ourselves to Half-way house to walk, but did not go in
there, but only a walk and so home again and to supper, my father with us,
and had a good lobster intended for part of our entertainment to these
people to-day, and so to cards, and then to bed, being the first day that
I have spent so much to my pleasure a great while.
25th. Up betimes and to my vyall and song book a pretty while, and so to
my office, and there we sat all the morning. Among other things Sir W.
Batten had a mind to cause Butler (our chief witness in the business of
Field, whom we did force back from an employment going to sea to come back
to attend our law sute) to be borne as a mate on the Rainbow in the Downes
in compensation for his loss for our sakes. This he orders an order to be
drawn by Mr. Turner for, and after Sir J. Minnes, Sir W. Batten, and Sir
W. Pen had signed it, it came to me and I was going to put it up into my
book, thinking to consider of it and give them my opinion upon it before I
parted with it, but Sir W. Pen told me I must sign it or give it him
again, for it should not go without my hand. I told him what I meant to
do, whereupon Sir W. Batten was very angry, and in a great heat (which
will bring out any thing which he has in his mind, and I am glad of it,
though it is base in him to have a thing so long in his mind without
speaking of it, though I am glad this is the worst, for if he had worse it
would out as well as this some time or other) told me that I should not
think as I have heretofore done, make them sign orders and not sign them
myself. Which what ignorance or worse it implies is easy to judge, when
he shall sign to things (and the rest of the board too as appears in this
business) for company and not out of their judgment for. After some
discourse I did convince them that it was not fit to have it go, and Sir
W. Batten first, and then the rest, did willingly cancel all their hands
and tear the order, for I told them, Butler being such a rogue as I know
him, and we have all signed him to be to the Duke, it will be in his power
to publish this to our great reproach, that we should take such a course
as this to serve ourselves in wronging the King by putting him into a
place he is no wise capable of, and that in an Admiral ship. At noon we
rose, Sir W. Batten ashamed and vexed, and so home to dinner, and after
dinner walked to the old Exchange and so all along to Westminster Hall,
White Hall, my Lord Sandwich's lodgings, and going by water back to the
Temple did pay my debts in several places in order to my examining my
accounts tomorrow to my great content. So in the evening home, and after
supper (my father at my brother's) and merrily practising to dance, which
my wife hath begun to learn this day of Mr. Pembleton,
[Pembleton, the dancing-master, made Pepys very jealous, and there
are many allusions to him in the following pages. His lessons
ceased on May 27th.]
but I fear will hardly do any great good at it, because she is conceited
that she do well already, though I think no such thing. So to bed. At
Westminster Hall, this day, I buy a book lately printed and licensed by
Dr. Stradling, the Bishop of London's chaplin, being a book discovering
the practices and designs of the papists, and the fears of some of our own
fathers of the Protestant church heretofore of the return to Popery as it
were prefacing it.
The book is a very good book; but forasmuch as it touches one of the
Queenmother's fathers confessors, the Bishop, which troubles many good men
and members of Parliament, hath called it in, which I am sorry for.
Another book I bought, being a collection of many expressions of the great
Presbyterian Preachers upon publique occasions, in the late times, against
the King and his party, as some of Mr. Marshall, Case, Calamy, Baxter,
&c., which is good reading now, to see what they then did teach, and the
people believe, and what they would seem to believe now. Lastly, I did
hear that the Queen is much grieved of late at the King's neglecting her,
he having not supped once with her this quarter of a year, and almost
every night with my Lady Castlemaine; who hath been with him this St.
George's feast at Windsor, and came home with him last night; and, which
is more, they say is removed as to her bed from her own home to a chamber
in White Hall, next to the King's own; which I am sorry to hear, though I
love her much.
26th (Lord's-day). Lay pretty long in bed talking with my wife, and then
up and set to the making up of my monthly accounts, but Tom coming, with
whom I was angry for botching my camlott coat, to tell me that my father
and he would dine with me, and that my father was at our church, I got me
ready and had a very good sermon of a country minister upon "How blessed a
thing it is for brethren to live together in unity!" So home and all to
dinner, and then would have gone by coach to have seen my Lord Sandwich at
Chelsey if the man would have taken us, but he denying it we staid at
home, and I all the afternoon upon my accounts, and find myself worth full
L700, for which I bless God, it being the most I was ever yet worth in
money. In the evening (my father being gone to my brother's to lie
to-night) my wife, Ashwell, and the boy and I, and the dogg, over the
water and walked to Half-way house, and beyond into the fields, gathering
of cowslipps, and so to Half-way house, with some cold lamb we carried
with us, and there supped, and had a most pleasant walk back again,
Ashwell all along telling us some parts of their mask at Chelsey School,
which was very pretty, and I find she hath a most prodigious memory,
remembering so much of things acted six or seven years ago. So home, and
after reading my vows, being sleepy, without prayers to bed, for which God
forgive me!
27th. Up betimes and to my office, where doing business alone a good
while till people came about business to me. Will Griffin tells me this
morning that Captain Browne, Sir W. Batten's brother-in-law, is dead of a
blow given him two days ago by a seaman, a servant of his, being drunk,
with a stone striking him on the forehead, for which I am sorry, he having
a good woman and several small children. At the office all the morning,
at noon dined at home with my wife, merry, and after dinner by water to
White Hall; but found the Duke of York gone to St. James's for this
summer; and thence with Mr. Coventry, to whose chamber I went, and Sir W.
Pen up to the Duke's closett. And a good while with him about our Navy
business; and so I to White Hall, and there alone a while with my Lord
Sandwich discoursing about his debt to the Navy, wherein he hath given me
some things to resolve him in. Thence to my Lord's lodging, and thither
came Creed to me, and he and I walked a great while in the garden, and
thence to an alehouse in the market place to drink fine Lambeth ale, and
so to Westminster Hall, and after walking there a great while, home by
coach, where I found Mary gone from my wife, she being too high for her,
though a very good servant, and my boy too will be going in a few days,
for he is not for my family, he is grown so out of order and not to be
ruled, and do himself, against his brother's counsel, desire to be gone,
which I am sorry for, because I love the boy and would be glad to bring
him to good. At home with my wife and Ashwell talking of her going into
the country this year, wherein we had like to have fallen out, she
thinking that I have a design to have her go, which I have not, and to let
her stay here I perceive will not be convenient, for she expects more
pleasure than I can give her here, and I fear I have done very ill in
letting her begin to learn to dance. The Queen (which I did not know) it
seems was at Windsor, at the late St. George's feast there; and the Duke
of Monmouth dancing with her with his hat in his hand, the King came in
and kissed him, and made him put on his hat, which every body took notice
of. After being a while at my office home to supper and to bed, my Will
being come home again after being at his father's all the last week taking
physique.
28th. Up betimes and to my office, and there all the morning, only
stepped up to see my wife and her dancing master at it, and I think after
all she will do pretty well at it. So to dinner, Mr. Hunt dining with us,
and so to the office, where we sat late, and then I to my office casting
up my Lord's sea accounts over again, and putting them in order for
payment, and so home to supper and to bed.
29th. Up betimes, and after having at my office settled some accounts for
my Lord Sandwich, I went forth, and taking up my father at my brother's,
took coach and towards Chelsey, 'lighting at an alehouse near the
Gatehouse at Westminster to drink our morning draught, and so up again and
to Chelsey, where we found my Lord all alone at a little table with one
joynt of meat at dinner; we sat down and very merry talking, and mightily
extolling the manner of his retirement, and the goodness of his diet,
which indeed is so finely dressed: the mistress of the house, Mrs. Becke,
having been a woman of good condition heretofore, a merchant's wife, and
hath all things most excellently dressed; among others, her cakes
admirable, and so good that my Lord's words were, they were fit to present
to my Lady Castlemaine. From ordinary discourse my Lord fell to talk of
other matters to me, of which chiefly the second part of the fray, which
he told me a little while since of, between Mr. Edward Montagu and
himself, which is that after that he had since been with him three times
and no notice taken at all of any difference between them, and yet since
that he hath forborn coming to him almost two months, and do speak not
only slightly of my Lord every where, but hath complained to my Lord
Chancellor of him, and arrogated all that ever my Lord hath done to be
only by his direction and persuasion. Whether he hath done the like to
the King or no, my Lord knows not; but my Lord hath been with the King
since, and finds all things fair; and my Lord Chancellor hath told him of
it, but with so much contempt of Mr. Montagu, as my Lord knows himself
very secure against any thing the fool can do; and notwithstanding all
this, so noble is his nature, that he professes himself ready to show
kindness and pity to Mr. Montagu on any occasion. My Lord told me of his
presenting Sir H. Bennet with a gold cupp of L100, which he refuses, with
a compliment; but my Lord would have been glad he had taken it, that he
might have had some obligations upon him which he thinks possible the
other may refuse to prevent it; not that he hath any reason to doubt his
kindness. But I perceive great differences there are at Court; and Sir H.
Bennet and my Lord Bristol, and their faction, are likely to carry all
things before them (which my Lord's judgment is, will not be for the
best), and particularly against the Chancellor, who, he tells me, is
irrecoverably lost: but, however, that he will not actually joyne in
anything against the Chancellor, whom he do own to be his most sure
friend, and to have been his greatest; and therefore will not openly act
in either, but passively carry himself even. The Queen, my Lord tells me,
he thinks he hath incurred some displeasure with, for his kindness to his
neighbour, my Lady Castlemaine. My Lord tells me he hath no reason to
fall for her sake, whose wit, management, nor interest, is not likely to
hold up any man, and therefore he thinks it not his obligation to stand
for her against his own interest. The Duke and Mr. Coventry my Lord says
he is very well with, and fears not but they will show themselves his very
good friends, specially at this time, he being able to serve them, and
they needing him, which he did not tell me wherein. Talking of the
business of Tangier, he tells me that my Lord Tiviott is gone away without
the least respect paid to him, nor indeed to any man, but without his
commission; and (if it be true what he says) having laid out seven or
eight thousand pounds in commodities for the place; and besides having not
only disobliged all the Commissioners for Tangier, but also Sir Charles
Barkeley the other day, who, speaking in behalf of Colonel Fitz-Gerald,
that having been deputy-governor there already, he ought to have expected
and had the governorship upon the death or removal of the former governor.
And whereas it is said that he and his men are Irish, which is indeed the
main thing that hath moved the King and Council to put in Tiviott to
prevent the Irish having too great and the whole command there under
Fitz-Gerald; he further said that there was never an Englishman fit to
command Tangier; my Lord Tiviott answered yes, that there were many more
fit than himself or Fitz-Gerald either. So that Fitz-Gerald being so great
with the Duke of York, and being already made deputy-governor, independent
of my Lord Tiviott, and he being also left here behind him for a while, my
Lord Sandwich do think that, putting all these things together, the few
friends he hath left, and the ill posture of his affairs, my Lord Tiviott
is not a man of the conduct and management that either people take him to
be, or is fit for the command of the place. And here, speaking of the
Duke of York and Sir Charles Barkeley, my Lord tells me that he do very
much admire the good management, and discretion, and nobleness of the
Duke, that whatever he may be led by him or Mr. Coventry singly in
private, yet he did not observe that in publique matters, but he did give
as ready hearing and as good acceptance to any reasons offered by any
other man against the opinions of them, as he did to them, and would
concur in the prosecution of it. Then we came to discourse upon his own
sea accompts, and came to a resolution what and how to proceed in them;
wherein he resolved, though I offered him a way of evading the greatest
part of his debt honestly, by making himself debtor to the Parliament,
before the King's time, which he might justly do, yet he resolved to go
openly and nakedly in it, and put himself to the kindness of the King and
Duke, which humour, I must confess, and so did tell him (with which he was
not a little pleased) had thriven very well with him, being known to be a
man of candid and open dealing, without any private tricks or hidden
designs as other men commonly have in what they do. From that we had
discourse of Sir G. Carteret, who he finds kind to him, but it may be a
little envious, and most other men are, and of many others; and upon the
whole do find that it is a troublesome thing for a man of any condition at
Court to carry himself even, and without contracting enemys or envyers;
and that much discretion and dissimulation is necessary to do it. My
father staid a good while at the window and then sat down by himself while
my Lord and I were thus an hour together or two after dinner discoursing,
and by and by he took his leave, and told me he would stay below for me.
Anon I took leave, and coming down found my father unexpectedly in great
pain and desiring for God's sake to get him a bed to lie upon, which I
did, and W. Howe and I staid by him, in so great pain as I never saw, poor
wretch, and with that patience, crying only: Terrible, terrible pain, God
help me, God help me, with the mournful voice, that made my heart ake. He
desired to rest a little alone to see whether it would abate, and W. Howe
and I went down and walked in the gardens, which are very fine, and a
pretty fountayne, with which I was finely wetted, and up to a banquetting
house, with a very fine prospect, and so back to my father, who I found in
such pain that I could not bear the sight of it without weeping, never
thinking that I should be able to get him from thence, but at last,
finding it like to continue, I got him to go to the coach, with great
pain, and driving hard, he all the while in a most unsufferable torment
(meeting in the way with Captain Ferrers going to my Lord, to tell him
that my Lady Jemimah is come to town, and that Will Stankes is come with
my father's horses), not staying the coach to speak with any body, but
once, in St. Paul's Churchyard, we were forced to stay, the jogging and
pain making my father vomit, which it never had done before. At last we
got home, and all helping him we got him to bed presently, and after half
an hour's lying in his naked bed (it being a rupture [with] which he is
troubled, and has been this 20 years, but never in half the pain and with
so great swelling as now, and how this came but by drinking of cold small
beer and sitting long upon a low stool and then standing long after it he
cannot tell) . . . . After which he was at good ease, and so continued,
and so fell to sleep, and we went down whither W. Stankes was come with
his horses. But it is very pleasant to hear how he rails at the rumbling
and ado that is in London over it is in the country, that he cannot endure
it. He supped with us, and very merry, and then he to his lodgings at the
Inne with the horses, and so we to bed, I to my father who is very well
again, and both slept very well.
30th. Up, and after drinking my morning draft with my father and W.
Stankes, I went forth to Sir W. Batten, who is going (to no purpose as he
uses to do) to Chatham upon a survey. So to my office, where till towards
noon, and then to the Exchange, and back home to dinner, where Mrs. Hunt,
my father, and W. Stankes; but, Lord! what a stir Stankes makes with his
being crowded in the streets and wearied in walking in London, and would
not be wooed by my wife and Ashwell to go to a play, nor to White Hall, or
to see the lyons,
[The Tower menagerie, with its famous lions, which was one of the
chief sights of London, and gave rise to a new English word, was not
abolished until the early part of the present century.]
though he was carried in a coach. I never could have thought there had
been upon earth a man so little curious in the world as he is. At the
office all the afternoon till 9 at night, so home to cards with my father,
wife, and Ashwell, and so to bed.
ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:
Academy was dissolved by order of the Pope
After some pleasant talk, my wife, Ashwell, and I to bed
And so to bed, my father lying with me in Ashwell's bed
Dare not oppose it alone for making an enemy and do no good
Dinner was great, and most neatly dressed
Dog attending us, which made us all merry again
Galileo's air thermometer, made before 1597
I do not find other people so willing to do business as myself
I was very angry, and resolve to beat him to-morrow
Insurrection of the Catholiques there
Justice of proceeding not to condemn a man unheard
Matters in Ireland are full of discontent
My maid Susan ill, or would be thought so
Parliament do agree to throw down Popery
Railed bitterly ever and anon against John Calvin
She is conceited that she do well already
So home to supper and bed with my father
That he is not able to live almost with her
That I might say I saw no money in the paper
There is no man almost in the City cares a turd for him
Though it be but little, yet I do get ground every month