Diary of Samuel Pepys, 1669 N.S. Complete

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2nd. Up, and to the office, where all the morning, and home to dinner at
noon, where I find Mr. Sheres; and there made a short dinner, and carried
him with us to the King's playhouse, where "The Heyresse,"
not-withstanding Kinaston's being beaten, is acted; and they say the King
is very angry with Sir Charles Sedley for his being beaten, but he do deny
it. But his part is done by Beeston, who is fain to read it out of a book
all the while, and thereby spoils the part, and almost the play, it being
one of the best parts in it; and though the design is, in the first
conception of it, pretty good, yet it is but an indifferent play, wrote,
they say, by my Lord Newcastle. But it was pleasant to see Beeston come
in with others, supposing it to be dark, and yet he is forced to read his
part by the light of the candles: and this I observing to a gentleman that
sat by me, he was mightily pleased therewith, and spread it up and down.
But that, that pleased me most in the play is, the first song that Knepp
sings, she singing three or four; and, indeed, it was very finely sung, so
as to make the whole house clap her. Thence carried Sheres to White Hall,
and there I stepped in, and looked out Mr. May, who tells me that he and
his company cannot come to dine with me to-morrow, whom I expected only to
come to see the manner of our Office and books, at which I was not very
much displeased, having much business at the Office, and so away home, and
there to the office about my letters, and then home to supper and to bed,
my wife being in mighty ill humour all night, and in the morning I found
it to be from her observing Knepp to wink and smile on me; and she says I
smiled on her; and, poor wretch! I did perceive that she did, and do on
all such occasions, mind my eyes. I did, with much difficulty, pacify her,
and were friends, she desiring that hereafter, at that house, we might
always sit either above in a box, or, if there be [no] room, close up to
the lower boxes.

3rd. So up, and to the Office till noon, and then home to a little
dinner, and thither again till night, mighty busy, to my great content,
doing a great deal of business, and so home to supper, and to bed; I
finding this day that I may be able to do a great deal of business by
dictating, if I do not read myself, or write, without spoiling my eyes, I
being very well in my eyes after a great day's work.

4th. Up, and at the office all the morning. At noon home with my people
to dinner, and then after dinner comes Mr. Spong to see me, and brings me
my Parallelogram, in better order than before, and two or three draughts
of the port of Brest, to my great content, and I did call Mr. Gibson to
take notice of it, who is very much pleased therewith; and it seems this
Parallelogram is not, as Mr. Sheres would, the other day, have persuaded
me, the same as a Protractor, which do so much the more make me value it,
but of itself it is a most usefull instrument. Thence out with my wife
and him, and carried him to an instrument-maker's shop in Chancery Lane,
that was once a 'Prentice of Greatorex's, but the master was not within,
and there he [Gibson] shewed me a Parallelogram in brass, which I like so
well that I will buy, and therefore bid it be made clean and fit for me.
And so to my cozen Turner's, and there just spoke with The., the mother
not being at home; and so to the New Exchange, and thence home to my
letters; and so home to supper and to bed. This morning I made a slip
from the Office to White Hall, expecting Povy's business at a Committee of
Tangier, at which I would be, but it did not meet, and so I presently
back.

5th. Up betimes, by coach to Sir W. Coventry's, and with him by coach to
White Hall, and there walked in the garden talking of several things, and
by my visit to keep fresh my interest in him; and there he tells me how it
hath been talked that he was to go one of the Commissioners to Ireland,
which he was resolved never to do, unless directly commanded; for he told
me that for to go thither, while the Chief Secretary of State was his
professed enemy, was to undo himself; and, therefore, it were better for
him to venture being unhappy here, than to go further off, to be undone by
some obscure instructions, or whatever other way of mischief his enemies
should cut out for him. He mighty kind to me, and so parted, and thence
home, calling in two or three places--among others, Dancre's, where I find
him beginning of a piece for me, of Greenwich, which will please me well,
and so home to dinner, and very busy all the afternoon, and so at night
home to supper, and to bed.

6th. Up, and to the office, where all the morning, and thence after
dinner to the King's playhouse, and there,--in an upper box, where come in
Colonel Poynton and Doll Stacey, who is very fine, and, by her
wedding-ring, I suppose he hath married her at last,--did see "The Moor of
Venice:" but ill acted in most parts; Mohun, which did a little surprise
me, not acting Iago's part by much so well as Clun used to do; nor another
Hart's, which was Cassio's; nor, indeed, Burt doing the Moor's so well as
I once thought he did. Thence home, and just at Holborn Conduit the bolt
broke, that holds the fore-wheels to the perch, and so the horses went
away with them, and left the coachman and us; but being near our
coachmaker's, and we staying in a little ironmonger's shop, we were
presently supplied with another, and so home, and there to my letters at
the office, and so to supper and to bed.

7th (Lord's day). My wife mighty peevish in the morning about my lying
unquietly a-nights, and she will have it that it is a late practice, from
my evil thoughts in my dreams, . . . and mightily she is troubled
about it; but all blew over, and I up, and to church, and so home to
dinner, where she in a worse fit, which lasted all the afternoon, and
shut herself up, in her closet, and I mightily grieved and vexed, and
could not get her to tell me what ayled her, or to let me into her
closet, but at last she did, where I found her crying on the ground,
and I could not please her; but I did at last find that she did plainly
expound it to me. It was, that she did believe me false to her with
Jane, and did rip up three or four silly circumstances of her not rising
till I come out of my chamber, and her letting me thereby see her
dressing herself; and that I must needs go into her chamber and was
naught with her; which was so silly, and so far from truth, that I could
not be troubled at it, though I could not wonder at her being troubled,
if she had these thoughts, and therefore she would lie from me, and
caused sheets to be put on in the blue room, and would have Jane to lie
with her lest I should come to her. At last, I did give her such
satisfaction, that we were mighty good friends, and went to bed betimes
. . . . .

8th. Up, and dressed myself; and by coach, with W. Hewer and my wife, to
White Hall, where she set us two down; and in the way, our little boy, at
Martin, my bookseller's shop, going to 'light, did fall down; and, had he
not been a most nimble boy (I saw how he did it, and was mightily pleased
with him for it), he had been run over by the coach. I to visit my Lord
Sandwich; and there, while my Lord was dressing himself, did see a young
Spaniard, that he hath brought over with him, dance, which he is admired
for, as the best dancer in Spain, and indeed he do with mighty mastery;
but I do not like his dancing as the English, though my Lord commends it
mightily: but I will have him to my house, and show it my wife. Here I
met with Mr. Moore, who tells me the state of my Lord's accounts of his
embassy, which I find not so good as I thought: for, though it be passed
the King and his Cabal (the Committee for Foreign Affairs as they are
called), yet they have cut off from L9000 full L8000, and have now sent it
to the Lords of the Treasury, who, though the Committee have allowed the
rest, yet they are not obliged to abide by it. So that I do fear this
account may yet be long ere it be passed--much more, ere that sum be paid:
I am sorry for the family, and not a little for what it owes me. So to my
wife, took her up at Unthank's, and in our way home did shew her the tall
woman in Holborne, which I have seen before; and I measured her, and she
is, without shoes, just six feet five inches high, and they say not above
twenty-one years old. Thence home, and there to dinner, and my wife in a
wonderful ill humour; and, after dinner, I staid with her alone, being not
able to endure this life, and fell to some angry words together; but by
and by were mighty good friends, she telling me plain it was still about
Jane, whom she cannot believe but I am base with, which I made a matter of
mirth at; but at last did call up Jane, and confirm her mistress's
directions for her being gone at Easter, which I find the wench willing to
be, but directly prayed that Tom might go with her, which I promised, and
was but what I designed; and she being thus spoke with, and gone, my wife
and I good friends, and mighty kind, I having promised, and I will perform
it, never to give her for the time to come ground of new trouble; and so I
to the Office, with a very light heart, and there close at my business all
the afternoon. This day I was told by Mr. Wren, that Captain Cox,
Master-Attendant at Deptford, is to be one of us very soon, he and Tippets
being to take their turns for Chatham and Portsmouth, which choice I like
well enough; and Captain Annesley is to come in his room at Deptford.
This morning also, going to visit Roger Pepys, at the potticary's in
King's Street, he tells me that Roger is gone to his wife's, so that they
have been married, as he tells me, ever since the middle of last week: it
was his design, upon good reasons, to make no noise of it; but I am well
enough contented that it is over. Dispatched a great deal of business at
the office, and there pretty late, till finding myself very full of wind,
by my eating no dinner to-day, being vexed, I was forced to go home, and
there supped W. Batelier with us, and so with great content to bed.

9th. Up, and all the morning busy at the office, and after dinner abroad
with my wife to the King's playhouse, and there saw "The Island
Princesse," which I like mighty well, as an excellent play: and here we
find Kinaston to be well enough to act again, which he do very well, after
his beating by Sir Charles Sedley's appointment; and so thence home, and
there to my business at the Office, and after my letters done, then home
to supper and to bed, my mind being mightily eased by my having this
morning delivered to the Office a letter of advice about our answers to
the Commissioners of Accounts, whom we have neglected, and I have done
this as a record in my justification hereafter, when it shall come to be
examined.

10th. Up, and with my wife and W. Hewer, she set us down at White Hall,
where the Duke of York was gone a-hunting: and so, after I had done a
little business there, I to my wife, and with her to the plaisterer's at
Charing Cross, that casts heads and bodies in plaister: and there I had my
whole face done; but I was vexed first to be forced to daub all my face
over with pomatum: but it was pretty to feel how soft and easily it is
done on the face, and by and by, by degrees, how hard it becomes, that you
cannot break it, and sits so close, that you cannot pull it off, and yet
so easy, that it is as soft as a pillow, so safe is everything where many
parts of the body do bear alike. Thus was the mould made; but when it
came off there was little pleasure in it, as it looks in the mould, nor
any resemblance whatever there will be in the figure, when I come to see
it cast off, which I am to call for a day or two hence, which I shall long
to see. Thence to Hercules Pillars, and there my wife and W. Hewer and I
dined, and back to White Hall, where I staid till the Duke of York come
from hunting, which he did by and by, and, when dressed, did come out to
dinner; and there I waited: and he did tell me that to-morrow was to be
the great day that the business of the Navy would be dis coursed of before
the King and his Caball, and that he must stand on his guard, and did
design to have had me in readiness by, but that upon second thoughts did
think it better to let it alone, but they are now upon entering into the
economical part of the Navy. Here he dined, and did mightily magnify his
sauce, which he did then eat with every thing, and said it was the best
universal sauce in the world, it being taught him by the Spanish
Embassador; made of some parsley and a dry toast, beat in a mortar,
together with vinegar, salt, and a little pepper: he eats it with flesh,
or fowl, or fish: and then he did now mightily commend some new sort of
wine lately found out, called Navarre wine, which I tasted, and is, I
think, good wine: but I did like better the notion of the sauce, and by
and by did taste it, and liked it mightily. After dinner, I did what I
went for, which was to get his consent that Balty might hold his
Muster-Master's place by deputy, in his new employment which I design for
him, about the Storekeeper's accounts; which the Duke of York did grant
me, and I was mighty glad of it. Thence home, and there I find Povy and
W. Batelier, by appointment, met to talk of some merchandize of wine and
linnen; but I do not like of their troubling my house to meet in, having
no mind to their pretences of having their rendezvous here, but, however,
I was not much troubled, but went to the office, and there very busy, and
did much business till late at night, and so home to supper, and with
great pleasure to bed. This day, at dinner, I sent to Mr. Spong to come
to me to Hercules Pillars, who come to us, and there did bring with him my
new Parallelogram of brass, which I was mightily pleased with, and paid
for it 25s., and am mightily pleased with his ingenious and modest
company.

11th. Up, and to the office, where sat all the morning, and at noon home
and heard that the last night Colonel Middleton's wife died, a woman I
never saw since she come hither, having never been within their house
since. Home at noon to dinner, and thence to work all the afternoon with
great pleasure, and did bring my business to a very little compass in my
day book, which is a mighty pleasure, and so home to supper and get my
wife to read to me, and then to bed.

12th. Up, and my wife with me to White Hall, and Tom, and there she sets
us down, and there to wait on the Duke of York, with the rest of us, at
the Robes, where the Duke of York did tell us that the King would have us
prepare a draught of the present administration of the Navy, and what it
was in the late times, in order to his being able to distinguish between
the good and the bad, which I shall do, but to do it well will give me a
great deal of trouble. Here we shewed him Sir J. Minnes's propositions
about balancing Storekeeper's accounts; and I did shew him Hosier's, which
did please him mightily, and he will have it shewed the Council and King
anon, to be put in practice. Thence to the Treasurer's; and I and Sir J.
Minnes and Mr. Tippets down to the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury,
and there had a hot debate from Sir Thomas Clifford and my Lord Ashly (the
latter of which, I hear, is turning about as fast as he can to the Duke of
Buckingham's side, being in danger, it seems, of being otherwise out of
play, which would not be convenient for him), against Sir W. Coventry and
Sir J. Duncomb, who did uphold our Office against an accusation of our
Treasurers, who told the Lords that they found that we had run the King in
debt L50,000 or more, more than the money appointed for the year would
defray, which they declared like fools, and with design to hurt us, though
the thing is in itself ridiculous. But my Lord Ashly and Clifford did
most horribly cry out against the want of method in the Office. At last
it come that it should be put in writing what they had to object; but I
was devilish mad at it, to see us thus wounded by our own members, and so
away vexed, and called my wife, and to Hercules Pillars, Tom and I, there
dined; and here there coming a Frenchman by with his Shew, we did make him
shew it us, which he did just as Lacy acts it, which made it mighty
pleasant to me. So after dinner we away and to Dancre's, and there saw
our picture of Greenwich in doing, which is mighty pretty, and so to White
Hall, my wife to Unthank's, and I attended with Lord Brouncker the King
and Council, about the proposition of balancing Storekeeper's accounts and
there presented Hosier's book, and it was mighty well resented and
approved of. So the Council being up, we to the Queen's side with the
King and Duke of York: and the Duke of York did take me out to talk of our
Treasurers, whom he is mighty angry with: and I perceive he is mighty
desirous to bring in as many good motions of profit and reformation in the
Navy as he can, before the Treasurers do light upon them, they being
desirous, it seems, to be thought the great reformers: and the Duke of
York do well. But to my great joy he is mighty open to me in every thing;
and by this means I know his whole mind, and shall be able to secure
myself, if he stands. Here to-night I understand, by my Lord Brouncker,
that at last it is concluded on by the King and Buckingham that my Lord of
Ormond shall not hold his government of Ireland, which is a great stroke,
to shew the power of Buckingham and the poor spirit of the King, and
little hold that any man can have of him. Thence I homeward, and calling
my wife called at my cozen Turner's, and there met our new cozen Pepys
(Mrs. Dickenson), and Bab. and Betty' come yesterday to town, poor girls,
whom we have reason to love, and mighty glad we are to see them; and there
staid and talked a little, being also mightily pleased to see Betty
Turner, who is now in town, and her brothers Charles and Will, being come
from school to see their father, and there talked a while, and so home,
and there Pelling hath got me W. Pen's book against the Trinity.

[Entitled, "The Sandy Foundation Shaken; or those . . . doctrines
of one God subsisting in three distinct and separate persons; the
impossibility of God's pardoning sinners without a plenary
satisfaction, the justification of impure persons by an imputative
righteousness, refuted from the authority of Scripture testimonies
and right reason, etc. London, 1668." It caused him to be
imprisoned in the Tower. "Aug. 4, 1669. Young Penn who wrote the
blasphemous book is delivered to his father to be transported"
("Letter to Sir John Birkenhead, quoted by Bishop Kennett in his MS.
Collections, vol. lxxxix., p. 477).]

I got my wife to read it to me; and I find it so well writ as, I think, it
is too good for him ever to have writ it; and it is a serious sort of
book, and not fit for every body to read. So to supper and to bed.

13th. Up, and all the morning at the office, and at noon home to dinner,
and thence to the office again mighty busy, to my great content, till
night, and then home to supper and, my eyes being weary, to bed.

14th (Lord's day). Up, and by coach to Sir W. Coventry, and there, he
taking physic, I with him all the morning, full of very good discourse of
the Navy and publick matters, to my great content, wherein I find him
doubtful that all will be bad, and, for his part, he tells me he takes no
more care for any thing more than in the Treasury; and that, that being
done, he goes to cards and other delights, as plays, and in summertime to
bowles. But here he did shew me two or three old books of the Navy, of my
Lord Northumberland's' times, which he hath taken many good notes out of,
for justifying the Duke of York and us, in many things, wherein, perhaps,
precedents will be necessary to produce, which did give me great content.
At noon home, and pleased mightily with my morning's work, and coming
home, I do find a letter from Mr. Wren, to call me to the Duke of York
after dinner. So dined in all haste, and then W. Hewer and my wife and I
out, we set her at my cozen Turner's while we to White Hall, where the
Duke of York expected me; and in his closet Wren and I. He did tell me how
the King hath been acquainted with the Treasurers' discourse at the Lords
Commissioners of the Treasury, the other day, and is dissatisfied with our
running him in debt, which I removed; and he did, carry me to the King,
and I did satisfy him also; but his satisfaction is nothing worth, it
being easily got, and easily removed; but I do purpose to put in writing
that which shall make the Treasurers ashamed. But the Duke of York is
horrid angry against them; and he hath cause, for they do all they can to
bring dishonour upon his management, as do vainly appear in all they do.
Having done with the Duke of York, who do repose all in me, I with Mr.
Wren to his, chamber, to talk; where he observed, that these people are
all of them a broken sort of people, that have not much to lose, and
therefore will venture all to make their fortunes better: that Sir Thomas
Osborne is a beggar, having 11 of L1200 a-year, but owes above L10,000.
The Duke of Buckingham's condition is shortly this: that he hath about
L19,600 a-year, of which he pays away about L7,000 a-year in interest,
about L2000 in fee-farm rents to the King, about L6000 wages and pensions,
and the rest to live upon, and pay taxes for the whole. Wren says, that
for the Duke of York to stir in this matter, as his quality might justify,
would but make all things worse, and that therefore he must bend, and
suffer all, till time works it out: that he fears they will sacrifice the
Church, and that the King will take anything, and so he will hold up his
head a little longer, and then break in pieces. But Sir W. Coventry did
today mightily magnify my late Lord Treasurer, for a wise and solid,
though infirm man: and, among other things, that when he hath said it was
impossible in nature to find this or that sum of money, and my Lord
Chancellor hath made sport of it, and tell the King that when my Lord hath
said it [was] impossible, yet he hath made shift to find it, and that was
by Sir G. Carteret's getting credit, my Lord did once in his hearing say
thus, which he magnifies as a great saying--that impossible would be found
impossible at last; meaning that the King would run himself out, beyond
all his credit and funds, and then we should too late find it impossible;
which is, he says, now come to pass. For that Sir W. Coventry says they
could borrow what money they would, if they had assignments, and funds to
secure it with, which before they had enough of, and then must spend it as
if it would never have an end. From White Hall to my cozen Turner's, and
there took up my wife; and so to my uncle Wight's, and there sat and
supped, and talked pretty merry, and then walked home, and to bed.

15th. Up, and with Tom to White Hall; and there at a Committee of
Tangier, where a great instance of what a man may lose by the neglect of a
friend: Povy never had such an opportunity of passing his accounts, the
Duke of York being there, and everybody well disposed, and in expectation
of them; but my Lord Ashly, on whom he relied, and for whose sake this day
was pitched on, that he might be sure to be there, among the rest of his
friends, staid too long, till the Duke of York and the company thought
unfit to stay longer and so the day lost, and God knows when he will ever
have so good a one again, as long as he lives; and this was the man of the
whole company that he hath made the most interest to gain, and now most
depended upon him. So up and down the house a while, and then to the
plaisterer's, and there saw the figure of my face taken from the mould:
and it is most admirably like, and I will have another made, before I take
it away, and therefore I away and to the Temple, and thence to my cozen
Turner's, where, having the last night been told by her that she had drawn
me for her Valentine, I did this day call at the New Exchange, and bought
her a pair of green silk stockings and garters and shoe-strings, and two
pair of jessimy gloves, all coming to about 28s., and did give them her
this noon. At the 'Change, I did at my bookseller's shop accidentally
fall into talk with Sir Samuel Tuke about trees, and Mr. Evelyn's garden;
and I do find him, I think, a little conceited, but a man of very fine
discourse as any I ever heard almost, which I was mighty glad of. I dined
at my cozen Turner's, and my wife also and her husband there, and after
dinner, my wife and I endeavoured to make a visit to Ned Pickering; but he
not at home, nor his lady; and therefore back again, and took up my cozen
Turner, and to my cozen Roger's lodgings, and there find him pretty well
again, and his wife mighty kind and merry, and did make mighty much of us,
and I believe he is married to a very good woman. Here was also Bab. and
Betty, who have not their clothes yet, and therefore cannot go out,
otherwise I would have had them abroad to-morrow; but the poor girls
mighty kind to us, and we must skew them kindness also. Here in Suffolk
Street lives Moll Davis; and we did see her coach come for her to her
door, a mighty pretty fine coach. Here we staid an hour or two, and then
carried Turner home, and there staid and talked a while, and then my wife
and I to White Hall; and there, by means of Mr. Cooling, did get into the
play, the only one we have seen this winter: it was "The Five Hours'
Adventure:" but I sat so far I could not hear well, nor was there any
pretty woman that I did see, but my wife, who sat in my Lady Fox's pew

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