Diary, Apr/May 1668 | Page 7

Hackney, which I am mightily pleased with; for then I shall, now and
then, see her. She is pretty, and a girl for that, and her relations, I love.

8th. Up, and to White Hall, to the King's side, to find Sir T. Clifford,
where the Duke of York come and found me, which I was sorry for, for
fear he should think I was making friends on that side. But I did put it
off the best I could, my being there: and so, by and by, had opportunity
alone to shew Sir T. Clifford the fair account I had drawn up of the
Customes, which he liked, and seemed mightily pleased with me; and
so away to the Excise-Office, to do a little business there, and so to the
Office, where all the morning. At noon home to dinner, and then to the
office again till the evening, and then with my wife by coach to
Islington, to pay what we owe there, for the late dinner at Jane's
wedding; and so round by Kingsland and Hogsden home, pleased with
my. wife's singing with me, by the way, and so to the office again a
little, and then home to supper and to bed. Going this afternoon through
Smithfield, I did see a coach run over the coachman's neck, and stand
upon it, and yet the man rose up, and was well after it, which I thought
a wonder.

9th. Up, and by water to White Hall, end there, with the Board,
attended the Duke of York, and Sir Thomas Allen with us (who come
to town yesterday); and it is resolved another fleete shall go to the
Streights forthwith, and he command it. But his coming home is mighty
hardly talked on by the merchants, for leaving their ships there to the
mercy of the Turks: but of this more in my White-Booke. Thence out,
and slipped out by water to Westminster Hall and there thought to have
spoke with Mrs. Martin, but she was not there, nor at home. So back
again, and with W. Hewer by coach home and to dinner, and then to the
office, and out again with W. Hewer to the Excise-Office, and to
several places; among others, to Mr. Faythorne's, to have seen an
instrument which he was said to have, for drawing perspectives, but he
had it not: but here I did see his work-house, and the best things of his
doing he had by him, and so to other places among others to
Westminster Hall, and I took occasion to make a step to Mrs. Martin's,
the first time I have been with her since her husband went last to sea,

which is I think a year since . . . . But, Lord! to hear how sillily she tells
the story of her sister Doll's being a widow and lately brought to bed;
and her husband, one Rowland Powell, drowned, sea with her husband,
but by chance dead at sea, cast When God knows she hath played the
whore, and forced at this time after she was brought to bed, this story.
Thence calling at several places by the home, and there to the office,
and then home to supper and to bed.

10th. Up, and to the Excise-Office, and thence to White Hall a little,
and so back again to the 'Change, but nobody there, it being over, and
so walked home to dinner, and after dinner comes Mr. Seymour to visit
me, a talking fellow: but I hear by him that Captain Trevanion do give
it out every where, that I did overrule the whole Court-martiall against
him, as long as I was there; and perhaps I may receive, this time, some
wrong by it: but I care not, for what I did was out of my desire of doing
justice. So the office, where late, and then home to supper and to bed.

11th (Lord's day. Easter day). Up, and to Church; where Alderman
Backewell's wife, and mother, and boy, and another gentlewoman, did
come, and sit in our pew; but no women of our own there, and so there
was room enough. Our Parson made a dull sermon, and so home to
dinner; and, after dinner, my wife and I out by coach, and Balty with us,
to Loton, the landscape-drawer, a Dutchman, living in St. James's
Market, but there saw no good pictures. But by accident he did direct
us to a painter that was then in the house with him, a Dutchman, newly
come over, one Evarelst, who took us to his lodging close by, and did
shew us a little flower-pot of his doing, the finest thing that ever, I
think, I saw in my life; the drops