Diary, March 1666/67 | Page 6

before him; but no newes is
yet heard of him. This is all he brings. Thence to my Lord Chancellor's,
and there, meeting Sir H. Cholmly, he and I walked in my Lord's
garden, and talked; among other things, of the treaty: and he says there
will certainly be a peace, but I cannot believe it. He tells me that the
Duke of Buckingham his crimes, as far as he knows, are his being of a
caball with some discontented persons of the late House of Commons,
and opposing the desires of the King in all his matters in that House;
and endeavouring to become popular, and advising how the Commons'
House should proceed, and how he would order the House of Lords.
And that he hath been endeavouring to have the King's nativity
calculated; which was done, and the fellow now in the Tower about it;
which itself hath heretofore, as he says, been held treason, and people
died for it; but by the Statute of Treasons, in Queen Mary's times and
since, it hath been left out. He tells me that this silly Lord hath
provoked, by his ill- carriage, the Duke of York, my Lord Chancellor,
and all the great persons; and therefore, most likely, will die. He tells
me, too, many practices of treachery against this King; as betraying
him in Scotland, and giving Oliver an account of the King's private
councils; which the King knows very well, and hath yet pardoned him.
[Two of our greatest poets have drawn the character of the Duke of
Buckingham in brilliant verse, and both have condemned him to
infamy. There is enough in Pepys's reports to corroborate the main
features of Dryden's magnificent portrait of Zimri in "Absolom and
Achitophel":
"In the first rank of these did Zimri stand; A man so various that he
seemed to be Not one, but all mankind's epitome; Stiff in opinions,
always in the wrong; Was everything by starts, and nothing long,
But, in the course of one revolving moon, Was chymist, fiddler,
statesman, and buffoon; Then all for women, painting, rhyming,
drinking, Besides ten thousand freaks that died in thinking, * * * * * *

* He laughed himself from Court, then sought relief By forming parties,
but could ne'er be chief."
Pope's facts are not correct, and hence the effect of his picture is
impaired. In spite of the duke's constant visits to the Tower, Charles II.
still continued his friend; but on the death of the king, expecting little
from James, he retired to his estate at Helmsley, in Yorkshire, to nurse
his property and to restore his constitution. He died on April 16th, 1687,
at Kirkby Moorside, after a few days' illness, caused by sitting on the
damp grass when heated from a fox chase. The scene of his death was
the house of a tenant, not "the worst inn's worst room" (Moral Essays,"
epist. iii.). He was buried in Westminster Abbey.]
Here I passed away a little time more talking with him and Creed,
whom I met there, and so away, Creed walking with me to White Hall,
and there I took water and stayed at Michell's to drink. I home, and
there to read very good things in Fuller's "Church History," and
"Worthies," and so to supper, and after supper had much good
discourse with W. Hewer, who supped with us, about the ticket office
and the knaveries and extortions every day used there, and particularly
of the business of Mr. Carcasse, whom I fear I shall find a very rogue.
So parted with him, and then to bed.

4th. Up, and with Sir J. Minnes and [Sir] W. Batten by barge to
Deptford by eight in the morning, where to the King's yard a little to
look after business there, and then to a private storehouse to look upon
some cordage of Sir W. Batten's, and there being a hole formerly made
for a drain for tarr to run into, wherein the barrel stood still, full of
stinking water, Sir W. Batten did fall with one leg into it, which might
have been very bad to him by breaking a leg or other hurt, but, thanks
be to God, he only sprained his foot a little. So after his shifting his
stockings at a strong water shop close by, we took barge again, and so
to Woolwich, where our business was chiefly to look upon the ballast
wharfe there, which is offered us for the King's use to hire, but we do
not think it worth the laying out much money upon, unless we could
buy the fee-simple of it, which cannot be sold us, so we wholly flung it
off: So to the Dockyard, and there staid a while talking about business
of