my last night’s drinking yet. I had the boy up to-night for his sister to teach him to put me to bed, and I heard him read, which he did pretty well.
23rd (Lord’s day). My wife got up to put on her mourning to-day and to go to Church this morning. I up and set down my journall for these 5 days past. This morning came one from my father’s with a black cloth coat, made of my short cloak, to walk up and down in. To church my wife and I, with Sir W. Batten, where we heard of Mr. Mills a very good sermon upon these words, “So run that ye may obtain.” After dinner all alone to Westminster. At Whitehall I met with Mr. Pierce and his wife (she newly come forth after childbirth) both in mourning for the Duke of Gloucester. She went with Mr. Child to Whitehall chapel and Mr. Pierce with me to the Abbey, where I expected to hear Mr. Baxter or Mr. Rowe preach their farewell sermon, and in Mr. Symons’s pew I sat and heard Mr. Rowe. Before sermon I laughed at the reader, who in his prayer desires of God that He would imprint his word on the thumbs of our right hands and on the right great toes of our right feet. In the midst of the sermon some plaster fell from the top of the Abbey, that made me and all the rest in our pew afeard, and I wished myself out. After sermon with Mr. Pierce to Whitehall, and from thence to my Lord, but Diana did not come according to our agreement. So calling at my father’s (where my wife had been this afternoon but was gone home) I went home. This afternoon, the King having news of the Princess being come to Margate, he and the Duke of York went down thither in barges to her.
24th (Office day). From thence to dinner by coach with my wife to my Cozen Scott’s, and the company not being come, I went over the way to the Barber’s. So thither again to dinner, where was my uncle Fenner and my aunt, my father and mother, and others. Among the rest my Cozen Rich. Pepys,
[Richard Pepys, eldest son of Richard Pepys, Lord Chief Justice of
Ireland. He went to Boston, Mass., in 1634, and returned to England
about 1646.]
their elder brother, whom I had not seen these fourteen years, ever since he came from New England. It was strange for us to go a gossiping to her, she having newly buried her child that she was brought to bed of. I rose from table and went to the Temple church, where I had appointed Sir W. Batten to meet him; and there at Sir Heneage Finch Sollicitor General’s chambers, before him and Sir W. Wilde,
[William Wilde, elected Recorder on November 3rd, 1659, and
appointed one of the commissioners sent to Breda to desire Charles
II. to return to England immediately. He was knighted after the
King’s return, called to the degree of Serjeant, and created a
baronet, all in the same year. In 1668 he ceased to be Recorder,
and was appointed judge of the Court of Common Pleas. In 1673 he
was removed to the King’s Bench. He was turned out of his office in
1679 on account of his action in connection with the Popish Plot,
and died November 23rd of the same year.]
Recorder of London (whom we sent for from his chamber) we were sworn justices of peace for Middlesex, Essex, Kent, and Southampton; with which honour I did find myself mightily pleased, though I am wholly ignorant in the duty of a justice of peace. From thence with Sir William to Whitehall by water (old Mr. Smith with us) intending to speak with Secretary Nicholas about the augmentation of our salaries, but being forth we went to the Three Tuns tavern, where we drank awhile, and then came in Col. Slingsby and another gentleman and sat with us. From thence to my Lord’s to enquire whether they have had any thing from my Lord or no. Knocking at the door, there passed me Mons. L’Impertinent [Mr. Butler] for whom I took a coach and went with him to a dancing meeting in Broad Street, at the house that was formerly the glass-house, Luke Channel, Master of the School, where I saw good dancing, but it growing late, and the room very full of people and so very hot, I went home.
25th. To the office, where Sir W. Batten, Colonel Slingsby, and I sat awhile, and Sir R. Ford
[Sir Richard Ford was one of the commissioners sent to Breda to
desire Charles II. to return to England immediately.]
coming to us about some business, we talked together of the interest of this kingdom to have a peace with Spain and a war with France and Holland; where Sir R. Ford talked like a man of great reason and experience. And afterwards I did send for a cup of tee’
[That excellent and by all Physicians, approved, China drink, called
by the Chineans Tcha, by other nations Tay alias Tee, is sold at the
Sultaness Head Coffee-House, in Sweetings Rents, by the “Royal
Exchange, London.” “Coffee, chocolate, and a kind of drink called
tee, sold in almost every street in 1659.”—Rugge’s Diurnal. It is
stated in “Boyne’s Trade Tokens,” ed. Williamson, vol. i., 1889,
p. 593 “that the word tea occurs on no other tokens than those
issued from ‘the Great Turk’ (Morat ye Great) coffeehouse in
Exchange Alley. The Dutch East India Company introduced tea into
Europe in 1610, and it is said to have been first imported into
England from Holland about 1650. The English “East India Company”
purchased and presented 2 lbs. of tea to Charles II. in 1660, and 23
lbs. in 1666. The first order for its importation by the company
was in 1668, and the first consignment of it, amounting to 143 lbs.,
was received from Bantam in 1669 (see Sir George Birdwood’s “Report
on the Old Records at the India Office,” 1890, p. 26). By act 12
Car. II., capp. 23, 24, a duty of 8d. per gallon was imposed upon
the infusion of tea, as well as on chocolate and sherbet.]
(a China drink) of which I never had drank before, and went away. Then came Col. Birch and Sir R. Browne by a former appointment, and with them from Tower wharf in the barge belonging to our office we went to Deptford to pay off the ship Success, which (Sir G. Carteret and Sir W. Pen coming afterwards to us) we did, Col. Birch being a mighty busy man and one that is the most indefatigable and forward to make himself work of any man that ever I knew in my life. At the Globe we had a very good dinner, and after that to the pay again, which being finished we returned by water again, and I from our office with Col. Slingsby by coach to Westminster (I setting him down at his lodgings by the way) to inquire for my Lord’s coming thither (the King and the Princess
[“The Princess Royall came from Gravesend to Whitehall by water,
attended by a noble retinue of about one hundred persons, gentry,
and servants, and tradesmen, and tirewomen, and others, that took
that opportunity to advance their fortunes, by coming in with so
excellent a Princess as without question she is.”--Rugge’s Diurnal.
A broadside, entitled “Ourania, the High and Mighty Lady the
Princess Royal of Aurange, congratulated on her most happy arrival,
September the 25th, 1660,” was printed on the 29th.]
coming up the river this afternoon as we were at our pay), and I found him gone to Mr. Crew’s, where I found him well, only had got some corns upon his foot which was not well yet. My Lord told me how the ship that brought the Princess and him (The Tredagh) did knock six times upon the Kentish Knock,
[A shoal in the North Sea, off the Thames mouth, outside the Long
Sand, fifteen miles N.N.E. of the North Foreland. It measures seven
miles north-eastward, and about two miles in breadth. It is partly
dry at low water. A revolving light was set up in 1840.]
which