The Diary of John Evelyn Volume I Part 39

7th July, 1663. Dined at the Comptroller's; after dinner we met at the Commission about the streets, and to regulate hackney coaches, also to make up our accounts to pa.s.s the Exchequer.

16th July, 1663. A most extraordinary wet and cold season.

Sir George Carteret, Treasurer of the Navy, had now married his daughter, Caroline, to Sir Thomas Scott, of Scott's Hall, in Kent. This gentleman was thought to be the son of Prince Rupert.

2d August, 1663. This evening I accompanied Mr. Treasurer and Vice-Chamberlain Carteret to his lately married son-in-law's, Sir Thomas Scott, to Scott's Hall. We took barge as far as Gravesend, and thence by post to Rochester, whence in coach and six horses to Scott's Hall; a right n.o.ble seat, uniformly built, with a handsome gallery. It stands in a park well stored, the land fat and good. We were exceedingly feasted by the young knight, and in his pretty chapel heard an excellent sermon by his chaplain. In the afternoon, preached the learned Sir Norton Knatchbull (who has a n.o.ble seat hard by, and a plantation of stately fir trees). In the churchyard of the parish church I measured an overgrown yew tree, that was eighteen of my paces in compa.s.s, out of some branches of which, torn off by the winds, were sawed divers goodly planks.

10th August, 1663. We returned by Sir Norton's, whose house is likewise in a park. This gentleman is a worthy person, and learned critic, especially in Greek and Hebrew. Pa.s.sing by Chatham, we saw his Majesty's Royal Navy, and dined at Commissioner Pett's,[78] master-builder there, who showed me his study and models, with other curiosities belonging to his art. He is esteemed for the most skillful shipbuilder in the world.

He hath a pretty garden and banqueting house, pots, statues, cypresses, resembling some villas about Rome. After a great feast we rode post to Gravesend, and, sending the coach to London, came by barge home that night.

[Footnote 78: A monument to him in Deptford Church bears a most pompous inscription: "_Qui fuit patriae decus, patriae suae magnum munimentum_;" to the effect that he had not only restored our naval affairs, but he invented that excellent and new ornament of the Navy which we call Frigate, formidable to our enemies, to us most useful and safe: he was to be esteemed, indeed, by this invention, the Noah of his age, which, like another Ark, had s.n.a.t.c.hed from shipwreck our rights and our dominion of the seas.]

[Sidenote: LONDON]

18th August, 1663. To London, to see my Lord Chancellor, where I had discourse with my Lord Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of Winchester, who enjoined me to write to Dr. Pierce, President of Magdalen College, Oxford, about a letter sent him by Dr. Goffe, a Romish Oratorian, concerning an answer to Dean Cressy's late book.

20th August, 1663. I dined at the Comptroller's [of the Household] with the Earl of Oxford and Mr. Ashburnham; it was said it should be the last of the public diets, or tables, at Court, it being determined to put down the old hospitality, at which was great murmuring, considering his Majesty's vast revenue and the plenty of the nation. Hence, I went to sit in a Committee, to consider about the regulation of the Mint at the Tower; in which some small progress was made.

27th August, 1663. Dined at Sir Philip Warwick's, Secretary to my Lord Treasurer, who showed me the accounts and other private matters relating to the revenue. Thence, to the Commissioners of the Mint, particularly about coinage, and bringing his Majesty's rate from fifteen to ten shillings for every pound weight of gold.

31st August, 1663. I was invited to the translation of Dr. Sheldon, Bishop of London, from that see to Canterbury, the ceremony performed at Lambeth. First, went his Grace's mace bearer, steward, treasurer, comptroller, all in their gowns, and with white staves; next, the bishops in their habits, eight in number; Dr. Sweate, Dean of the Arches, Dr.

Exton, Judge of the Admiralty, Sir William Merick, Judge of the Prerogative Court, with divers advocates in scarlet. After divine service in the chapel, performed with music extraordinary, Dr. French and Dr.

Stradling (his Grace's chaplains) said prayers. The Archbishop in a private room looking into the chapel, the bishops, who were commissioners, went up to a table placed before the altar, and sat round it in chairs. Then Dr. Chaworth presented the commission under the broad seal to the Bishop of Winchester, and it was read by Dr. Sweate. After which, the Vicar-General went to the vestry, and brought his Grace into the chapel, his other officers marching before. He being presented to the Commissioners, was seated in a great armchair at one end of the table, when the definitive sentence was read by the Bishop of Winchester, and subscribed by all the bishops, and proclamation was three times made at the chapel door, which was then set open for any to enter, and give their exceptions; if any they had. This done, we all went to dinner in the great hall to a mighty feast. There were present all the n.o.bility in town, the Lord Mayor of London, Sheriffs, Duke of Albemarle, etc. My Lord Archbishop did in particular most civilly welcome me. So going to visit my Lady Needham, who lived at Lambeth, I went over to London.

10th September, 1663. I dined with Mr. Treasurer of the Navy, where, sitting by Mr. Secretary Morice, we had much discourse about books and authors, he being a learned man, and had a good collection.

24th October, 1663. Mr. Edward Phillips came to be my son's preceptor: this gentleman was nephew to Milton, who wrote against Salmasius's "_Defensio_"; but was not at all infected with his principles, though brought up by him.

5th November, 1663. Dr. South, my Lord Chancellor's chaplain, preached at Westminster Abbey an excellent discourse concerning obedience to magistrates, against the pontificians and sectaries. I afterward dined at Sir Philip Warwick's, where was much company.

6th November, 1663. To Court, to get Sir John Evelyn, of G.o.dstone, off from being Sheriff of Surrey.

30th November, 1663. Was the first anniversary of our Society for the choice of new officers, according to the tenor of our patent and inst.i.tution. It being St. Andrew's day, who was our patron, each fellow wore a St. Andrew's cross of ribbon on the crown of his hat. After the election we dined together, his Majesty sending us venison.

16th December, 1663. To our Society, where Mr. P. Balle, our treasurer at the late election, presented the Society with an iron chest, having three locks, and in it 100 as a gift.

18th December, 1663. Dined with the gentlemen of his Majesty's bedchamber at Whitehall.

[Sidenote: LONDON]

2d January, 1663-64. To Barn Elms, to see Abraham Cowley after his sickness; and returned that evening to London.

4th February, 1664. Dined at Sir Philip Warwick's; thence, to Court, where I had discourse with the King about an invention of gla.s.s-grenades, and several other subjects.

5th February, 1664. I saw "The Indian Queen" acted, a tragedy well written,[79] so beautiful with rich scenes as the like had never been seen here, or haply (except rarely) elsewhere on a mercenary theater.

[Footnote 79: By Sir Robert Howard and Dryden.]

16th February, 1664. I presented my "Sylva" to the Society; and next day to his Majesty, to whom it was dedicated; also to the Lord Treasurer and the Lord Chancellor.

24th February, 1664. My Lord George Berkeley, of Durdans, and Sir Samuel Tuke came to visit me. We went on board Sir William Petty's double-bottomed vessel, and so to London.

26th February, 1664. Dined with my Lord Chancellor; and thence to Court, where I had great thanks for my "Sylva," and long discourse with the King of divers particulars.

2d March, 1664. Went to London to distribute some of my books among friends.

4th March, 1664. Came to dine with me the Earl of Lauderdale, his Majesty's great favorite, and Secretary of Scotland; the Earl of Teviot; my Lord Viscount Brouncker, President of the Royal Society; Dr. Wilkins, Dean of Ripon; Sir Robert Murray, and Mr. Hooke, Curator to the Society.

This spring I planted the Home field and West field about Sayes Court with elms, being the same year that the elms were planted by his Majesty in Greenwich Park.

9th March, 1664. I went to the Tower, to sit in commission about regulating the Mint; and now it was that the fine new-milled coin, both of white money and guineas, was established.

26th March, 1664. It pleased G.o.d to take away my son, Richard, now a month old, yet without any sickness of danger perceivably, being to all appearance a most likely child; we suspected much the nurse had overlain him; to our extreme sorrow, being now again reduced to one: but G.o.d's will be done.

29th March, 1664. After evening prayers, was my child buried near the rest of his brothers--my very dear children.

27th April, 1664. Saw a facetious comedy, called "Love in a Tub"; and supped at Mr. Secretary Bennett's.

3d May, 1664. Came the Earl of Kent, my kinsman, and his Lady, to visit us.

5th May, 1664. Went with some company a journey of pleasure on the water, in a barge, with music, and at Mortlake had a great banquet, returning late. The occasion was, Sir Robert Carr now courting Mrs. Bennett, sister to the Secretary of State.

6th May, 1664. Went to see Mr. Wright the painter's collection of rare sh.e.l.ls, etc.

8th June, 1664. To our Society, to which his Majesty had sent that wonderful horn of the fish which struck a dangerous hole in the keel of a ship in the India sea, which, being broken off with the violence of the fish, and left in the timber, preserved it from foundering.

9th June, 1664. Sir Samuel Tuke[80] being this morning married to a lady, kinswoman to my Lord Arundel of Wardour, by the Queen's Lord Almoner, L.

Aubigny in St. James's chapel, solemnized his wedding night at my house with much company.

[Footnote 80: A Roman Catholic.]

22d June, 1664. One Tomson, a Jesuit, showed me such a collection of rarities, sent from the Jesuits of j.a.pan and China to their Order at Paris, as a present to be reserved in their repository, but brought to London by the East India ships for them, as in my life I had not seen.

The chief things were, rhinoceros's horns; glorious vests, wrought and embroidered on cloth of gold, but with such lively colors, that for splendor and vividness we have nothing in Europe that approaches it; a girdle studded with agates and rubies of great value and size; knives, of so keen an edge as one could not touch them, nor was the metal of our color, but more pale and livid; fans, like those our ladies use, but much larger, and with long handles curiously carved and filled with Chinese characters; a sort of paper very broad, thin, and fine, like abortive parchment, and exquisitely polished, of an amber yellow, exceedingly glorious and pretty to look on, and seeming to be like that which my Lord Verulam describes in his "_Nova Atlantis_"; several other sorts of paper, some written, others printed; prints of landscapes, their idols, saints, paG.o.ds, of most ugly serpentine monstrous and hideous shapes, to which they paid devotion; pictures of men and countries, rarely painted on a sort of gummed calico, transparent as gla.s.s; flowers, trees, beasts, birds, etc., excellently wrought in a kind of sleeve silk, very natural; divers drugs that our druggists and physicians could make nothing of, especially one which the Jesuit called _Lac Tigridis_: it looked like a fungus, but was weighty like metal, yet was a concretion, or coagulation, of some other matter; several book MSS.; a grammar of the language written in Spanish; with innumerable other rarities.

1st July, 1664. Went to see Mr. Povey's elegant house in Lincoln's-Inn Fields, where the perspective in his court, painted by Streeter, is indeed excellent, with the vases in imitation of porphyry, and fountains; the inlaying of his closet; above all, his pretty cellar and ranging of his wine bottles.

7th July, 1664. To Court, where I subscribed to Sir Arthur Slingsby's lottery, a desperate debt owing me long since in Paris.

14th July, 1664. I went to take leave of the two Mr. Howards, now going to Paris, and brought them as far as Bromley; thence to Eltham, to see Sir John Shaw's new house, now building; the place is pleasant, if not too wet, but the house not well contrived; especially the roof and rooms too low pitched, and the kitchen where the cellars should be; the orangery and aviary handsome, and a very large plantation about it.

[Sidenote: LONDON]

19th July, 1664. To London, to see the event of the lottery which his Majesty had permitted Sir Arthur Slingsby to set up for one day in the Banqueting House, at Whitehall; I gaining only a trifle, as well as did the King, Queen-Consort, and Queen-Mother, for near thirty lots; which was thought to be contrived very unhandsomely by the master of it, who was, in truth, a mere shark.

21st July, 1664. I dined with my Lord Treasurer at Southampton House, where his Lordship used me with singular humanity. I went in the afternoon to Chelsea, to wait on the Duke of Ormond, and returned to London.

28th July, 1664. Came to see me Monsieur Zuylichen, Secretary to the Prince of Orange, an excellent Latin poet, a rare lutinist, with Monsieur Oudart.