The Diary of John Evelyn Volume II Part 15

[Footnote 36: Now the British Museum.]

13th May, 1676. Returned home, and found my son returned from France; praised be G.o.d!

22d May, 1676. Trinity Monday. A chaplain of my Lord Ossory's preached, after which we took barge to Trinity House in London. Mr. Pepys (Secretary of the Admiralty) succeeded my Lord as Master.

[Sidenote: ENFIELD]

2d June, 1676. I went with my Lord Chamberlain to see a garden, at Enfield town; thence, to Mr. Secretary Coventry's lodge in the Chase. It is a very pretty place, the house commodious, the gardens handsome, and our entertainment very free, there being none but my Lord and myself.

That which I most wondered at was, that, in the compa.s.s of twenty-five miles, yet within fourteen of London, there is not a house, barn, church, or building, besides three lodges. To this Lodge are three great ponds, and some few inclosures, the rest a solitary desert, yet stored with no less than 3,000 deer. These are pretty retreats for gentlemen, especially for those who are studious and lovers of privacy.

We returned in the evening by Hampstead, to see Lord Wotton's house and garden (Bellsize House), built with vast expense by Mr. O'Neale, an Irish gentleman who married Lord Wotton's mother, Lady Stanhope. The furniture is very particular for Indian cabinets, porcelain, and other solid and n.o.ble movables. The gallery very fine, the gardens very large, but ill kept, yet woody and chargeable. The soil a cold weeping clay, not answering the expense.

12th June, 1676. I went to see Sir Thomas Bond's new and fine house by Peckham; it is on a flat, but has a fine garden and prospect through the meadows to London.

2d July, 1676. Dr. Castillion, Prebend of Canterbury, preached before the King, on John xv. 22, at Whitehall.

19th July, 1676. Went to the funeral of Sir William Sanderson, husband to the Mother of the Maids, and author of two large but mean histories of King James and King Charles I. He was buried at Westminster.

1st August, 1676. In the afternoon, after prayers at St. James's Chapel, was christened a daughter of Dr. Leake's, the Duke's Chaplain: G.o.dmothers were Lady Mary, daughter of the Duke of York, and the d.u.c.h.ess of Monmouth: G.o.dfather, the Earl of Bath.

15th August, 1676. Came to dine with me my Lord Halifax, Sir Thomas Meeres, one of the Commissioners of the Admiralty, Sir John Clayton, Mr.

Slingsby, Mr. Henshaw, and Mr. Bridgeman.

25th August, 1676. Dined with Sir John Banks at his house in Lincoln's Inn Fields, on recommending Mr. Upman to be tutor to his son going into France. This Sir John Banks was a merchant of small beginning, but had ama.s.sed 100,000.

26th August, 1676. I dined at the Admiralty with Secretary Pepys, and supped at the Lord Chamberlain's. Here was Captain Baker, who had been lately on the attempt of the Northwest pa.s.sage. He reported prodigious depth of ice, blue as a sapphire, and as transparent. The thick mists were their chief impediment, and cause of their return.

2d September, 1676. I paid 1,700 to the Marquis de Sissac, which he had lent to my Lord Berkeley, and which I heard the Marquis lost at play in a night or two.

The Dean of Chichester preached before the King, on Acts xxiv. 16; and Dr. Crichton preached the second sermon before him on Psalm xc. 12, of wisely numbering our days, and well employing our time.

3d September, 1676. Dined at Captain Graham's, where I became acquainted with Dr. Compton (brother to the Earl of Northampton), now Bishop of London, and Mr. North, son to the Lord North, brother to the Lord Chief-Justice and Clerk of the Closet, a most hopeful young man. The Bishop had once been a soldier, had also traveled in Italy, and became a most sober, grave, and excellent prelate.

6th September, 1676. Supped at the Lord Chamberlain's, where also supped the famous beauty and errant lady, the d.u.c.h.ess of Mazarine (all the world knows her story), the Duke of Monmouth, Countess of Suss.e.x (both natural children of the King by the d.u.c.h.ess of Cleveland[37]), and the Countess of Derby, a virtuous lady, daughter to my best friend, the Earl of Ossory.

[Footnote 37: Evelyn makes a slip here. The Duke of Monmouth's mother was, it is well known, Lucy Walters, sometimes called Mrs.

Barlow, and heretofore mentioned in the "Diary." Nor is he more correct as to the Countess of Suss.e.x. Lady Anne Fitzroy, as she is called in the Peerage books, was married to Lennard Dacre, Earl of Suss.e.x, by whom she left a daughter only, who succeeded on her father's death to the Barony of Dacre. On the other hand, the Duke of Southampton, the Duke of Grafton, and the Duke of Northumberland, were all of them children of Charles II. by the d.u.c.h.ess of Cleveland.]

10th September, 1676. Dined with me Mr. Flamsted, the learned astrologer and mathematician, whom his Majesty had established in the new Observatory in Greenwich Park, furnished with the choicest instruments.

An honest, sincere man.

12th September, 1676. To London, to take order about the building of a house, or rather an apartment, which had all the conveniences of a house, for my dear friend, Mr. G.o.dolphin and lady, which I undertook to contrive and survey, and employ workmen until it should be quite finished; it being just over against his Majesty's wood-yard by the Thames side, leading to Scotland Yard.

19th September, 1676. To Lambeth, to that rare magazine of marble, to take order for chimney-pieces, etc., for Mr. G.o.dolphin's house. The owner of the works had built for himself a pretty dwelling house; this Dutchman had contracted with the Genoese for all their marble. We also saw the Duke of Buckingham's gla.s.swork, where they made huge vases of metal as clear, ponderous, and thick as crystal; also looking-gla.s.ses far larger and better than any that come from Venice.

9th October, 1676. I went with Mrs. G.o.dolphin and my wife to Blackwall, to see some Indian curiosities; the streets being slippery, I fell against a piece of timber with such violence that I could not speak nor fetch my breath for some s.p.a.ce; being carried into a house and let blood, I was removed to the water-side and so home, where, after a day's rest, I recovered. This being one of my greatest deliverances, the Lord Jesus make me ever mindful and thankful!

31st October, 1676. Being my birthday, and fifty-six years old, I spent the morning in devotion and imploring G.o.d's protection, with solemn thanksgiving for all his signal mercies to me, especially for that escape which concerned me this month at Blackwall. Dined with Mrs.

G.o.dolphin, and returned home through a prodigious and dangerous mist.

9th November, 1676. Finished the lease of Spalding, for Mr. G.o.dolphin.

16th November, 1676. My son and I dining at my Lord Chamberlain's, he showed us among others that incomparable piece of Raphael's, being a Minister of State dictating to Guicciardini, the earnestness of whose face looking up in expectation of what he was next to write, is so to the life, and so natural, as I esteem it one of the choicest pieces of that admirable artist. There was a woman's head of Leonardo da Vinci; a Madonna of old Palma, and two of Vand.y.k.e's, of which one was his own picture at length, when young, in a leaning posture; the other, an eunuch, singing. Rare pieces indeed!

4th December, 1676. I saw the great ball danced by all the gallants and ladies at the d.u.c.h.ess of York's.

10th December, 1676. There fell so deep a snow as hindered us from church.

[Sidenote: LONDON]

12th December, 1676. To London, in so great a snow, as I remember not to have seen the like.

17th December, 1676. More snow falling, I was not able to get to church.

8th February, 1676-77. I went to Roehampton, with my Lady d.u.c.h.ess of Ormond. The garden and perspective is pretty, the prospect most agreeable.

15th May, 1677. Came the Earl of Peterborough, to desire me to be a trustee for Lord Viscount Mordaunt and the Countess, for the sale of certain lands set out by Act of Parliament, to pay debts.

12th June, 1677. I went to London, to give the Lord Amba.s.sador Berkeley (now returned from the treaty at Nimeguen) an account of the great trust reposed in me during his absence, I having received and remitted to him no less than 20,000 to my no small trouble and loss of time, that during his absence, and when the Lord Treasurer was no great friend [of his] I yet procured him great sums, very often soliciting his Majesty in his behalf; looking after the rest of his estates and concerns entirely, without once accepting any kind of acknowledgment, purely upon the request of my dear friend, Mr. G.o.dolphin. I returned with abundance of thanks and professions from my Lord Berkeley and my Lady.

29th June, 1677. This business being now at an end, and myself delivered from that intolerable servitude and correspondence, I had leisure to be somewhat more at home and to myself.

3d July, 1677. I sealed the deeds of sale of the manor of Blechingley to Sir Robert Clayton, for payment of Lord Peterborough's debts, according to the trust of the Act of Parliament.

[Sidenote: WOTTON]

16th July, 1677. I went to Wotton.--22d. Mr. Evans, curate of Abinger, preached an excellent sermon on Matt. v. 12. In the afternoon, Mr.

Higham at Wotton catechised.

26th July, 1677. I dined at Mr. Duncomb's, at Sheere, whose house stands environed with very sweet and quick streams.

29th July, 1677. Mr. Bohun, my Son's late tutor, preached at Abinger, on Phil., iv. 8, very elegantly and practically.

5th August, 1677. I went to visit my Lord Brounker, now taking the waters at Dulwich.

9th August, 1677. Dined at the Earl of Peterborough's the day after the marriage of my Lord of Arundel to Lady Mary Mordaunt, daughter of the Earl of Peterborough.

28th August, 1677. To visit my Lord Chamberlain, in Suffolk; he sent his coach and six to meet and bring me from St. Edmund's Bury to Euston.

29th August, 1677. We hunted in the Park and killed a very fat buck.

31st August, 1677. I went a hawking.

4th September, 1677. I went to visit my Lord Crofts, now dying at St.

Edmunds Bury, and took the opportunity to see this ancient town, and the remains of that famous monastery and abbey. There is little standing entire, save the gatehouse; it has been a vast and magnificent Gothic structure, and of great extent. The gates are wood, but quite plated over with iron. There are also two stately churches, one especially.

5th September, 1677. I went to Thetford, to the borough-town, where stand the ruins of a religious house: there is a round mountain artificially raised, either for some castle, or monument, which makes a pretty landscape. As we went and returned, a tumbler showed his extraordinary address in the Warren. I also saw the Decoy; much pleased with the stratagem.