Diary, February 1667/68 | Page 8

my
books, and was made to sit down, and used with much respect,
otherwise than the other day, when I come to them as a criminal about
the business of the prizes. I sat here with them a great while, while my
books were inventoried. And here do hear from them by discourse that
they are like to undo the Treasurer's instruments of the Navy by making
it a rule that they shall repay all money paid to wrong parties, which is
a thing not to be supported by these poor creatures the Treasurer's
instruments, as it is also hard for seamen to be ruined by their paying
money to whom they please. I know not what will be the issue of it. I
find these gentlemen to sit all day, and only eat a bit of bread at noon,
and a glass of wine; and are resolved to go through their business with
great severity and method. Thence I, about two o'clock, to Westminster
Hall, by appointment, and there met my cozen Roger again, and Mr.
Jackson, who is a plain young man, handsome enough for Pall, one of
no education nor discourse, but of few words, and one altogether that, I
think, will please me well enough. My cozen had got me to give the

odd sixth L100 presently, which I intended to keep to the birth of the
first child: and let it go--I shall be eased of the care, and so, after little
talk, we parted, resolving to dine together at my house tomorrow. So
there parted, my mind pretty well satisfied with this plain fellow for my
sister, though I shall, I see, have no pleasure nor content in him, as if he
had been a man of reading and parts, like Cumberland, and to the Swan,
and there sent for a bit of meat and eat and drank, and so to White Hall
to the Duke of York's chamber, where I find him and my fellows at
their usual meeting, discoursing about securing the Medway this year,
which is to shut the door after the horse is stole. However, it is good.
Having done here, my Lord Brouncker, and W. Pen, and I, and with us
Sir Arnold Breames, to the King's playhouse, and there saw a piece of
"Love in a Maze," a dull, silly play, I think; and after the play, home
with W. Pen and his son Lowther, whom we met there, and then home
and sat most of the evening with my wife and Mr. Pelting, talking, my
head being full of business of one kind or other, and most such as do
not please me, and so to supper and to bed.

8th. Up, and to the office, where sat all day, and at noon home, and
there find cozen Roger and Jackson by appointment come to dine with
me, and Creed, and very merry, only Jackson hath few words, and I like
him never the worse for it. The great talk is of Carr's coming off in all
his trials, to the disgrace of my Lord Gerard, to that degree, and the
ripping up of so many notorious rogueries and cheats of my Lord's, that
my Lord, it is thought, will be ruined; and, above all things, do skew
the madness of the House of Commons, who rejected the petition of
this poor man by a combination of a few in the House; and, much more,
the base proceedings (just the epitome of all our publick managements
in this age), of the House of Lords, that ordered him to stand in the
pillory for those very things, without hearing and examining what he
hath now, by the seeking of my Lord Gerard himself, cleared himself of,
in open Court, to the gaining himself the pity of all the world, and
shame for ever to my Lord Gerard. We had a great deal of good
discourse at table, and after dinner we four men took coach, and they
set me down at the Old Exchange, and they home, having discoursed
nothing today with cozen or Jackson about our business. I to Captain
Cocke's, and there discoursed over our business of prizes, and I think I

shall go near to state the matter so as to secure myself without wrong to
him, doing nor saying anything but the very truth. Thence away to the
Strand, to my bookseller's, and there staid an hour, and bought the idle,
rogueish book, "L'escholle des filles;" which I have bought in plain
binding, avoiding the buying of it better bound, because I resolve, as
soon as I have read it, to burn it, that it may not stand in the list of
books, nor among them, to disgrace them if it should be found. Thence