26th. Up, and at the Office all the morning, where I was to have delivered the Duke of York's letter of advice to the Board, in answer to our several answers to his great letter; but Lord Brouncker not being there, and doubtful to deliver it before the new Treasurers, I forbore it to next sitting. So home at noon to dinner, where I find Mr. Pierce and his wife but I was forced to shew very little pleasure in her being there because of my vow to my wife; and therefore was glad of a very bad occasion for my being really troubled, which is, at W. Hewer's losing of a tally of L1000, which I sent him this day to receive of the Commissioners of Excise. So that though I hope at the worst I shall be able to get another, yet I made use of this to get away as soon as I had dined, and therefore out with him to the Excise Office to make a stop of its payment, and so away to the coachmaker's and several other places, and so away home, and there to my business at the office, and thence home, and there my wife to read to me, and W. Hewer to set some matters of accounts right at my chamber, to bed.
27th. Up, and with W. Hewer to see W. Coventry again, but missed him again, by coming too late, the man of [all] the world that I am resolved to preserve an interest in. Thence to White Hall, and there at our usual waiting on the Duke of York; and that being done, I away to the Exchequer, to give a stop, and take some advice about my lost tally, wherein I shall have some remedy, with trouble, and so home, and there find Mr. Povy, by appointment, to dine with me; where a pretty good dinner, but for want of thought in my wife it was but slovenly dressed up; however, much pleasant discourse with him, and some serious; and he tells me that he would, by all means, have me get to be a Parliament-man the next Parliament, which he believes there will be one, which I do resolve of. By and by comes my cozen Roger, and dines with us; and, after dinner, did seal his mortgage, wherein I do wholly rely on his honesty, not having so much as read over what he hath given me for it, nor minded it, but do trust to his integrity therein. They all gone, I to the office and there a while, and then home to ease my eyes and make my wife read to me.
28th. Up, and all the morning at the Office, where, while I was sitting, one comes and tells me that my coach is come. So I was forced to go out, and to Sir Richard Ford's, where I spoke to him, and he is very willing to have it brought in, and stand there; and so I ordered it, to my great content, it being mighty pretty, only the horses do not please me, and, therefore, resolve to have better. At noon home to dinner, and so to the office again all the afternoon, and did a great deal of business, and so home to supper and to bed, with my mind at pretty good ease, having this day presented to the Board the Duke of York's letter, which, I perceive, troubled Sir W. Pen, he declaring himself meant in that part, that concerned excuse by sickness; but I do not care, but am mightily glad that it is done, and now I shall begin to be at pretty good ease in the Office. This morning, to my great content, W. Hewer tells me that a porter is come, who found my tally in Holborne, and brings it him, for which he gives him 20s.
29th (Lord's day). Lay long in bed with pleasure with my wife, with whom I have now a great deal of content, and my mind is in other things also mightily more at ease, and I do mind my business better than ever and am more at peace, and trust in God I shall ever be so, though I cannot yet get my mind off from thinking now and then of Deb., but I do ever since my promise a while since to my wife pray to God by myself in my chamber every night, and will endeavour to get my wife to do the like with me ere long, but am in much fear of what she lately frighted me with about her being a Catholique; and I dare not, therefore, move her to go to church, for fear she should deny me; but this morning, of her own accord, she spoke of going to church the next Sunday, which pleases me mightily. This morning my coachman's clothes come home; and I like the livery mightily, and so I all the morning at my chamber, and dined with my wife, and got her to read to me in the afternoon, till Sir W. Warren, by appointment, comes to me, who spent two hours, or three, with me, about his accounts of Gottenburgh, which are so confounded, that I doubt they will hardly ever pass without my doing something, which he desires of me, and which, partly from fear, and partly from unwillingness to wrong the King, and partly from its being of no profit to me, I am backward to give way to, though the poor man do indeed deserve to be rid of this trouble, that he hath lain so long under, from the negligence of this Board. We afterwards fell to other talk, and he tells me, as soon as he saw my coach yesterday, he wished that the owner might not contract envy by it; but I told him it was now manifestly for my profit to keep a coach, and that, after employments like mine for eight years, it were hard if I could not be justly thought to be able to do that.
[Though our journalist prided himself not a little upon becoming
possessed of a carriage, the acquisition was regarded with envy and
jealousy by his enemies, as will appear by the following extract
from the scurrilous pamphlet, "A Hue and Cry after P. and H. and
Plain Truth (or a Private Discourse between P. and H.)," in which
Pepys and Hewer are severely handled: "There is one thing more you
must be mightily sorry for with all speed. Your presumption in your
coach, in which you daily ride, as if you had been son and heir to
the great Emperor Neptune, or as if you had been infallibly to have
succeeded him in his government of the Ocean, all which was
presumption in the highest degree. First, you had upon the fore
part of your chariot, tempestuous waves and wrecks of ships; on your
left hand, forts and great guns, and ships a-fighting; on your right
hand was a fair harbour and galleys riding, with their flags and
pennants spread, kindly saluting each other, just like P[epys] and
H[ewer]. Behind it were high curled waves and ships a-sinking, and
here and there an appearance of some bits of land.">[
He gone, my wife and I to supper; and so she to read, and made an end of the Life of Archbishop Laud, which is worth reading, as informing a man plainly in the posture of the Church, and how the things of it were managed with the same self-interest and design that every other thing is, and have succeeded accordingly. So to bed.
30th. Up betimes, and with W. Hewer, who is my guard, to White Hall, to a Committee of Tangier, where the business of Mr. Lanyon
[John Lanyon, agent of the Navy Commissioners at Plymouth. The
cause of complaint appears to have been connected with his contract
for Tangier. In 1668 a charge was made against Lanyon and Thomas
Yeabsley that they had defrauded the king in the freighting of the
ship "Tiger" ("Calendar of State Papers," 1668-69, p. 138).]
took up all the morning; and where, poor man! he did manage his business with so much folly, and ill fortune to boot, that the Board, before his coming in, inclining, of their own accord, to lay his cause aside, and leave it to the law, but he pressed that we would hear it, and it ended to the making him appear a very knave, as well as it did to me a fool also, which I was sorry for. Thence by water, Mr. Povy, Creed, and I, to Arundell House, and there I did see them choosing their Council, it being St. Andrew's-day; and I had his Cross
[The cross of St. Andrew, like that of St. Patrick, is a saltire.
The two, combined with the red cross of St. George, form the Union
flag.]