Court, and they were buying of a hanging jack to roast birds on of a fellow that was there selling of some. I was fain to slip from there and went to Mrs. Crew’s to her and advised about a maid to come and be with Mrs. Jem while her maid is sick, but she could spare none. Thence to Sir Harry Wright’s, but my lady not being within I spoke to Mrs. Carter about it, who will get one against Monday. So with a link boy
[Links were torches of tow or pitch to light the way. Ed.]
to Scott’s, where Mrs. Ann was in a heat, but I spoke not to her, but told Mrs. Jem what I had done, and after that went home and wrote letters into the country by the post, and then played awhile on my lute, and so done, to supper and then to bed. All the news to-day is, that the Parliament this morning voted the House to be made up four hundred forthwith. This day my wife killed her turkeys that Mr. Sheply gave her, that came out of Zealand with my Lord, and could not get her m’d Jane by no means at any time to kill anything.
5th,(Lord’s day). In the morning before church time Mr. Hawly, who had for this day or two looked something sadly, which methinks did speak something in his breast concerning me, came to me telling me that he was out £24 which he could not tell what was become of, and that he do remember that he had such a sum in a bag the other day, and could not tell what he did with it, at which I was very sorry but could not help him. In the morning to Mr. Gunning, where a stranger, an old man, preached a good honest sermon upon “What manner of love is this that we should be called the sons of God.” After sermon I could not find my wife, who promised to be at the gate against my coming out, and waited there a great while; then went to my house and finding her gone I returned and called at the Chequers, thinking to dine at the ordinary with Mr. Chetwind and Mr. Thomas, but they not being there I went to my father and found her there, and there I dined. To their church in the afternoon, and in Mrs. Turner’s pew my wife took up a good black hood and kept it. A stranger preached a poor sermon, and so read over the whole book of the story of Tobit. After sermon home with Mrs. Turner, staid with her a little while, then she went into the court to a christening and we to my father’s, where I wrote some notes for my brother John to give to the Mercers’ to-morrow, it being the day of their apposition. After supper home, and before going to bed I staid writing of this day its passages, while a drum came by, beating of a strange manner of beat, now and then a single stroke, which my wife and I wondered at, what the meaning of it should be. This afternoon at church I saw Dick Cumberland newly come out of the country from his living, but did not speak to him.
6th. Before I went to my office I went to Mr. Crew’s and paid Mr. Andrews the same £60 that he had received of Mr. Calthrop the last week. So back to Westminster and walked with him thither, where we found the soldiers all set in the Palace Yard, to make way for General Monk to come to the House. At the Hall we parted, and meeting Swan, he and I to the Swan and drank our morning draft. So back again to the Hall, where I stood upon the steps and saw Monk go by, he making observance to the judges as he went along. At noon my father dined with me upon my turkey that was brought from Denmark, and after dinner he and I to the Bull Head Tavern, where we drank half a pint of wine and so parted. I to Mrs. Ann, and Mrs. Jem being gone out of the chamber she and I had a very high bout, I rattled her up, she being in her bed, but she becoming more cool, we parted pretty good friends. Thence I went to Will’s, where I staid at cards till 10 o’clock, losing half a crown, and so home to bed.
7th. In the morning I went early to give Mr. Hawly notice of my being forced to go into London, but he having also business we left our office business to Mr. Spicer and he and I walked as far as the Temple, where I halted a little and then went to Paul’s School, but it being too soon, went and drank my morning draft with my cozen Tom Pepys the turner, and saw his house and shop, thence to school, where he that made the speech for the seventh form in praise of the founder, did show a book which Mr. Crumlum had lately got, which is believed to be of the Founder’s own writing. After all the speeches, in which my brother John came off as well as any of the rest, I went straight home and dined, then to the Hall, where in the Palace I saw Monk’s soldiers abuse Billing and all the Quakers, that were at a meeting-place there, and indeed the soldiers did use them very roughly and were to blame.
[“Fox, or some other ‘weighty’ friend, on hearing of this,
complained to Monk, who issued the following order, dated March 9th:
‘I do require all officers and soldiers to forbear to disturb
peaceable meetings of the Quakers, they doing nothing prejudicial to
the Parliament or the Commonwealth of England. George Monk.’ This
order, we are told, had an excellent effect on the soldiers.”—A. C.
Bickley’s ‘George Fox and the Early Quakers, London, 1884, p. 179.
The Quakers were at this time just coming into notice. The first
preaching of George Fox, the founder, was in 1648, and in 1655 the
preachers of the sect numbered seventy-three. Fox computed that
there were seldom less than a thousand quakers in prison. The
statute 13 and 14 Car. II. cap. i. (1662) was “An act for
preventing the mischiefs and dangers that may arise by certain
persons called quakers and others, refusing to take lawful oaths.”
Billing is mentioned again on July 22nd, 1667, when he addressed
Pepys in Westminster Hall.]
So after drinking with Mr. Spicer, who had received £600 for me this morning, I went to Capt. Stone and with him by coach to the Temple Gardens (all the way talking of the disease of the stone), where we met Mr. Squib, but would do nothing till to-morrow morning. Thence back on foot home, where I found a letter from my Lord in character [private cryptic code Ed.], which I construed, and after my wife had shewn me some ribbon and shoes that she had taken out of a box of Mr. Montagu’s which formerly Mr. Kipps had left here when his master was at sea, I went to Mr. Crew and advised with him about it, it being concerning my Lord’s coming up to Town, which he desires upon my advice the last week in my letter. Thence calling upon Mrs. Ann I went home, and wrote in character to my Lord in answer to his letter. This day Mr. Crew told me that my Lord St. John is for a free Parliament, and that he is very great with Monk, who hath now the absolute command and power to do any thing that he hath a mind to do. Mr. Moore told me of a picture hung up at the Exchange of a great pair of buttocks shooting of a turd into Lawson’s mouth, and over it was wrote “The thanks of the house.” Boys do now cry “Kiss my Parliament, instead of “Kiss my [rump],” so great and general a contempt is the Rump come to among all the good and bad.
8th. A little practice on my flageolet, and afterwards walking in my yard to see my stock of pigeons, which begin now with the spring to breed very fast. I was called on by Mr. Fossan, my fellow pupil at Cambridge, and I took him to the Swan in the Palace yard, and drank together our morning draft. Thence to my office, where I received money, and afterwards Mr. Carter, my old friend at Cambridge, meeting me as I was going out of my office I took him to the Swan, and in the way I met with Captain Lidcott, and so we three went together and drank there, the Captain talking as high as ever he did, and more because of the fall of his brother Thurlow.
[John Thurloe, born 1616; Secretary of State to Cromwell; M.P. for
Ely, 1656, and for the University of Cambridge in Richard Cromwell’s
Parliament of December, 1658. He was never employed after the
Restoration, although the King solicited his services. He died
February
