Still, in spite of a few misgivings, the omens were favorable, and Pepys soon gets into exulting spirits. Pepys' had been a prosperous life hitherto, and there was now the dawn of higher prosperity. Competence, at least, was within his reach-probably wealth, and perhaps rank. The manners of the time were such as to us would appear strange-nay, shabby. Presents-bribes, in truth-were universal; and it seems astonishing how a system of corruption, extending itself to everything, and overspreading private and public life, did not leave society less sound at the core than it appears to have been. When Downing, Pepys' first master, went on an excursion to Holland, he took a civil leave of the poor clerk, who was trembling lest his master was about dismissing him. "I was afraid," says Pepys, "that he would have told me something of removing me from my office; but he did not; but that he would do me any service that lay in his power. So I went down, and sent a porter to my house for my best fur cap; but he coming too late with it, I did not present it to him; and so I returned and went to Heaven, where I dined."

Pepys was now in the position to feel how much more blessed it is to receive than to give. He is appointed secretary to the two generals of the fleet, and we find him writing, in his secret cipher" Strange how these people do promise me anything; one a rapier, the other a vessel of wine or a gun; and one offered me a silver hatband to do him a courtesy. I pray God to keep me from being proud, or too much lifted up hereby." We have an entry of the 30th "I was saluted in the morning with two letters from some one I had done a favor to, which brought me in each a piece of gold." Neither of the passages which we have last quoted are in the earlier editions of the "Diary; " and this may suggest to our readers how imperfect any acquaintance with the book derived from the former editions can be, An entry of April the 1st follows, the following sentence of which was first printed in 1848 :"April 1 (Lord's day.) -This morning I gave Mr. Hill, that was on board with the vice-admiral,

their Hall, and set up the King's. My Lord and I had a great deal of discourse about the several captains of the fleet, and his interest among them, and had his mind clear to bring in the King. He confessed to me that he was not sure of his own captain to be true to him, and that he did not like Captain Stokes." We soon, however, have the fleet with the king. Pepys drew up the vote, and we have the letter which accompanied the official copies of it signed with his name :-“ SirHe that can fancy a fleet (like ours) in her pride, with pendants loose, guns roaring, caps flying, and the loud Vive le Roys, echoed from one ship's company to another, he and he only can apprehend the joy this enclosed vote was received with, or the blessing he thought himself possessed of that bore it, and is your humble servant-S. PEPYS."

The pecuniary distress of the royal family at the moment of the Restoration is mentioned :

May 16, 1660. This afternoon Mr. E. Pickering told me in what a sad, poor condition, for clothes and money, the King was, and all his attendants, when he came to him first from my Lord. their clothes not being worth forty shillings, the best of them. And how overjoyed overjoyed the King was when Sir J. Greenville brought him some money; so joyful that he called the Princess Royal and Duke of York to look upon it as it lay in the portmanteau before it was taken out. My Lord told me, too, that the Duke of York is made High Admiral of England.

On the 17th, Pepys was presented to the king, the Duke of York, and the princess royal.

May 23, 1660. We weighed anchor, and with a fresh gale and most happy weather, we set sail for England. All the afternoon the King walked here and there, up and down (quite contrary to what I thought him to have been) very active and stirring. Upon the quarter-deck he fell into discourse of his escape from Worcester, where it made me ready to weep to hear the stories that he told of his difficulties that he had passed through, as his travelling four days and three nights on foot, every step up to his knees in dirt, with nothing but a green coat and a pair of country breeches on, and a pair of country shoes that made him so sore all over his feet, that he could scarce stir. Yet he was

use with reference to general history, follow; but

their value for this, or for any purpose, is diminished, by omitting anything illustrative of the character of the writer. The entire unreserve with which everything that passes through his mind is jotted down, is no inconsiderable part of the evidence that makes us rely entirely on his fidelity. Montagu soon ceased to have any secrets from Pepys; but the necessity of caution and secrecy still existed. When at sea, they learn that "All the news from London is, that things go on fur* "False Heaven, at the end of the Hall."-Hudibras. A place of entertainment in Old Palace-yard.

had not seen him in eight years, did know him, but

kept it private; when at the table there was one had been of his own regiment at Worcester, could not know him, but made him drink the King's health, and said that the King was at least four fingers higher than he. At another place he was by some servants of the house made to drink, that they might know that he was not a Roundhead, which they swore he was. In another place at his inn, the master of the house, as the king was standing with his hands on the back of a chair at the fireside, kneeled down and kissed his hand, privately, saying, that he would not ask him who he was, but bid God bless him whither he was going. Then the difficulties in getting a boat to get into France, (which was all the ship's company,) and so get to Fecamp, in France. At Rouen he looked so poorly that the people went into the rooms before he went away, to see whether he had not stole something or other.

Pepys is, however, occupied in one way or other for a month more, so as to have no opportunity of rejoining his family; and it is not until the 22nd of the following month that we have the entry-" To bed the first time since my coming from sea in my own house, for which God be praised." On the 8th of July we have the entry "To Whitehall Chapel, where I got in with ease, by going before the Lord Chancellor with Mr. Kipps. Here I heard very good musique, the first time that ever I remember to have heard the organs, and singing men in surplices, in my life. The Bishop of Chichester [King] preached before the King, and made a great flattering sermon, which I did not like, that the clergy should meddle with

matters of state."

The 10th is an important day with Pepys. It was the day on which his patron obtained the title of Earl of Sandwich. It was more important on other accounts. "This day I put on my new silk suit, the first that ever I wore in my life." It had further interest. Pepys had an eye for pretty women, and that day he took his wife to "a great wedding of Nan Hartlib's to Mynheer Roder, which was kept at Goring House, with very great state, cost, and able company. But among all the beauties there my wife was thought the greatest." "Home, with my mind pretty quiet; not returning, as I said I would, to see the bride put

to bed."

On the 13th Pepys rises early, for he has business to do he had been promised the patent place of Clerk of the Acts, and he had to pass his paThis was difficult, for fees were to be paid to every one who had anything to do in preparing it; and it would seem that even a copying clerk, who had not been the person himself to copy it, was near interrupting all by insisting that it was not fairly written. However, Pepys gave him "two pieces, after which it was strange how civil and tractable he was to me." Pepys' fear was lest some sudden change should displace his patron from power, before the patent was passed. The business of the day, however, succeeded to his heart's content, and on that day he was a happy "It was," this faithful record states, "the first day I put on my black camlett cloak with silver buttons." The same entry concludes with a notice which shows to what the court was coming, and that another reign than that of the Puritans was what the English people had to prepare themselves for :- "Late writing letters, and great doings of musique, at the next house, which was Whally's; the King and the Duke there with Madame Palmer, a pretty woman that they had a fancy too, to make her husband a cuckold. Here at the old door, that did go into his lodgings, my

Madame Palmer goes on, and there is more in the matter than Pepys has heard; the king, however, and not the duke, seems the favored lover. "There are factions," we are told, "private ones at court, about Mrs. Palmer, but what it is about I know not. But it is about the King's favor to her now that the Queen is coming." Our next meeting with Mrs. Palmer is as Lady Castlemaine. We are told of a patent for "Roger Palmer (Madame Palmer's husband) to be Earl of Castlemaine and Baron of Limbricke in Ireland; but the honor

is tied up to the males of the body of this wife, the reason whereof everybody knows." Soon after we have an account that Lady Castlemaine, "being quite fallen out with her husband, did yesterday go away from him with all her plate, jewels, and other best things, and is gone to Richmond to a brother of her's; which I am apt to think was a design to get her out of town, that the King might come at her the better." This entry was in July. In the following January we have recorded a visit to Whitehall, "where I spent a little time walking among the courtiers, which I perceive I shall be able to do with great confidence, being now beginning to be pretty well known among them. Among other discourse am told how the King sups at least four times every week with my Lady Castlemaine, and most often stays till the morning with her, and goes home through the garden all alone, privately; and that

so as the very sentries take notice of it and speak

of it." In February he is told "that my Lady Castlemaine hath all the King's Christmas presents made him by the peers given to her, which is a most abominable thing; and that at the great ball she was much richer in jewels than the Queen and Duchess both put together." In a miscellaneous entry of the 25th of April, the greater part of which was suppressed in the earlier editions, we find a good deal worth preserving :

April 25th, 1663. In the evening, merrily practising the dance which my wife hath begun to learn this day of Mr. Pembleton. but I fear will hardly do any great good at it, because she is conceited that she do well already, though I think no such thing. At Westminister Hall this day I bought a book, lately printed, and licensed by Dr. Stradling, the Bishop of London's chaplain, being a book discovering the practices and designs of the Papistsa very good book; but forasmuch as it touches one of the Queen Mother's father confessors, the bishop, which troubles many good men and members of par

liament, hath called it in, which I am sorry for it. Another book I bought, being a collection of many expressions of the great Presbyterian preachers upon on public occasions, in the late times, against the King and his party, as some of Mr. Marshall, Case, Calamy, Baxter, &c., which is good reading now, to see what they then did teach, and the people believe, and what they would seem to believe now. I did fear that the Queen is much grieved of late at the King's neglecting her, he not having supped once with her this quarter of a year, and almost every night with my Lady Castlemaine, who hath

3rd of June. In the Hall to-day Dr. Pierce tells me that the Queen began to be brisk, and play like other ladies, and is quite another woman from what she was. It may be, at any rate, the King like her the better, and forsake his two mistresses-my Lady Castlemaine and Stewart.

October 14th. My Lady Castlemaine, then, is in as great favor as ever, and the King supped with her the very first night he came from Bath, and last night, and the night before, supped with her, when there being a chine of beef to roast, and the tide rising into their kitchen, that it could not be roasted there, and the cook telling her of it, she answered, "Zounds! she must set the house on fire, but it should be roasted;"* so it was carried to Mrs. Sarah's husband, and there it was roasted.

The queen is dangerously ill; but the attentions to Lady Castlemaine are not discontinued :

80.

Oct. 20, 1663. This evening, at my Lord's lodgings, Mrs. Sarah talking with my wife and I how the Queene do, and how the King tends her, being so ill. She tells us that the Queene's sickness is the spotted fever; that she was as full of the spots as a leopard, which is very strange that it should be no more known, but, perhaps, it is not And that the King do seem to take it much at heart, for that he hath wept before her; but, for all that, that he hath not missed one night since she was sick, of supping with my Lady Castlemaine, which I believe is true; for she says that her husband hath dressed the suppers every night; and I confess I saw him myself, coming through the street, dressing up a great supper to-night, which Sarah says is also for the King and her, which is a very strange thing.

Public calamities do not interfere with

infatuation:

this

This day come news from Harwich, that the Dutch fleet are all in sight, near 100 sail, great and small, they think coming towards them, where they think they shall be able to oppose them; but do cry out of the falling back of the seamen, few standing by them, and those with much faintness. The like they wrote from Portsmouth, and their letters this post are worth reading. Sir W. Cholmly came to me this day, and tells me the court is as bad as ever; that the night the Dutch burned our ships the King did sup with my Lady Castlemaine, at the Duchess of Monmouth's, and these were all mad in hunting of a poor moth. All the court afraid of a parliament; but he thinks nothing can save us but the King's giving up all to a par

liament.

In reviewing a book of this kind, it is impossible to adopt any very systematic arrangement :

21st (Lord's day.) To the Parke. The Queene coming by in her coach, going to her chapel at St. James' (the first time it hath been ready for her.) I crowded after her, and I got up to the room where * Lord Sandwich's housekeeper.

her closet is, and there stood, and saw the fine altar, ornaments, and the fryers in their habits, and the priests come in with their fine crosses, and many other fine things. I heard their musique too, which may be good, but it did not appear so to me; neither as to their manner of singing, nor was it good concord to my ears, whatever the matter was. The Queene very devout; but what pleased me best was, to see my dear Lady Castlemaine, who, though a Protestant, did wait upon the Queene to chapel. By and bye, after mass was done, a fryer, with his cowl, did rise up, and preach a sermon in Portuguese, which I not understanding, did go away, and to the King's Chapel, but that was done; and so up to the Queene's presence-chamber, where she and the king was expected to dine; but she staying at St. James', they were forced to remove the things to the King's presence, and there he dined alone; and I with Mr. Fox very finely; but I see I must not have too much of that liberty, for my honor sake only, not but that I am very well received.

There was a report of Lady Castlemaine's becoming Roman Catholic. "I heard," says Pepys, "for certain, that Lady Castlemaine is turned Papist, which the Queene for all do not much like, thinking that she do it not for conscience sake." The date of this entry is 22nd December, 1663. There is a letter from Monsieur de Lionne to Louis XIV. of this date, which says, "Le Roy d'Angleterre estant tant priè par les parents de la dame d'aporter quelque obstacle a cette action, repondit galamment, que pour l'ame des dames il ne s'en meloit point.'"*

We have a scene in which Pepys exhibits his own character in his descriptions, not alone of the beauty, but of the dress of the ladies :

By and by, the King and Queen-the Queen, in a white laced waistcoat, and a crimson short petticoat, and her hair dressed a la negligence, mighty pretty, and the King rode hand-in-hand with her. Here was also my Lady Castlemaine, rode amongst the rest of the ladies, but the King took, methought, no notice of her; nor when she did light, did anybody press (as she seemed to expect, and staid for it) to take her down, but she was taken down by her own gentleman. She looked mighty out of humor, and had a yellow plume in her hat, which all took notice of; and yet she is very handsome, but very melancholy. Nor did anybody speak to her, or she so much as smile or speak to anybody. I followed them up into Whitehall, and into the Queene's presence, where all the ladies walked, talking and fiddling with their hats and feathers, and changing and trying one another's by one another's heads, and laughing, which it was the finest sight to me, considering their great beauties and dress, that ever I did see in all my life. But, above all, Mrs. Stewart in this dress, with her hat cocked, and a red plume, with her sweet eye, little Roman nose, and excellent taille, is now the greatest beauty I ever saw, I think, in my life, and, if ever woman can, do exceed my Lady Castlemaine, at least in this dress; nor do I wonder if the King changes, which I verily believe is the reason of his coldness to my Lady Castlemaine.

There are amusing stories of the jealousies * Lord Braybrooke-note in the new edition. Lord Braybrooke gives, in an appendix, extracts from this correspondence; but the letter to which he refers is not given.