The Charles. I was near his Majesty. She is longer than the Sovereign, and carries 110 brass cannon; she was built by old Shish, a plain honest carpenter, master-builder of this dock, but one who can give very little account of his art by discourse, and is hardly capable of reading, yet of great ability in his calling. The family have been ship-carpenters in this yard above 300 years.

12th March. Went to visit Sir John Cotton, who had me into his library, full of good MSS. Greek and Latin, but most famous for those of the Saxon and English Antiquities, collected by his grandfather.

2nd April. To the Royal Society, where I subscribed 50,000 bricks, towards building a college. Amongst other libertine libels, there was one now printed and thrown about, a bold petition of the poor w- -s to Lady Castle

maine.2

9th. To London, about finishing my grand account of the sick and wounded, and prisoners at war, amounting to above £34,000.

I heard Sir R. Howard impeach Sir William Penn,3 in the House of Lords, for breaking bulk, and taking away rich goods out of the East India prizes, formerly taken by Lord Sandwich.

28th. To London, about the purchase of Ravensbourne Mills, and land around it, in Upper Deptford, of one Mr. Becher.

30th. We sealed the deeds in Sir Edward Thurland's chambers in the Inner Temple. I pray God bless it to me, it being a dear pennyworth; but the passion Sir R. Browne had for it, and that it was contiguous to our other grounds, engaged me!

13th May. Invited by that expert commander, Captain

The like was to be said of Mr. Brindley, who executed such great works for the Duke of Bridgewater towards the close of the eighteenth century.

2 Evelyn has been supposed himself to have written this piece.

Father of the Founder of Pennsylvania, whom Evelyn in a subsequent page accuses of having published "a blasphemous book against the Deity of our blessed Lord." Sir William Penn held the rank of Admiral, and had distinguished himself in the battle with the Dutch in 1664, which gained him the honour of knighthood. He was Governor of Kinsale, and died in 1670.

Cox, master of the lately built Charles the Second, now the best vessel of the fleet, designed for the Duke of York, I went to Erith, where we had a great dinner.

16th May. Sir Richard Edgecombe, of Mount Edgecombe, by Plymouth, my relation, came to visit me ; a very virtuous and worthy gentleman.

19th June. To a new play with several of my relations, The Evening Lover, a foolish plot, and very profane; it afflicted me to see how the stage was degenerated and polluted by the licentious times.

2nd July. Sir Samuel Tuke, Bart., and the lady he had married this day, came and bedded at night at my house, many friends accompanying the bride.

23rd. At the Royal Society, were presented divers glossa petras, and other natural curiosities, found in digging to build the fort at Sheerness. They were just the same as they bring from Malta, pretending them to be viper's teeth, whereas, in truth, they are of a shark, as we found by comparing them with one in our Repository.

3rd August. Mr. Bramstone, (son to Judge B.), my old fellow-traveller, now Reader at the Middle Temple, invited me to his feast, which was so very extravagant and great as the like had not been seen at any time. There were the Duke of Ormond, Privy Seal, Bedford, Belasis, Halifax, and a world more of Earls and Lords.

14th. His Majesty was pleased to grant me a lease of a slip of ground out of Brick Close, to enlarge my fore-court, for which I now gave him thanks; then, entering into other discourse, he talked to me of a new varnish for ships, instead of pitch, and of the gilding with which his new yacht was beautified. I showed his Majesty the perpetual motion sent to me by Dr. Stokes, from Cologne; and then came in Monsieur Colbert, the French Ambassador.

19th. I saw the magnificent entry of the French Ambas

There is no play extant with this name; and though the latter might be but a second title (for Evelyn frequently mentions only one name of a play that has two), it is next to certain that he here means Dryden's comedy of An Evening's Love, or, The Mock Astrologer, which is indeed sufficiently licentious. It was produced and printed in 1668, when Evelyn appears to have seen it.

Evelyn's cousin, and a colonel in the army of Charles I. His scat was at Cressing Temple, Essex.

sador Colbert, received in the Banqueting House. I had never seen a richer coach than that which he came in to Whitehall. Standing by his Majesty at dinner in the presence, there was of that rare fruit called the King-pine, growing in Barbadoes and the West Indies; the first of them I had ever seen.' His Majesty having cut it up, was pleased to give me a piece off his own plate to taste of; but, in my opinion, it falls short of those ravishing varieties of deliciousness described in Captain Ligon's History, and others; but possibly it might, or certainly was, much impaired in coming so far; it has yet a grateful acidity, but tastes more like the quince and melon than of any other fruit be mentions.

28th August. Published my book of The Perfection of Painting, dedicated to Mr. Howard.

17th September. I entertained Signor Muccinigo, the Venetian Ambassador, of one of the noblest families of the State, this being the day of making his public entry, setting forth from my house with several gentlemen of Venice and others in a very glorious train. He staid with me till the

Earl of Anglesea and Sir Charles Cotterell (Master of the Ceremonies) came with the King's barge to carry him to the Tower, where the guns were fired at his landing; he then entered his Majesty's coach, followed by many others of the nobility. I accompanied him to his house, where there was a most noble supper to all the company, of course. After the extraordinary compliments to me and my wife, for the civi lities he received at my house, I took leave and returned. He is a very accomplished person. He is since Ambassador

at Rome.

29th. I had much discourse with Signor Pietro Cisij, a Persian gentleman, about the affairs of Turkey, to my great satisfaction. I went to see Sir Elias Leighton's project of a cart with iron axle-trees.

1 See ante, as to the Queen-pine, vol. i. P. 874.

• Reprinted in Evelyn's "Miscellaneous Writings," pp. 553-562.

The Sir Ellis Layton of Pepys. He was secretary to the Prize Office, and to the Duke of York. A mad freaking fellow "-according to one authority-though a Doctor of Civil Law, and brother to the Bishop of Dumblane. According to another, "for a speech of forty words the wittiest man that ever he knew," and moreover "one of the best companions at a meal in the world."

8th November. Being at dinner, my sister Evelyn sent for me to come up to London to my continuing sick brother.

14th. To London, invited to the consecration of that excellent person, the Dean of Ripon, Dr. Wilkins, now made Bishop of Chester; it was at Ely-House, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Cosin Bishop of Durham, the Bishops of Ely, Salisbury, Rochester, and others officiating. Dr. Tillotson preached. Then, we went to a sumptuous dinner in the hall, where were the Duke of Buckingham, Judges, Secretaries of State, Lord-Keeper, Council, Noblemen, and innumerable other company, who were honourers of this incomparable man, universally beloved by all who knew him. This being the Queen's birth-day, great was the gallantry at Whitehall, and the night celebrated with very fine fireworks.

My poor brother continuing ill, I went not from him till the 17th, when, dining at the Groom Porters, I heard Sir Edward Sutton play excellently on the Irish harp; he performs genteelly, but not approaching my worthy friend, Mr. Clark, a gentleman of Northumberland, who makes it execute lute, viol, and all the harmony an instrument is capable of; pity it is that it is not more in use; but, indeed, to play well, takes up the whole man, as Mr. Clark has assured me, who, though a gentleman of quality and parts, was yet brought up to that instrument from five years old, as I remember he told me.

25th. I waited on Lord Sandwich, who presented me with a Sembrador he brought out of Spain, showing me his two books of observations made during his embassy and stay at Madrid; in which were several rare things he promised to impart to me.

27th. I dined at my Lord Ashley's (since Earl of Shaftesbury), when the match of my niece' was proposed for his only son, in which my assistance was desired for my Lord.

28th. Dr. Patrick preached at Covent Garden, on Acts xvii. 31, the certainty of Christ's coming to judgment, it being Advent; a most suitable discourse.

19th December. I went to see the old play of Cataline acted, having been now forgotten almost forty years.

20th. I dined with my Lord Cornbury, at Clarendon

Probably the daughter of his Brother, Richard, of Epsom, but who married Mr. Montagu.

House, now bravely furnished, especially with the pictures of most of our ancient and modern wits, poets, philosophers, famous and learned Englishmen; which collection of the Chancellor's I much commended, and gave his Lordship a catalogue of more to be added.'

1 It will be well to subjoin here what is said by Evelyn, in a letter to the Lord Chancellor, dated 18th March, 1666-7:

"My Lord, your Lordship inquires of me what pictures might be added to the Assembly of the Learned and Heroic persons of England which your Lordship has already collected; the design of which I do infinitely more magnify than the most famous heads of foreigners, which do not concern the glory of our country; and it is my opinion the most honourable ornament, the most becoming and obliging, which your Lordship can think of to adorn your palace withal, such, therefore, as seem to be wanting, I shall range under these three heads:

Some of which, though difficult to procure originals of, yet haply copies

For an account of Lady Joan Weston, less known than her companion, see Ballard's Learned Ladies. There is a very scarce volume of Latin Poems by her, printed at Prague, 1606, and Evelyn specially mentions her in his Numismata. She is often celebrated by the writers of her time.