that God knows in what a sad condition I should be if I were truly in debt: and therefore ought to bless God that I have no such reall reason, and to endeavour to keep myself, by my good deportment and good husbandry, out of any such condition. At home I find, by a note that Mr Clerke in my absence hath left here, that I am free; and that he hath stopped all matters in Court; and I was very glad of it. We took coach and to Court, and there saw The Wilde Gallant,¹⁶ performed by the King’s house, but it was ill acted. The King did not seem pleased at all, the whole play, nor any body else. My Lady Castlemaine was all worth seeing to-night, and little Steward.¹⁷ Mrs Wells do appear at Court again, and looks well; so that, it may be, the late report of laying the dropped child to her was not true. This day I was 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 jewells than the Queene and Duchesse put both together.

24th. Among other things, my Lord [Sandwich] tells me, that he hears the Commons will not agree to the King’s late declaration, nor will yield that the Papists have any ground given them to raise themselves up again in England, which I perceive by my Lord was expected at Court.

25th. The Commons in Parliament, I hear, are very high to stand to the Act of Uniformity, and will not indulge the Papists (which is endeavoured by the Court Party,) nor the Presbyters.

26th. Sir W. Batten and I by water to the Parliament-house: he went in, and I walked up and down the Hall. All the newes is the great oddes yesterday in the votes between them that are for the Indulgence to the Papists and Presbyters, and those that are against it, which did carry it by 200 against 30. And pretty it is to consider how the King would appear to be a stiff Protestant and son of the Church; and yet willing to give a liberty to these people, because of his promise at Breda. And yet all the world do believe that the King would not have the liberty given them at all.

27th. About 11 o’clock, Commissioner Pett and I walked to Chyrurgeon’s Hall, (we being all invited thither, and promised to dine there;) where we were led into the Theatre: and by and by comes the reader, Dr Tearne,¹⁸ with the Master and Company, in a very handsome manner: and all being settled, he begun his lecture; and his discourse being ended, we had a fine dinner and good learned company, many Doctors of Phisique, and we used with extraordinary great respect. Among other observables we drunk the King’s health out of a gilt cup given by King Henry VIII to this Company, with bells hanging at it, which every man is to ring by shaking after he hath drunk up the whole cup. There is also a very excellent piece of the King, done by Holbein, stands up in the Hall, with the officers of the Company kneeling to him to receive their Charter Dr Scarborough took some of his friends, and I went with them, to see the body of a lusty fellow, a seaman, that was hanged for a robbery It seems one Dillon, of a great family, was, after much endeavours to have saved him, hanged with a silken halter this Sessions, (of his own preparing,) not for honour only, but it being soft and sleek it do slip close and kills, that is, strangles presently whereas, a stiff one do not come so close together, and so the party may live the longer before killed But all the Doctors at table conclude, that there is no pain at all in hanging, for that it do stop the circulation of the blood, and so stops all sense and motion in an instant To Sir W Batten’s to speak upon some business, where I found Sir J Minnes pretty well fuddled I thought he took me aside to tell me how being at my Lord Chancellor’s to-day, my Lord told him that there was a Great Seal passing for Sir W Pen, through the impossibility of the Comptroller’s duty to be performed by one man, to be as it were joynt-comptroller with him at which he is stark mad, and swears he will give up his place For my part, I do hope, when all is done that my following my business will keep me secure against all their envys But to see how the old man do strut, and swear that he understands all his duty as easily as crack a nut, and easier, he told my Lord Chancellor, for his teeth are gone, and that he understands it as well as any man in England, and that he will never leave to record that he should be said to be unable to do his duty alone, though, God knows, he cannot do it more than a child.

28th The House have this noon been with the King to give him their reasons for refusing to grant any indulgence to Presbyters or Papists, which he, with great content and seeming pleasure, took, saying, that he doubted not but he and they should agree in all things, though there may seem a difference in