for moving for going on with the King’s supply
of money, without regard to the keeping pace therewith,
with the looking into miscarriages, and was told by
this man privately that it did arise because that he
had a kinsman concerned therein; and therefore he
would prefer the safety of his kinsman to the good
of the nation, and that there was great things against
us and against me, for all my fine discourse the other
day. But I did bid him be at no pain for me;
for I knew of nothing but what I was very well prepared
to answer; and so I think I am, and therefore was not
at all disquieted by this. Thence he to the
House, and I to the Hall, where my Lord Brouncker
and the rest waiting till noon and not called for by
the House, they being upon the business of money again,
and at noon all of us to Chatelin’s, the French
house in Covent Garden, to dinner—Brouncker,
J. Minnes, W. Pen, T. Harvey, and myself—and
there had a dinner cost us 8s. 6d. a-piece, a damned
base dinner, which did not please us at all, so that
I am not fond of this house at all, but do rather
choose the Beare. After dinner to White Hall
to the Duke of York, and there did our usual business,
complaining of our standing still in every-respect
for want of money, but no remedy propounded, but so
I must still be. Thence with our company to
the King’s playhouse, where I left them, and
I, my head being full of to-morrow’s dinner,
I to my Lord Crew’s, there to invite Sir Thomas
Crew; and there met with my Lord Hinchingbroke and
his lady, the first time I spoke to her. I saluted
her; and she mighty civil and; with my Lady Jemimah,
do all resolve to be very merry to-morrow at my house.
My Lady Hinchingbroke I cannot say is a beauty, nor
ugly; but is altogether a comely lady enough, and
seems very good-humoured, and I mighty glad of the
occasion of seeing her before to-morrow. Thence
home; and there find one laying of my napkins against
tomorrow in figures of all sorts, which is mighty
pretty; and, it seems, it is his trade, and he gets
much money by it; and do now and then furnish tables
with plate and linnen for a feast at so much, which
is mighty pretty, and a trade I could not have thought
of. I find my wife upon the bed not over well,
her breast being broke out with heat, which troubles
her, but I hope it will be for her good. Thence
I to Mrs. Turner, and did get her to go along with
me to the French pewterer’s, and there did buy
some new pewter against to-morrow; and thence to White
Hall, to have got a cook of her acquaintance, the best
in England, as she says. But after we had with
much ado found him, he could not come, nor was Mr.
Gentleman in town, whom next I would have had, nor
would Mrs. Stone let her man Lewis come, whom this
man recommended to me; so that I was at a mighty loss
what in the world to do for a cooke, Philips being
out of town. Therefore, after staying here at
Westminster a great while, we back to London, and
there to Philips’s, and his man directed us
to Mr. Levett’s, who could not come, and he sent
to two more, and they could not; so that, at last,
Levett as a great kindness did resolve he would leave
his business and come himself, which set me in great
ease in my mind, and so home, and there with my wife
setting all things in order against to-morrow, having
seen Mrs. Turner at home, and so late to bed.