says he, “after all this discourse, I now come to understand it; and that is, that there can nothing be done in this more than is possible,” which was so silly as I never heard:  “and therefore,” says he, “I would have these gentlemen to do as much as possible to hasten the Treasurer’s accounts; and that is all.”  And so we broke up:  and I confess I went away ashamed, to see how slightly things are advised upon there.  Here I saw the Duke of Buckingham sit in Council again, where he was re-admitted, it seems, the last Council-day:  and it is wonderful to see how this man is come again to his places, all of them, after the reproach and disgrace done him:  so that things are done in a most foolish manner quite through.  The Duke of Buckingham did second Sir W. Coventry in the advising the King that he would not concern himself in the owning or not owning any man’s accounts, or any thing else, wherein he had not the same satisfaction that would satisfy the Parliament; saying, that nothing would displease the Parliament more than to find him defending any thing that is not right, nor justifiable to the utmost degree but methought he spoke it but very poorly.  After this, I walked up and down the Gallery till noon; and here I met with Bishop Fuller, who, to my great joy, is made, which I did not hear before, Bishop of Lincoln.  At noon I took coach, and to Sir G. Carteret’s, in Lincoln’s-Inn-Fields, to the house that is my Lord’s, which my Lord lets him have:  and this is the first day of dining there.  And there dined with him and his lady my Lord Privy-seale, who is indeed a very sober man; who, among other talk, did mightily wonder at the reason of the growth of the credit of banquiers, since it is so ordinary a thing for citizens to break, out of knavery.  Upon this we had much discourse; and I observed therein, to the honour of this City, that I have not heard of one citizen of London broke in all this war, this plague, this fire, and this coming up of the enemy among us; which he owned to be very considerable.

     [This remarkable fact is confirmed by Evelyn, in a letter to Sir
     Samuel Tuke, September 27th, 1666.  See “Correspondence,” vol.
     iii., p. 345, edit. 1879.]

After dinner I to the King’s playhouse, my eyes being so bad since last night’s straining of them, that I am hardly able to see, besides the pain which I have in them.  The play was a new play; and infinitely full:  the King and all the Court almost there.  It is “The Storme,” a play of Fletcher’s;’ which is but so-so, methinks; only there is a most admirable dance at the end, of the ladies, in a military manner, which indeed did please me mightily.  So, it being a mighty wet day and night, I with much ado got a coach, and, with twenty stops which he made, I got him to carry me quite through, and paid dear for it, and so home, and there comes my wife home from the Duke of York’s playhouse, where she hath been with my aunt and Kate Joyce, and so to supper, and betimes to bed, to make amends for my last night’s work and want of sleep.