A SOLEMN FAST DAY.

281

the West End. The Park was now locked up-and Pepys, as he walked along, observed a house that had once been a club for young men, in Pall Mall, shut up also. A solemn fast-day was held on the 12th of July. Pepys was consoled for the dismal scene by the present of a bottle of plaguewater from 'my Lady Carteret'—and, to do him justice, he refused to leave his duties at the Navy Office: 'You, sir,' he said to Sir William Coventry, took your turn of the sword, I must not, therefore, grudge to take mine of the pestilence.' Solemn and serious thoughts did not prevent Pepys from giving the following glowing description of court doings at this period*:

6

Hearing that the King and Queen are rode abroade with the ladies of Honour to the Parke, and seeing a great crowd of gallants staying here to see them return, I also staid walking up and down. By and by the King and Queene who looked in their dress (a white laced waistcoate and a crimson short pettycoat, and her hair dressed à 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 light, did any body press (as she seemed to expect and wait for it) to take her down, but was taken down by her own gentleman. She looked mighty out of humour, and had a yellow plume to her hat (which all took notice of), and yet is very handsome, but very melancholy: nor did any body speake to her, or she so much as smile, or speake to any body. 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 another's head, and laughing. But it was the finest sight to me, considering their beauty and their dress, that ever I did see in my life. But above all, Mrs. Stewart,

* Diary, vol. i. p. 238.

282 NO WOMAN DO EXCEED MY LADY CASTLEMAINE.

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 the King changes, which I verily believe is the coldness of his behaviour to my Lady Castlemaine.'

We may readily suppose that the Muses were plaguestruck, and that they languished during the great national visitation. Light literature, satire, ballads, plays, vanished it is true: the funeral bell and the dead cart silenced all such productions. It was a sad thing, Pepys thought, 'to toll and ring so often, either for deaths or burials;' but it was a pleasant thing, also, to hasten down to Hampton Court, and to see the King and Queen, the Duke and Duchess of York set off to Salisbury; and pretty to see the pretty ladies dressed like men, in velvet coats, caps with ribbands, and laced bands, just like men's'-though it did not become stout Anne Hyde, Duchess though she was, to wear that masculine attire. And although for the poet or dramatist the times were bad, for the light efforts of the diarist they were excellent. Pepys becomes lively at this period. His contrasts are inimitable: he ends the month of August with the 'greatest joy of any he ever did in his life-having spent that month in journeys and brave entertainments, 'without any cost of money'-a great point with Pepys-only 'the Bill,' meaning the Bill of Mortality, rises so high-nearly to four thousand in a week: 'so God preserve us!'

A man could not count on his life two days, and the streets were full of ghastly spectacles of corpses taken to the open fields—in daylight,—night not being long enough for the terrible work; and at night poor Pepys goes about with a lanthorn, in great fear of meeting of dead corpses, carrying to be buried, but, blessed be God! met none, but did see now and then a linke in the distance, which is the marke of them.' He even does not dare to wear his coloured silk

PEPYS DARES NOT WEAR HIS NEW PERRIWIG.

283

suit, and new perriwig, because the Plague was in Westminster when they were bought: and he wonders what will be the fashion after the Plague is over, for no one will dare, he thinks, to buy any hair, from the fear that it has been cut off the heads of those who have died of the Plague.

Some touches there are of natural feeling in this childless man, who, stout-hearted, did all he could to stay the pestilence; and,—treating his Diary as one of the most valuable contributions to the 'Literature of Society,'-we close this chapter with a touching anecdote told by Samuel Pepysthat most anti-pathetic man and matter-of-fact author:

*

'Among other stories, one was very passionate, methought, of a complaint brought against a man in the town for taking a child from London from an infected house. Alderman Hooke told me it was the child of a very able citizen in Gracious Street, who had buried all the rest of his children of the plague, and himself and his wife now being shut up and in despair of escaping did desire only to save the life of this little child; and so prevailed to have it received starknaked in the hands of a friend, who brought it (having put it into new clothes) to Greenwich: whereupon, hearing the story, we did agree it should be received, and kept in the

town.'

A sad time was it indeed: no boats on the river: the grass growing in the streets of Whitehall,-and the pestilence, in spite of the coming autumnal weather, increasing. Only one physician and one apothecary were left in Westminster :-the fearless practitioners had fallen, victims to their zeal in trying to save others. Every one was talking of that man dead, and this man sick; the searchers with their rods were walking the streets: nevertheless the year 1665 closed well to Pepys-his estate, he tells us, was more than doubled: 'My whole family,' he adds, hath been well all this while, and all my friends I

* Diary, vol. i., p. 364.

284

MY AUNT BELL,' DEAD.

know of: saving my Aunt Bell, who is dead, and some children of my cosen Sarah's of the Plague. But many of such as I know very well, dead: yet, to our great joy, the town fills apace, and shops begin to be open again. Pray God continue the Plague's decrease! for that keeps the court away from the place of business, and so all goes to rack as to public matters; they at this distance, not thinking of it.'

CHAPTER XIII.

JOHN EVELYN.

THE OBLIGATIONS WE OWE TO HIM AND PEPYS AS DIARISTS. -EVELYN'S LIGHTER WORKS.—' TYRANNUS, OR THE MODE;' EXTRACTS FROM SCARCITY OF BOOKS. EVELYN'S STRICTURES UPON THE DEFICIENCY OF PUBLIC LIBRARIES.

THAT WORK.

TOM' AND HIS VARIOUS OTHER WORKS.

WOTTON.
LAND.

*

THE GOLDEN BOOK OF ST. CHRYSOS

COWLEY'S PICTURE OF EVELYN AT MARRIAGE OF THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH AND LADY SUNDER

· JOHN DRYDEN; HIS PARENTAGE. THE CHARACTER OF HIS RELA

TIVES. HIS ODE TO CROMWELL.

THE COMMENCEMENT OF HIS CAREER.