study his honour It seems the present favourites now are my Lord Bristol, Duke of Buckingham, Sir H Benner, my Lord Ashley, and Sir Charles Barkeley, who, among them, have cast my Lord Chancellor upon his back, past ever getting up again there being now little for him to do, and he waits at Court attending to speak to the King as others do which I pray God may prove of good effects, for it is feared it will be the same with my Lord Treasurer shortly But strange to hear how my Lord Ashley, by my Lord Bristol’s means, (he being brought over to the Catholique party against the Bishops, whom he hates to the death, and publicly rails against them, not that he is become a Catholique, but merely opposes the Bishops, and yet, for aught I hear, the Bishop of London keeps as great with the King as ever,) is got into favour so much that, being a man of great business and yet of pleasure, and drolling too, he, it is thought, will be made Lord Treasurer upon the death or removal of the good old man³² My Lord Albemarle, I hear, do bear through and bustle among them, and will not be removed from the King’s good opinion and favour, though none of the Cabinet, but yet he is envied enough It is made very doubtful whether the King do not intend the making of the Duke of Monmouth legitimate, but surely the Commons of England will never do it, nor the Duke of York suffer it, whose Lady I am told is very troublesome to him by her jealousy No care is observed to be taken of the main chance, either for maintaining of trade or opposing of factions, which, God knows, are ready to break out, if any of them (which God forbid!) should dare to begin, the King and every man about him minding so much dare to begin, the King and every man about him minding so much their pleasures or profits My Lord Hinchingbroke, I am told, hath had a mischance to kill his boy by his birding-piece going off as he was a fowling The gun was charged with small shot, and hit the boy in the face and about the temples, and he lived four days In Scotland, it seems, for all the newsbooks tell us every week that they are all so quiet, and every thing in the Church settled, the old woman had liked to have killed, the other day, the Bishop of Galloway, and not half the Churches of the whole kingdom conform Strange were the effects of the late thunder and lightning about a week since at Northampton, coming with great rain, which caused extraordinary floods in a few hourses, bearing away bridges, drowning horses, men, and cattle Two men passing over a bridge on horseback, the arches before and behind them were borne away, and that left which they were upon but, however, one of the horses fell over, and was drowned Stacks of faggots carried as high as a steeple, and other dreadful things, which Sir Thomas Crewe showed me letters to him about from Mr Freemantle and others, that it is very true The Portugalls have choused us, it seems in the Island of Bombay, in the East Indys, for after a great charge of our fleets being sent thither with full commission from the King of Portugall to receive it the Governour by some pretence or other will not deliver it to Sir Abraham Shipman, sent from the King, nor to my Lord of Marlborough,³³ which the King takes highly ill and I fear our Queene will fare the worse for it The Dutch decay there exceedingly, it being believed that their people will revolt from them there, and they forced to give up their trade Sir Thomas showed me his picture and Sir Anthony Vandyke’s in crayon in little, done exceedingly well.

18th I walked to White Hall, and into the Parke, seeing the Queene and Maids of Honour passing through the house going to the Parke But above all Mrs Stuart is a fine woman, and they say now a common mistress to the King, as my Lady Castlemaine is, which is a great pity.

19th With Sir John Minnes to the Tower, and by Mr Slingsby, and Mr Howard, Controller of the Mint, we were shown the method of making this new money That being done, the Controller would have us dine with him and his company, the King giving them a dinner every day And very merry and good discourse upon the business we have been upon They now coyne between 16 and 24 000 pounds in a week At dinner they did discourse very finely to us of the probability that there is a vast deal of money hid in the land, from this that in King Charles’s time there was near ten millions of money coyned, besides what was then in being of King James’s and Queene Elizabeth’s, of which there is a good deal at this day in being Next, that there was but £750,000 coyned of the Harp and Crosse money, and of this there was £500,000 brought in upon its being called in And from very good arguments they find that there cannot be less of it in Ireland and Scotland than £100,000, so that there is but £150,000 missing, and of that, suppose that there should be not above £50,000 still remaining, either melted down, hid, or lost, or hoarded up in England, there will then be but £100,000 left to be thought to have been transported Now, if £750,000 in twelve years’ time lost but a £100 000 in danger of being transported, then £10,000,000 in thirty-five years’ time will have lost but £3,888,888 and odd pounds, and as there is £650 000 remaining after twelve