The Diary of Samuel Pepys [377]
and let them get out what they can by force: which I shall observe. He declared to me much of his mind to be ruled by his own measures, and not to go so far as many would have him to the ruin of my Lord Chancellor, and for which they do endeavour to do what they can against Sir W. Coventry. "But," says he, "I have done my do in helping to get him out of the administration of things, for which he is not fit; but for his life or estate I will have nothing to say to it: besides that, my duty to my master the Duke of York is such, that I will perish before I will do any thing to displease or disoblige him, where the very necessity of the kingdom do not in my judgment call me." Home; and there met W. Batelier, who tells me the first great, news, that my Lord Chancellor is fled this day, and left a paper behind him for the House of Lords, telling them the reason of his retiring, complaining of a design for his ruin. But the paper I must get: only the thing at present is great, and will put the King and Commons to some new counsels certainly. Sir Richard Ford told us this evening an odd story of the basenesse of the Lord Mayor, Sir W. Bolton, in cheating the poor of the City (out of the collections made for the people that were burned) of 1800l.; of which he can give no account, and in which he hath forsworn himself plainly, so as the Court of Aldermen have sequestered him from their Court till he do bring in an account. He says also that this day hath been made appear to them that the Keeper of Newgate hath at this day made his house the only nursery of rogues, prostitutes, pickpockets and thieves, in the world; where they were bred and entertained and the whole society met; and that for the sake of the Sheriffes they durst not this day commit him, for fear of making him let out the prisoners but are fain to go by artifice to deal with him. He tells me also, speaking of the new street that is to be made from Guild Hall down to Cheapside, that the ground is already most of it bought. And tells me of one particular, of a man that hath a piece of ground lying in the very middle of the street that must be; which, when the street is cut out of it, there will remain ground enough, of each side, to build a house to front the street. He demanded 700l. for the ground, and to be excused paying any thing for the melioration of the rest of his ground that he was to keep. The Court consented to give him 700l., only not to abate him the consideration: which the man denied; but told them, and so they agreed, that he would excuse the City the 700l., that he might have the benefit of the melioration without paying any thing for it. So much some will get by having the City burned! Ground by this means, that was not worth 4d. a-foot before, will now, when houses are built, be worth 15s. a-foot. But he tells me of the common standard now reckoned on between man and man, in places where there is no alteration of circumstances, but only the houses burnt, there the ground, which with a house on it did yield 100l. a year, is now reputed worth 33l. 6s. 8d.; and that this is the common market-price between one man and another, made upon a good and moderate medium.
4th. I hear that the House of Lords did send down the paper which my Lord Clarendon left behind him, directed to the Lords, to be seditious and scandalous; and the Commons have voted that it be burned by the hands of the hangman, and that the King be desired to agree to it. I do hear also that they have desired the King to use means to stop his escape out of the nation. This day Gilsthrop is buried, who hath made all the late discourse of the great discovery of 65,000l. of which the King hath been wronged.
6th. With Sir J. Minnes to the Duke of York, the first time that I have seen him, or we waited on him, since his sickness: and blessed be God, he is not at all the worse for the small-pox, but is only a little weak yet. We did much business with him, and so parted. My Lord Anglesy told me how my Lord Northampton [James third Earl of Northampton, Lord Lieutenant
4th. I hear that the House of Lords did send down the paper which my Lord Clarendon left behind him, directed to the Lords, to be seditious and scandalous; and the Commons have voted that it be burned by the hands of the hangman, and that the King be desired to agree to it. I do hear also that they have desired the King to use means to stop his escape out of the nation. This day Gilsthrop is buried, who hath made all the late discourse of the great discovery of 65,000l. of which the King hath been wronged.
6th. With Sir J. Minnes to the Duke of York, the first time that I have seen him, or we waited on him, since his sickness: and blessed be God, he is not at all the worse for the small-pox, but is only a little weak yet. We did much business with him, and so parted. My Lord Anglesy told me how my Lord Northampton [James third Earl of Northampton, Lord Lieutenant