where I found the Duchess of Albemarle, and other company, and returned home on that evening, late.

15th August. Came to visit me my Lord Chancellor, the Earl of Shaftesbury.

18th. My Lord Clifford, being about this time returned from Tunbridge, and preparing for Devonshire, I went to take my leave of him at Wallingford-House; he was packing up pictures, most of which were of hunting wild beasts, and vast pieces of bull-baiting, bear-baiting, etc. I found him in his study, and restored to him several papers of state, and others of importance, which he had furnished me with, on engaging me to write the History of the Holland War, with other private letters of his acknowledgments to my Lord Arlington, who from a private gentleman of a very noble family, but inconsiderable fortune, had advanced him from almost nothing. The first thing was his being in Parliament, then knighted, then made one of the Commissioners of Sick and Wounded, on which occasion, we sate long together; then, on the death of Hugh Pollard, he was made Comptroller of the Household and Privy Councillor, yet still my brother Commissioner; after the death of Lord Fitz-Harding, Treasurer of the Household, he, by letters to Lord Arlington, which that Lord showed me, begged of his Lordship to obtain it for him as the very height of his ambition. These were written with such submissions and professions of his patronage, as I had never seen any more acknowledging. The Earl of Southampton then dying, he was made one of the Commissioners of the Treasury. His Majesty inclining to put it into one hand, my Lord Clifford, under pretence of making all his interest for his patron, my Lord Arlington, cut the grass under 1 [See ante, p. 277.]

his feet, and procured it for himself, assuring the King that Lord Arlington did not desire it. Indeed, my Lord Arlington protested to me that his confidence in Lord Clifford made him so remiss, and his affection to him was so particular, that he was absolutely minded to devolve it on Lord Clifford, all the world knowing how he himself affected ease and quiet, now growing into years, yet little thinking of this go-by. This was the only great ingratitude Lord Clifford showed, keeping my Lord Arlington in ignorance, continually assuring him he was pursuing his interest, which was the Duke's, into whose great favour Lord Clifford was now gotten; but which certainly cost him the loss of all, namely, his going so irrevocably far in his interest.

For the rest, my Lord Clifford was a valiant incorrupt gentleman, ambitious, not covetous; generous, passionate, a most constant sincere friend, to me in particular, so as when he laid down his office, I was at the end of all my hopes and endeavours. These were not for high matters, but to obtain what his Majesty was really indebted to my father-in-law, which was the utmost of my ambition, and which I had undoubtedly obtained, if this friend had stood. Sir Thomas Osborne, who succeeded him, though much more obliged to my father-in-law and his family, and my long and old acquaintance, being of a more haughty and far less obliging nature, I could hope for little; a man of excellent natural parts; but nothing of generous or grateful.

I

Taking leave of my Lord Clifford, he wrung me by the hand, and, looking earnestly on me, bid me God-b'ye, adding, "Mr. Evelyn, Í shall never see thee more." "No!" said I, "my Lord, what's the meaning of this? I hope I shall see you often, and as great a person again." "No, Mr. Evelyn,

do not expect it, I will never see this place, this City, or Court again," or words of this sound. In this manner, not without almost mutual tears, I parted from him; nor was it long after, but the news was that he was dead, and I have heard from some who I believe knew, he made himself away, after an extraordinary melancholy. This is not confidently affirmed, but a servant who lived in the house, and afterwards with Sir Robert Clayton, Lord Mayor, did, as well as others, report it; and when I hinted some such thing to Mr. Prideaux, one of his trustees, he was not willing to enter into that discourse.

It was reported with these particulars, that, causing his servant to leave him unusually one morning, locking himself in, he strangled himself with his cravat upon the bed-tester; his servant, not liking the manner of dismissing him, and looking through the key-hole (as I remember), and seeing his master hanging, brake in before he was quite dead, and taking him down, vomiting a great deal of blood, he was heard to utter these words, "Well; let men say what they will, there is a God, a just God above"; after which he spake no more. This, if true, is dismal. Really, he was the chief occasion of the Dutch war, and of all that blood which was lost at Bergen in attacking the Smyrna fleet,' and that whole quarrel.

This leads me to call to mind what my Lord Chancellor Shaftesbury affirmed, not to me only, but to all my brethren the Council of Foreign Plantations, when not long after, this accident being mentioned as we were one day sitting in Council, his Lordship told us this remarkable passage that, being one day discoursing with him when he was only Sir Thomas Clifford, speaking of men's advancement to great charges in the 1 [See ante, p. 339.]

nation, “Well," says he, "my Lord, I shall be one of the greatest men in England. Don't impute what I say either to fancy, or vanity; I am certain that I shall be a mighty man; but it will not last long; I shall not hold it, but die a bloody death.” "What," says my Lord, “your horoscope tells you so?" "No matter for that, it will be as I tell you.' "Well," says my Lord Chancellor Shaftesbury, "if I were of that opinion, I either would not be a great man, but decline preferment, or prevent my danger."

This my Lord affirmed in my hearing, before several gentlemen and noblemen sitting in council at Whitehall. And I the rather am confident of it, remembering what Sir Edward Walker (Garter King-at-Arms)1 had likewise affirmed to me a long time before, even when he was first made a Lord; that carrying his pedigree to Lord Clifford on his being created a peer, and, finding him busy, he bade him go into his study, and divert himself there till he was at leisure to discourse with him about some things relating to his family; there lay, said Sir Edward, on his table, his horoscope and nativity calculated, with some writing under it, where he read that he should be advanced to the highest degree in the state that could be conferred upon him, but that he should not long enjoy it, but should die, or expressions to that sense; and I think, (but cannot confidently say) a bloody death. This Sir Edward affirmed both to me and Sir Richard Browne; nor could I

1 Sir Edward Walker, 1612-77, celebrated for his knowledge of heraldry. He attended Charles II. into exile, and after the Restoration he became first Clerk of the Privy Council, and subsequently Garter King-at-Arms. Author, among other works, of Iter Carolinum, or an account of the Marches, etc., of King Charles I., Military Discoveries, Historical Discoveries, etc. Pepys describes his bringing the Garter to the Earl of Sandwich (27th May, 1660).

forbear to note this extraordinary passage in these memoirs.1

14th September. Dr. Creighton, son to the late eloquent Bishop of Bath and Wells, preached to the Household on Isaiah lvii. 8.

15th. I procured £4000 of the Lords of the Treasury, and rectified divers matters about the sick and wounded.

16th. To Council, about choosing a new Secretary.

17th. I went with some friends to visit Mr. Bernard Grenville, at Ab's Court in Surrey; an old house in a pretty park.3

23rd. I went to see Paradise, a room in HattonGarden, furnished with a representation of all sorts of animals handsomely painted on boards, or cloth, and so cut out and made to stand, move, fly, crawl, roar, and make their several cries. The man who showed it, made us laugh heartily at his formal poetry.

4

15th October. To Council, and swore in Mr. Locke, secretary, Dr. Worsley being dead."

27th. To Council, about sending succours to

1 [Here Evelyn speaks of his diary by its proper title.] 2 See ante, p. 17.]

3 [Apps or Ab's Court, "over against Hampton Court," 11 mile N.E. from Walton-on-Thames. It is said to have been a residence of Wolsey. It certainly once belonged to Lord Halifax, who left it to the lady to whom he is believed to have been privately married, Newton's niece, the beautiful Catherine Barton. Pope mentions the house in the Imitations of Horace, Ep. II. Bk. ii. l. 232:

Delightful Abs-court, if its fields afford
Their fruits to you, confesses you its lord,

when it was apparently occupied by Colonel Cotterell, to whom the Epistle is addressed. A new house now stands on the old site.]

4 [This was a popular exhibition at the end of the seventeenth century. Locke notes it down for a friend as a place to be visited.] 5 [See ante, p. 338.]