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Art. VII. Memoirs of Samuel Pepys, Esq. F.R.S. Secretary to the Admiralty in the Reigns of Charles II. and James II. Comprising his Diary from 1659 to 1669, deciphered by the Rev. John Smith, A.B. of St. John's College, Cambridge, from the Original Short-hand MS. in the Pepysian Library, and a Selection from his private Correspondence. Edited by Richard, Lord Braybrooke. 2 vols. 4to. Price 61. 6s. London, 1825.

TH

HE Public are indebted, we suspect, for these memoirs, to the favourable reception given to the Evelyn papers. Pepys was not an Evelyn in any respect. He was a man of far inferior talents and of much less admirable character; but he seems to have been a simple-minded man, and his diary, though it would not have been worth printing in the year 1700, will be read with interest in 1825. The Diary commences with the year 1659-60, when Mr. Pepys was twenty-seven years of age. After being regularly kept for ten years, it is suddenly brought to a conclusion, owing to the weak state of Mr. Pepys's eyes, which precluded him from continuing or resuming the occupation. The original forms six volumes closely written in short-hand, and was bequeathed by him, together with a valuable collection of books and prints, to Magdalene College, Cambridge. It had remained there, it seems, unexamined, till the appointment of the present Master, brother to the noble Editor, under whose auspices the MS. was deciphered with a view to its publication.

My Brother's time,' says his Lordship, being too much engrossed by more important duties to admit of his editing the work, the task of preparing it for the press was undertaken by me at his request.

As Mr. Pepys was in the habit of recording the most trifling occurrences of his life, it became absolutely necessary to curtail the MS. materially, and in many instances to condense the matter; but the greatest care has been taken to preserve the original meaning, without making a single addition, excepting where, from the shorthand being defective, some alteration appeared absolutely necessary. It may be objected by those who are not aware how little is known, from authentic sources, of the History of the Stage about the period of the Restoration, that the notices of theatrical performances occur too frequently; but, as many of the incidents recorded, connected with this subject, are not to be met with elsewhere, I thought myself justified in retaining them, at the risk of fatiguing those readers who have no taste for the concerns of the Drama. The general details may also, in some instances, even in their abridged form, be considered as too minute; nor is it an easy task, in an undertaking of this sort, to please every body's taste; my principal study, however, in making the selection has been, to omit nothing of public interest, and to introduce, at the same time, a great variety of other topics,

less important, perhaps, but tending in some degree to illustrate the manners and habits of the age.' pp. yi, vii.

The pains which Lord Braybrooke has taken in editing the Journal, are manifest from the foot-notes, and we are certainly not inclined to complain, on the whole, of the manner in which he has discharged his task; but, waiving the insipid and wearisome notices relating to the theatrical performances, we cannot conceive that either the manners or the habits of the age are much illustrated by such memoranda as the following.

'Oct. 2. At Will's I met with Mr. Spicer; and went with him to the Abbey to see them at vespers. There I found but a thin congregation. p. 76.

Feb. 2. Home; where I found the parson and his wife gone. And by-and-by the rest of the company very well pleased, and I too; it being the last dinner I intend to make a great while.' p. 93.

Feb. 27. I called for a dish of fish, which we had for dinner, it being the first day of Lent; and I do intend to try whether I can keep it or no.'

Feb. 28. Notwithstanding my resolution, yet, for want of other victuals, I did eat flesh this Lent, but am resolved to eat as little as I can. p. 96.

June 26. Mr. Nicholson, my old fellow-student at Magdalene, come, and we played three or four things upon the violin and basse.”

P. 149.

Sep. 17. Some discourse of the Queen's being very sick, if not dead, &c.'

The memorandum which follows this last entry, is more amusing.

Sep. 19. Waked with a very high wind, and said to my wife, "I pray God I hear not of the death of any great person, this wind is so high !" fearing that the Queene might be dead,”

Mr. Pepys, it must be remembered, was afterwards President of the Royal Society. Was this the philosophy of the age?

But, although we think that the noble Editor would have laid the public under still greater obligations, had he used his discretion with somewhat less reserve, in curtailing and condensing the contents of this Diary, we have derived too much amusement from its multifarious contents, to quarrel even with the bulk of these unwieldy tomes. We shall now proceed to lay before our readers some copious extracts of a more interesting nature, which, as the price of the volumes renders them hardly accessible to a large class of readers, will, we apprehend, be not unacceptable. We must first, however, give the outline of the Author's personal history.

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Samuel Pepys was born in 1632. His father was a citizen of London, and followed the trade of a tailor till about the year 1660, when he came into some property on the death of an elder brother, and retired into Huntingdonshire. Samuel was educated at St. Paul's school, from which he went to Cambridge, having obtained a scholarship on Dr. Smith's foundation. Four years after, being now twenty-three, he married a young lady aged fifteen, who had just quitted a convent. As she brought her husband no fortune, it is unnecessary to say more,' remarks the Editor, upon the impru'dence of the alliance:' it was evidently a love match. About this period, however, young Pepys became a protegé of his relative, Sir Edward Montagu, afterwards the celebrated Earl of Sandwich, and was received into his family, in what pre cise capacity does not appear,-probably as private secretary, for in March 1658, he accompanied Sir Edward upon his expedition to the Sound. On his return, he had a clerkship given him in the Army pay-office. Shortly after, he obtained the appointment of secretary to the two generals of the fleet; and soon after the Restoration, while his patron was rewarded with an earldom, Mr. Pepys was nominated Clerk of the Acts of the Navy. In 1664, he was made secretary to the commissioners for managing the affairs of Tangier, and surveyor-general of the victualling department, which last office he subsequently resigned. In January 1673, he was returned member of parliament for Castle Rising on the Government interest, but had nearly lost his seat, on the petition of the unsuccessful candidate, owing to his being suspected of being a pa 'pist or popishly inclined. In 1673, he was appointed secretary to the Navy. In 1769, he was committed to the Tower, with Sir Anthony Deane, under the Speaker's warrant, on a charge of secretly corresponding with the French Government; but the depositions on which the charge was founded, appear to have been false and malicious. They were never brought to trial, and, after a nine month's imprisonment, were discharged. In 1683, he received the king's command to ac-. company Lord Dartmouth in the expedition against Tangier. On his return, he was re-instated in the office of secretary to the Navy, which he continued to fill during the remainder of the reign of Charles II. and the whole of that of his successor. In 1684, he was raised to the office of President of the Royal Society, which he filled for two years. In 1700, he found it necessary, from his advanced age, to retire from the fatigues and labours of public life, and after a lingering illness, he expired in 1706, in the sixty-ninth year of his age.

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Besides these offices and honours, Mr. Pepys was master of

the Cloth-workers' company, and a standing governor of all the principal houses of charity in and about London.' He assisted, as one of the Barons of the Cinque Ports, at the coronation of James II. He appears to have been, in fact, a regularly trained, faithful, and laborious official drudge, who rose into estimation and importance by his application and integrity-in those times, virtues of no mean value. But these labours never so far absorbed him as to prevent his entering into the gayeties of that licentious age. As he advanced in years, however, he appears to have turned his mind more earnestly to serious thoughts, and devoutly prepared for the change that awaited him. Nor could the example of the virtuous Evelyn,' remarks his Biographer, whose friendship and society he had so long enjoyed, and cultivated to the last moments of his life, have been useless or unprofitable in this particular.' This brief sketch will enable our readers to understand and appreciate the observations and reflections which occur in the Diary.

The Journal opens with the following Memorandum.

1659-60. Blessed be God, at the end of the last year I was in very good health, without any sense of my old pain, but upon taking of cold. I lived in Axe-yard, having my wife, and servant Jane, and no other in family than us three.

The condition of the state was thus: viz. the Rump, after being disturbed by my Lord Lambert, was lately returned to sit again. The officers of the Army all forced to yield. Lawson lies still in the river, and Monk is with his army in Scotland. Only my Lord Lambert is not yet come into the Parliament, nor is it expected that he will, without being forced to it. The new Common Council of the City. do speak very high; and had sent to Monk their sword-bearer, to acquaint him with their desires for a free and full Parliament, which is at present the desires, and the hopes, and the expectations of all. Twenty-two of the old secluded members having been at the Housedoor the last week to demand entrance, but it was denied them ; and it is believed that neither they nor the people will be satisfied till the House be filled. My own private condition very handsome, and esteemed rich, but indeed very poor; besides my goods of my house, and my office, which at present is somewhat certain.' pp. 1, 2. The following anecdote is curious: it occurs under Jan. 9, of the same year.

'Among other things, W. Simmons told me how his uncle Scobell was on Saturday last called to the bar, for entering in the journal of the House, for the year 1653, these words: "This day His Excellence the Lord G. Cromwell dissolved this House;" which words the Parliament voted a forgery, and demanded of him how they came to be entered. He said that they were his own hand-writing, and that

he did it by rights of his office, and the practice of his predecessor; and that the intent of the practice was, to let posterity know how such and such a Parliament was dissolved, whether by the command of the King, or by their own neglect, as the last House of Lords was; and that to this end, he had said and writ that it was dissolved by his Excellence the Lord G.; and that for the word dissolved, he never at the time did hear of any other term: and desired pardon if he would not dare to make a word himself, what it was six years after, before they came themselves to call it an interruption; that they were so little satisfied with this answer, that they did chuse a committee to report to the House, whether this crime of Mr. Scobell's did come within the act of indemnity or no. Thence into the Hall, where I heard for certain that Monk was coming to London, and that Bradshaw's lodgings were preparing for him. I heard Sir H. Vane was this day voted out of the House, and to sit no more there; and that he would retire himself to his house at Raby, as also all the rest of the nine officers that had their commissions formerly taken away from them, were commanded to their furthest houses from London during the pleasure of the Parliament.' pp. 4, 5.

To this succeed a series of references to the agitation produced by the proceedings of Monk. Under Feb. 10, Mr. Pepys writes,

Mr. Fage told me what Monk had done in the City, how he had pulled down the most part of the gates and chains that they could break down, and that he was now gone back to White Hall. The City look mighty blank, and cannot tell what in the world to do; the Parliament having this day ordered that the Common-council sit no more, but that new ones be chosen according to what qualifications they shall give them.

11th. I heard the news of a letter from Monk, who was now gone into the City again, and did resolve to stand for the sudden filling up of the House, and it was very strange how the countenance of men in the Hall was all changed with joy in half an hour's time. So I went up to the lobby, where I saw the Speaker reading of the letter; and after it was read, Sir A. Haselrigge came out very angry, and Billing standing at the door, took him by the arm, and cried, "Thou man, will thy beast carry thee no longer? thou must fall!" We took coach for the City to Guildhall, where the Hall was full of people expecting Monk and Lord Mayor to come thither, and all very joyfull. Met Monk coming out of the chamber where he had been with the Mayor and Aldermen, but such a shout I never heard in all my life, crying out "God bless your Excellence." Here I met with Mr. Lock, and took him to an ale-house: when we were come together, he told us the substance of the letter that went from Monk to the Parliament; wherein after complaints that he and his officers were put upon such offices against the City as they could not do with any content or honour, it states, that there are many members now in the House that were of the late tyrannical Committee o