Bill

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Second Reading

About Prince Rupert

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Prince Rupert, who was a man of harsh features, a great humourist, and of little elegance in his manners or his dress, was but indifferently qualified to shine in the court of Charles the Second. He made a much better figure in his laboratory, or at the head of the fleet; in which station he was equal, in courage at least, to any of the sea-officers of this reign. He particularly distinguished himself in that memorable engagement in the second Dutch war, in which the brave earl of Ossory commanded under him. He died at his house in Spring-Gardens, the 29th of Nov. 1682.
---A Biographical History of England. J. Granger, 1779.

About Princess Royal Mary

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The lady Mary was so far from being corrupted by a dissolute court, and a licentious age, that she maintained throughout her life the most unaffected piety and virtue. She was married, in this reign, to the prince of Orange; and made the most exemplary wife to a man, who, when a hero in the bloom of youth, had scarce a single quality to recommend him to the female sex.
---A Biographical History of England. J. Granger, 1779

About Henry Stuart (Duke of Gloucester)

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The duke of Glocester was a young prince of great hopes, who possessed almost all the good qualities of his two brothers, without any of their bad ones. The king had an extraordinary love and esteem for him, the effect of his virtues and amiable deportment; and was observed to be more deeply affected at his death, than with any calamity that had ever befallen him. Ob. 13 Sept. 1660, Æt. 20-21.
---A Biographical History of England. J. Granger, 1779.

About Anne Hyde (Duchess of York)

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Anne dutchess of York, was the elder of the two daughters of the lord-chancellor Clarendon, She possessed, together with a large portion of her father's understanding, the beauty and accomplishments of her own sex in an extraordinary degree. She had a dignity in her behaviour, which was by some, who regarded her as Anne Hyde, rather than the dutchess of York, mistaken for haughtiness. She sometimes amused herself with writing, and made a considerable progress in the Life of the duke her husband, which she shewed to Dr. Burnet in manuscript; but the work was never finished. Her misconduct before she was dutchess of York was amply atoned for by her conduct afterwards. Ob. 31 March, 1671.
---A Biographical History of England. J. Granger, 1779.

About James Stuart (Duke of York, Lord High Admiral)

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The duke of York, though he had a quick relish for pleasure, followed business with that closeness of application which the king his brother wanted; and wanted himself that quickness of apprehension, that natural sagacity and apparent benevolence of temper, which was so conspicuous in the king. His notions of government were as erroneous as those of his father and grandfather; and the large steps which his brother took towards arbitrary power, were in a great measure owing to his instigation. He was, what rarely happens, revengeful and valiant almost in the same degree; and displayed such courage in the first Dutch war, as rendered him more popular than all the other acts of his life. His bigotry to the Roman Catholic religion, which was still encreasing with his years, had the strongest influence upon his conduct; and at length prompted him to such measures as were condemned by the sober and judicious of all religions.
---A Biographical History of England. J. Granger, 1779.

About Henrietta-Maria Stuart (Queen Mother)

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The queen-mother returned to England in 1660, after an absence of about nineteen years. She declared, upon her re-entering Somerset House, "That if she had known the temper of the English some years past, as well as she did then, she had never been obliged to leave that house." She exerted herself with her usual vehemence against the marriage of the duke of York with Anne Hyde, which she was determined to prevent or annul. She also expressed the strongest dislike to those ministers who had the greatest share of the royal confidence and favour. On a sudden she appeared to be reconciled to the match, and to acquiesce in the ministry. This was imputed to a soothing, or, to speak more properly, an intimidating letter, sent her by cardinal Mazarine. Upon the breaking out of the plague, in 1665, she retired to France, where she died in August, 1669, in the sixtieth year of her age. It appears from sir John Reresby's "Memoirs," that she was secretly married to Henry Jermyn, earl of St. Alban's.
---A Biographical History of England. J. Granger, 1779.

About Catherine of Braganza (Queen)

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The manners of this princess, especially at her first appearance at court, retained a strong tincture of the convent; and were but ill formed to please, much less to reclaim, the polite and dissolute Charles. She at first rejected the English dress, and the attendance of English ladies; and chose to appear in the formal habit of her own country, and be attended by her duegnas, whose persons were the scorn and the jest of every courtier. She, for some time, carried herself towards the royal mistress with all the disdain which she thought became her dignity and virtue: but when she saw that the king was resolved to retain her, she suddenly fell into the other extreme, and treated her with such excessive affability and condescension, as lost the little esteem he had for her. The first years of her marriage were rendered unhappy by almost every passion that could disturb a female mind. At length, every spark of conjugal affection seemed to be extinguished, and she sunk into all the tranquillity of indifference.
---A Biographical History of England. J. Granger, 1779.

About Ald. Edward Backwell

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Edward Backwell, alderman of London, was a banker of great ability, industry, and integrity; and what was a consequence of his merit, of very extensive credit. With such qualifications, he, in a trading nation, would in the natural event of things, have made a fortune, except in such an age as that of Charles the Second, when the laws were overborne by perfidy, violence and rapacity; or in an age when bankers become gamesters instead of merchant-adventurers; when they affect to live like princes, and are, with their miserable creditors, drawn into the prevailing and pernicious vortex of luxury. Backwell carried on his business in the same shop which was afterwards occupied by Child, an unblemished name, which is entitled to respect and honour; but was totally ruined upon the shutting up of the exchequer. He, to avoid a prison, retired into Holland, where he died. His body was brought for sepulture, to Tyringham church, near Newport Pagnel, in Buckinghamshire.
--A biographical History of England. J. Granger, 1779.

About Spy-glasses

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In the Beginning of the present 17th Century, Metius, a Spectacle-maker in Holland, light upon a Composition of a Convex, with a concave Glass set at due Distance in a Tube, which made a perspective Glass to see Objects at a Distance. And Galileo, in Italy, whether excited by a Hint thence received, or from Baptista Porta, or by his own good Genius, is uncertain, did the same thing at Florence.
---Philosophical Experiments and Observations of the Late Dr. Robert Hooke. W. Derham, 1726.

When I had thus prepar'd my self, I took my Perspective Glass, and went up to the Side of the Hill, to see what I could discover; and I found quickly, by my Glass, that there were one and twenty Savages, three prisoners, and three Canoes.
---The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. Daniel Defoe, 1719.

About Ordinary

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An Ordinary, an eating or victualing house, where persons may eat at so much per meal.
---Dictionarium Britannicum Or a More Compleat Universal Etymological English. N. Bailey, 1736

About Daniel Whistler

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Daniel Whistler, fifth Geometry-Professor, succeeded Mr. Button, on his Resignation, June the 13th, 1648. He was born at Walthamstow in Essex, educated in the Free-school at Thame, and admitted a Probationary-Fellow of Merton-College in January 1639, being then about twenty Years of Age. Upon the 8th of February 1643, he took the Degree of Master of Arts; and about that Time obtaining Leave of the College to travel, he went into Holland, and was created Doctor of Physick at Leyden in 1645. Returning from thence to his College, the Year following, he was incorporated in the same Degree at Oxford, the 20th of May 1647. He was likewise appointed superior Reader of Dr. Lynacer's Lecture there. June the 16th that Year he was elected a Candidate of the College of Physicians of London; and May the 13th 1649 was admitted a Fellow of the same. In 1653 he attended Mr. Wbitelocke in his Embassy to Sweden, as his Physician. He returned in July 1654. He afterwards married; and resigned his Professorship, August the 7th, 1657.

Charles the Second having granted the College of Physicians a new Charter, March the 26th, 1663, Dr. Whistler was appointed one of their Censors for that Year. And on the 20th of May following being nominated one of the first Fellows of the Royal Society by the Council, upon the Grant of their Charter, was frequently afterwards a Member of the Council himself. In 1676 he was both Censor and Registrary of the College of Physicians; and upon the 18th of October 1683 he was elected President. He died on the 11th of May the ensuing Year. He published only one Physical Dissertation with the following Title:

Disputatio medica inauguralis de morbo puerili Anglorum, quem patrio ldiomate indigenae vocant the Rickets, &c. Lond. 1645, 1685. Quarto.
---The History of the Works of the Learned for the Year One Thousand Seven Hundred and Forty-One. 1741.

About Wednesday 27 February 1660/61

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"who gave me an account of the great falling out between my uncle Fenner and his son Will"

His son-in-law William Joyce.
---Wheatley (1896)

About Samuel Hartlib (sen.)

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Samuel Hartlib, son of a Polish merchant, and author of several ingenious works on agriculture, for which he received a pension from Cromwell. Milton's "Tractate of Education" is addressed to him. Evelyn describes him in his Diary, November 27th, 1655, as "honest and learned," and calls him "a public-spirited and ingenious person who had propagated many useful things and arts." He lived in Axe Yard about 1661, and had a son named Samuel and a daughter, Nan, who married John Roder or Roth, afterwards knighted. Evelyn says that Claudius, referred to before (see July l0th, 1660, of this Diary), was Hartlib's son-in-law. If so, Hartlib must have had another daughter. He seems to have been in some poverty at the end of his life.
---Wheatley (1896)

Mary Clodius (b. Hartlib): http://www.pepysdiary.com/encyclo…
Frederick Clodius: http://www.pepysdiary.com/encyclo…

About St Valentine's Day

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"To-morrow is Saint Valentine's day,
All in the morning betime,
And I a maid at your window
To be your Valentine."

Ophelia. Hamlet, act 4, scene 5.

About Tuesday 12 February 1660/61

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“The Scornfull Lady,” now done by a woman"

According to Downes's "Roscius Anglicanus" the characters were taken as follows:—Elder Lovelace: Burt; Young Lovelace: Kynaston; Welford: Hart; Sir Roger: Lacy; The Lady: Mrs. Marshall; Martha: Mrs. Rutter; Abigil: Mrs. Corey.
---Wheatley, 1896.

About Salisbury Court Theatre

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Salisbury Court Theatre, which was re-opened in 1660 by Rhode's company.
---Wheatley, 1896.

About Friday 8 February 1660/61

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"their master’s Bagnard"

The cellars of the castle of Livorno were called bagno [from the Italian 'bagno' meaning bath] because they were below sea level, but they were used as dungeons for Turkish slaves: hence bagnio in older English, and bagne in French, 'dungeon, workhouse'.
---Dictionary of Languages. Andrew Dalby. 1998.

About Friday 8 February 1660/61

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"their master’s Bagnard"

BAGNIO, an Italian Term, signifying a Bath. Thence Bagnio is become a general Name in Turky, for the Prisons in which the Slaves are confin'd, it being usual to have Baths in those Prisons.
---The Builder's Dictionary. 1734.

By this means I kept my self alive, shut up in a Prison or House, which the Turks call a Bagnio, where they keep their Christian Slaves, as well those of the King
---Don Quixote. Cervantes.

About Wednesday 27 February 1660/61

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"a letter from my brother John, wherein he tells us that he is chosen Schollar of the house"

Christ's College, Cambridge
---Diary and correspondence of Samuel Pepys, the diary deciphered by J. Smith. 1854.