Governor
of the Tower when Robinson was Lord Mayor) to the poorest 'prentices,
bakers, brewers, butchers, draymen, and what not; and all these fellows
one with another in swearing, cursing, and betting. I soon had enough
of it, and yet I would not but have seen it once, it being strange to
observe the nature of these poor creatures, how they will fight till
they drop down dead upon the table, and strike after they are ready
to give up the ghost, not offering to run away when they are weary or
wounded past doing further, whereas where a dunghill brood comes he
will, after a sharp stroke that pricks him, run off the stage, and
then they wring off his neck without more ado, whereas the other they
preserve, though their eyes be both out, for breed only of a true cock
of the game. Sometimes a cock that has had ten to one against him will
by chance give an unlucky blow, will strike the other starke dead in a
moment, that he never stirs more; but the common rule is, that though a
cock neither runs nor dies, yet if any man will bet L10 to a crowne, and
nobody take the bet, the game is given over, and not sooner. One thing
more it is strange to see how people of this poor rank, that look as
if they had not bread to put in their mouths, shall bet three or four
pounds at one bet, and lose it, and yet bet as much the next battle (so
they call every match of two cocks), so that one of them will lose L10
or L20 at a meeting. Thence, having enough of it, by coach to my Lord
Sandwich's, where I find him within with Captain Cooke and his boys,
Dr. Childe, Mr. Madge, and Mallard, playing and singing over my Lord's
anthem which he hath made to sing in the King's Chappell: my Lord
saluted me kindly and took me into the withdrawing-room, to hear it at
a distance, and indeed it sounds very finely, and is a good thing, I
believe, to be made by him, and they all commend it. And after that was
done Captain Cooke and his two boys did sing some Italian songs, which
I must in a word say I think was fully the best musique that I ever yet
heard in all my life, and it was to me a very great pleasure to hear
them. After all musique ended, my Lord going to White Hall, I went along
with him, and made a desire for to have his coach to go along with my
cozen Edward Pepys's hearse through the City on Wednesday next, which
he granted me presently, though he cannot yet come to speak to me in the
familiar stile that he did use to do, nor can I expect it. But I