n
London till a whole street be built; and several that had got ground of
the City for charity, to build sheds on, had got the trick presently
to sell that for L60, which did not cost them L20 to put up; and so the
City, being very poor in stock, thought it as good to do it themselves,
and therefore let leases for seven years of the ground in Moorefields;
and a good deal of this money, thus advanced, hath been employed for
the enabling them to find some money for Commissioner Taylor, and Sir
W. Batten, towards the charge of "The Loyall London," or else, it is
feared, it had never been paid. And Taylor having a bill to pay wherein
Alderman Hooker was concerned it was his invention to find out this
way of raising money, or else this had not been thought on. So home
to supper and to bed. This morning come to me the Collectors for my
Pollmoney; for which I paid for my title as Esquire and place of Clerk
of Acts, and my head and wife's, and servants' and their wages, L40 17s;
and though this be a great deal, yet it is a shame I should pay no more;
that is, that I should not be assessed for my pay, as in the Victualling
business and Tangier; and for my money, which, of my own accord, I had
determined to charge myself with L1000 money, till coming to the Vestry,
and seeing nobody of our ablest merchants, as Sir Andrew Rickard, to
do it, I thought it not decent for me to do it, nor would it be thought
wisdom to do it unnecessarily, but vain glory.

6th. Up, and betimes in the morning down to the Tower wharfe, there to
attend the shipping of soldiers, to go down to man some ships going out,
and pretty to see how merrily some, and most go, and how sad others--the
leave they take of their friends, and the terms that some wives, and
other wenches asked to part with them: a pretty mixture. So to the
office, having staid as long as I could, and there sat all the morning,
and then home at noon to dinner, and then abroad, Balty with me, and to
White Hall, by water, to Sir G. Carteret, about Balty's L1500 contingent
money for the fleete to the West Indys, and so away with him to the
Exchange, and mercers and drapers, up and down, to pay all my scores
occasioned by this mourning for my mother; and emptied a L50 bag, and it
was a joy to me to see that I am able to part with such a sum, without
much inconvenience; at least, without any trouble of mind. So to Captain
Cocke's to meet Fenn, to talk about this money for Balty, and there
Cocke