my wife, and he, and I out, and I set him down at Temple
Bar, and myself and wife went down the Temple upon seeming business,
only to put him off, and just at the Temple gate I spied Deb. with
another gentlewoman, and Deb. winked on me and smiled, but undiscovered,
and I was glad to see her. So my wife and I to the 'Change, about things
for her; and here, at Mrs. Burnett's shop, I am told by Betty, who
was all undressed, of a great fire happened in Durham-Yard last night,
burning the house of one Lady Hungerford, who was to come to town to it
this night; and so the house is burned, new furnished, by carelessness
of the girl sent to take off a candle from a bunch of candles, which she
did by burning it off, and left the rest, as is supposed, on fire. The
King and Court were here, it seems, and stopped the fire by blowing up
of the next house. The King and Court went out of town to Newmarket this
morning betimes, for a week. So home, and there to my chamber, and got
my wife to read to me a little, and so to supper and to bed. Coming home
this night I did call at the coachmaker's, and do resolve upon having
the standards of my coach gilt with this new sort of varnish, which
will come but to 40s.; and, contrary to my expectation, the doing of the
biggest coach all over comes not to above L6, which is [not] very much.

27th. Up, and to the Office, where all the morning. At noon home to
dinner, and then to the Office again, where the afternoon busy till
late, and then home, and got my wife to read to me in the Nepotisme,

[The work here mentioned is a bitter satire against the Court Rome,
written in Italian, and attributed to Gregorio Leti. It was first
printed in 1667, without the name or place of printer, but it is
from the press of the Elzevirs. The book obtained by Pepys was
probably the anonymous English translation, "Il Nipotismo di Roma:
or the history of the Popes nephews from the time of Sixtus the IV.
to the death the last Pope Alexander the VII. In two parts. Written
originally Italian in the year 1667 and Englished by W. A. London,
1669" 8vo. From this work the word Nepotism is derived, and is
applied to the bad practice of statesmen, when in power, providing
lucrative places for their relations.]

which is very pleasant, and so to supper and to bed. This afternoon was
brought to me a fresh Distringas upon the score of the Tangier accounts
which vexes me,