t Sir W.
Coventry did long since propose to the Duke of York the leaving his
service, as being unable to fulfill it, as he should do, now he hath
so much public business, and that the Duke of York did bid him to say
nothing of it, but that he would take time to please himself in another
to come in his place; yet the Duke's doing it at this time, declaring
that he hath found out another, and this one of the Chancellor's
servants, he cannot but think was done with some displeasure, and that
it could not well be otherwise, that the Duke of York should keep one
in that place, that had so eminently opposed him in the defence of his
father-in-law, nor could the Duchesse ever endure the sight of him,
to be sure. But he thinks that the Duke of York and he are parted
upon clear terms of friendship. He tells me he do believe that my Lady
Castlemayne is compounding with the King for a pension, and to leave the
Court; but that her demands are mighty high: but he believes the King is
resolved, and so do every body else I speak with, to do all possible to
please the Parliament; and he do declare that he will deliver every body
up to them to give an account of their actions: and that last Friday,
it seems, there was an Act of Council passed, to put out all Papists in
office, and to keep out any from coming in. I went to the King's Chapel
to the closet, and there I hear Cresset sing a tenor part along with the
Church musick very handsomely, but so loud that people did laugh at him,
as a thing done for ostentation. Here I met Sir G. Downing, who would
speak with me, and first to inquire what I paid for my kid's leather
gloves I had on my hand, and shewed me others on his, as handsome, as
good in all points, cost him but 12d. a pair, and mine me 2s. He told
me he had been seven years finding out a man that could dress English
sheepskin as it should be--and, indeed, it is now as good, in all
respects, as kid, and he says will save L100,000 a-year, that goes out
to France for kid's skins. Thus he labours very worthily to advance our
own trade, but do it with mighty vanity and talking. But then he told me
of our base condition, in the treaty with Holland and France, about our
prisoners, that whereas before we did clear one another's prisoners, man
for man, and we upon the publication of the peace did release all our's,
300 at Leith, and others in other places for nothing, the Dutch do
keep theirs, and will not discharge them with[out] paying