Strand; and my wife and I home, and there to do a
little business at the Office, and so home to supper and to bed.

20th. Up; and my wife, and I, and W. Hewer to White Hall, where she set
us down; and there I spoke with my Lord Peterborough, to tell him of the
day for his dining with me being altered by my Lord Sandwich from Friday
to Saturday next. And thence heard at the Council-board the City, by
their single counsel Symson, and the company of Strangers Merchants, a
debate the business of water-baylage; a tax demanded upon all goods, by
the City, imported and exported: which these Merchants oppose, and
demanding leave to try the justice of the City's demand by a Quo Warranto,
which the City opposed, the Merchants did quite lay the City on their
backs with great triumph, the City's cause being apparently too weak: but
here I observed Mr. Gold, the merchant, to speak very well, and very
sharply, against the City. Thence to my wife at Unthanke's, and with her
and W. Hewer to Hercules Pillars, calling to do two or three things by the
way, end there dined, and thence to the Duke of York's house, and saw
"Twelfth Night," as it is now revived; but, I think, one of the weakest
plays that ever I saw on the stage. This afternoon, before the play, I
called with my wife at Dancre's, the great landscape-painter, by Mr.
Povy's advice; and have bespoke him to come to take measure of my
dining-room panels, and there I met with the pretty daughter of the
coalseller's, that lived in Cheapside, and now in Covent Garden, who hath
her picture drawn here, but very poorly; but she is a pretty woman, and
now, I perceive, married, a very pretty black woman. So, the play done, we
home, my wife letting fall some words of her observing my eyes to be
mightily employed in the playhouse, meaning upon women, which did vex me;
but, however, when we come home, we were good friends; and so to read, and
to supper, and so to bed.

21st. Up, and walked to the Temple, it being frosty, and there took coach,
my boy Tom with me, and so to White Hall to a Committee of Tangier, where
they met, and by and by and till twelve at noon upon business, among
others mine, where my desire about being eased of appointing and standing
accountable for a Treasurer there was well accepted, and they will think
of some other way. This I was glad of, finding reason to doubt that I
might in this (since my Lord Sandwich made me understand what he had said
to the Duke of Yor