ing to think fit of the taking away the seals from the
Chancellor, which, when it was done, he told me that he himself, in his
own particular, was sorry for it; for, while he stood, there was he and my
Lord Arlington to stand between him and harm: whereas now there is only my
Lord Arlington, and he is now down, so that all their fury is placed upon
him but that he did tell the King, when he first moved it, that, if he
thought the laying of him, W. Coventry, aside, would at all facilitate the
removing of the Chancellor, he would most willingly submit to it,
whereupon the King did command him to try the Duke of York about it, and
persuade him to it, which he did, by the King's command, undertake, and
compass, and the Duke of York did own his consent to the King, but
afterwards was brought to be of another mind for the Chancellor, and now
is displeased with him, and [so is] the Duchesse, so that she will not see
him; but he tells me the Duke of York seems pretty kind, and hath said
that he do believe that W. Coventry did mean well, and do it only out of
judgment. He tells me that he never was an intriguer in his life, nor
will be, nor of any combination of persons to set up this, or fling down
that, nor hath, in his own business, this Parliament, spoke to three
members to say any thing for him, but will stand upon his own defence, and
will stay by it, and thinks that he is armed against all they can [say],
but the old business of selling places, and in that thinks they cannot
hurt him. However, I do find him mighty willing to have his name used as
little as he can, and he was glad when I did deliver him up a letter of
his to me, which did give countenance to the discharging of men by ticket
at Chatham, which is now coming in question; and wherein, I confess, I am
sorry to find him so tender of appearing, it being a thing not only good
and fit, all that was done in it, but promoted and advised by him. But he
thinks the House is set upon wresting anything to his prejudice that they
can pick up. He tells me he did never, as a great many have, call the
Chancellor rogue and knave, and I know not what; but all that he hath
said, and will stand by, is, that his counsels were not good, nor the
manner of his managing of things. I suppose he means suffering the King
to run in debt; for by and by the King walking in the parke, with a great
crowd of his idle people about him, I took occasion to say that it was a
sorry thing to be a p