to make her first visit to the Queene since the Duke
of York was sick; and by and by, she being returned, the Queene come and
visited her. But it was pretty to observe that Sir W. Coventry and I,
walking an hour and more together in the Matted Gallery, he observed, and
so did I, how the Duchesse, as soon as she spied him, turned her head a
one side. Here he and I walked thus long, which we have not done a great
while before. Our discourse was upon everything: the unhappiness of
having our matters examined by people that understand them not; that it
was better for us in the Navy to have men that do understand the whole,
and that are not passionate; that we that have taken the most pains are
called upon to answer for all crimes, while those that, like Sir W. Batten
and Sir J. Minnes, did sit and do nothing, do lie still without any
trouble; that, if it were to serve the King and kingdom again in a war,
neither of us could do more, though upon this experience we might do
better than we did; that the commanders, the gentlemen that could never be
brought to order, but undid all, are now the men that find fault and abuse
others; that it had been much better for the King to have given Sir J.
Minnes and Sir W. Batten L1000 a-year to have sat still, than to have had
them in his business this war: that the serving a Prince that minds not
his business is most unhappy for them that serve him well, and an
unhappiness so great that he declares he will never have more to do with a
war, under him. That he hath papers which do flatly contradict the Duke
of Albemarle's Narrative; and that he hath been with the Duke of Albemarle
and shewed him them, to prevent his falling into another like fault: that
the Duke of Albemarle seems to be able to answer them; but he thinks that
the Duke of Albemarle and the Prince are contented to let their Narratives
sleep, they being not only contradictory in some things (as he observed
about the business of the Duke of Albemarle's being to follow the Prince
upon dividing the fleete, in case the enemy come out), but neither of them
to be maintained in others. That the business the other night of my Lord
Anglesey at the Council was happily got over for my Lord, by his dexterous
silencing it, and the rest, not urging it further; forasmuch as, had the
Duke of Buckingham come in time enough, and had got it by the end, he,
would have toused him in it; Sir W. Coventry telling me that my Lord
Anglesey did, with