void till I have a
better purse; though, I confess, the gentlewoman, being pretty handsome,
and singing, makes me have a good mind to her. Anon I took them by coach
and carried them to a friend's of theirs, in Lincoln's Inn Fields,
and there I left them and I to the Temple by appointment to my cousin
Roger's chamber, where my uncle Thomas and his son Thomas met us, I
having hoped that they would have agreed with me to have had [it] ended
by my cozen Roger, but they will have two strangers to be for them
against two others of mine, and so we parted without doing any thing
till the two send me the names of their arbiters. Thence I walked home,
calling a little in Paul's Churchyard, and, I thank God, can read and
never buy a book, though I have a great mind to it. So to the Dolphin
Tavern near home, by appointment, and there met with Wade and Evett, and
have resolved to make a new attempt upon another discovery, in which God
give us better fortune than in the other, but I have great confidence
that there is no cheat in these people, but that they go upon good
grounds, though they have been mistaken in the place of the first. From
thence, without drinking a drop of wine, home to my office and there
made an end, though late, of my collection of the prices of masts for
these twelve years to this day, in order to the buying of some of Wood,
and I bound it up in painted paper to lie by as a book for future use.
So home and to supper and to bed, and a little before and after we were
in bed we had much talk and difference between us about my wife's having
a woman, which I seemed much angry at, that she should go so far in it
without consideration and my being consulted with. So to bed.

13th. Up and began our discontent again and sorely angered my wife, who
indeed do live very lonely, but I do perceive that it is want of work
that do make her and all other people think of ways of spending their
time worse, and this I owe to my building, that do not admit of her
undertaking any thing of work, because the house has been and is still
so dirty. I to my office, and there sat all the morning and dined with
discontent with my wife at noon, and so to my office, and there this
afternoon we had our first meeting upon our commission of inspecting
the Chest, and there met Sir J. Minnes, Sir Francis Clerke, Mr. Heath,
Atturney of the Dutchy, Mr. Prinn, Sir W. Rider, Captn. Cocke, and
myself. Our first work to read over the Institution, which i