business. At noon, Harry Ethall came to me and went along with Mr.
Maylard by coach as far as Salsbury Court, and there we set him down, and
we went to the Clerks, where we came a little too late, but in a closet we
had a very good dinner by Mr. Pinkny's courtesy, and after dinner we had
pretty good singing, and one, Hazard, sung alone after the old fashion,
which was very much cried up, but I did not like it. Thence we went to
the Green Dragon, on Lambeth Hill, both the Mr. Pinkney's, Smith,
Harrison, Morrice, that sang the bass, Sheply and I, and there we sang of
all sorts of things, and I ventured with good success upon things at first
sight, and after that I played on my flageolet, and staid there till nine
o'clock, very merry and drawn on with one song after another till it came
to be so late. After that Sheply, Harrison and myself, we went towards
Westminster on foot, and at the Golden Lion, near Charing Cross, we went
in and drank a pint of wine, and so parted, and thence home, where I found
my wife and maid a-washing. I staid up till the bell-man came by with his
bell just under my window as I was writing of this very line, and cried,
"Past one of the clock, and a cold, frosty, windy morning." I then went
to bed, and left my wife and the maid a-washing still.

17th. Early I went to Mr. Crew's, and having given Mr. Edward money to
give the servants, I took him into the coach that waited for us and
carried him to my house, where the coach waited for me while I and the
child went to Westminster Hall, and bought him some pictures. In the Hall
I met Mr. Woodfine, and took him to Will's and drank with him. Thence the
child and I to the coach, where my wife was ready, and so we went towards
Twickenham. In our way, at Kensington we understood how that my Lord
Chesterfield had killed another gentleman about half an hour before, and
was fled.

[Philip Stanhope, second Earl of Chesterfield, ob. 1713, act. suae