till at last, by knocking, Mr. Harrison the door-keeper did open us the
door, and, after some talk with my Lord about getting a catch to carry my
Lord St. Albans a goods to France, I parted and went home on foot, it
being very late and dirty, and so weary to bed.

23rd. This morning standing looking upon the workmen doing of my new door
to my house, there comes Captain Straughan the Scot (to whom the King has
given half of the money that the two ships lately sold do bring), and he
would needs take me to the Dolphin, and give me a glass of ale and a peck
of oysters, he and I. He did talk much what he is able to advise the King
for good husbandry in his ships, as by ballasting them with lead ore and
many other tricks, but I do believe that he is a knowing man in
sea-business. Home and dined, and in the afternoon to the office, where
till late, and that being done Mr. Creed did come to speak with me, and I
took him to the Dolphin, where there was Mr. Pierce the purser and his
wife and some friends of theirs. So I did spend a crown upon them behind
the bar, they being akin to the people of the house, and this being the
house where Mr. Pierce was apprentice. After they were gone Mr. Creed and
I spent an hour in looking over the account which he do intend to pass in
our office for his lending moneys, which I did advise about and approve or
disapprove of as I saw cause. After an hour being, serious at this we
parted about 11 o'clock at night. So I home and to bed, leaving my wife
and the maid at their linen to get up.

24th. To my Lord's, where after I had done talking with him Mr. Townsend,
Rumball, Blackburn, Creed and Shepley and I to the Rhenish winehouse, and
there I did give them two quarts of Wormwood wine,

[Wormwood (Artemisia absinthium) is celebrated for its intensely
bitter, tonic, and stimulating qualities, which have caused it to be