with him to his closet, and did our business, and so broke up, and I with
Sir W. Batten by coach to Salisbury Court, and there spoke with Clerk our
Solicitor about Field's business, and so parted, and I to Mrs. Turner's,
and there saw the achievement pretty well set up, and it is well done.
Thence I on foot to Charing Crosse to the ordinary, and there, dined,
meeting Mr. Gauden and Creed. Here variety of talk but to no great
purpose. After dinner won a wager of a payre of gloves of a crowne of Mr.
Gauden upon some words in his contract for victualling. There parted in
the street with them, and I to my Lord's, but he not being within, took
coach, and, being directed by sight of bills upon the walls, I did go to
Shoe Lane to see a cocke-fighting at a new pit there, a sport I was never
at in my life; but, Lord! to see the strange variety of people, from
Parliament-man (by name Wildes, that was Deputy Governor of the Tower when
Robinson was Lord Mayor) to the poorest 'prentices, bakers, brewers,
butchers, draymen, and what not; and all these fellows one with another in
swearing, cursing, and betting. I soon had enough of it, and yet I would
not but have seen it once, it being strange to observe the nature of these
poor creatures, how they will fight till they drop down dead upon the
table, and strike after they are ready to give up the ghost, not offering
to run away when they are weary or wounded past doing further, whereas
where a dunghill brood comes he will, after a sharp stroke that pricks
him, run off the stage, and then they wring off his neck without more ado,
whereas the other they preserve, though their eyes be both out, for breed
only of a true cock of the game. Sometimes a cock that has had ten to one
against him will by chance give an unlucky blow, will strike the other
starke dead in a moment, that he never stirs more; but the common rule is,
that though a cock neither runs nor dies, yet if any man will bet L10 to a
crowne, and nobody take the bet, the game is given over, and not sooner.
One thing more it is strange to see how people of this poor rank, that
look as if they had not bread to put in their mouths, shall bet three or