that goes from Sir J. Minnes through our house; and so we sent, and their
chimnies have been swept this morning, and the noise was that, and nothing
else. It is one of the most extraordinary accidents in my life, and gives
ground to think of Don Quixote's adventures how people may be surprised,
and the more from an accident last night, that our young gibb-cat

[A male cat. "Gib" is a contraction of the Christian name Gilbert
(Old French), "Tibert".

"I am melancholy as a gib-cat"

Shakespeare, I Henry IV, act i., sc. 3.

Gib alone is also used, and a verb made from it--"to gib," or act
like a cat.]

did leap down our stairs from top to bottom, at two leaps, and frighted
us, that we could not tell well whether it was the cat or a spirit, and do
sometimes think this morning that the house might be haunted. Glad to
have this so well over, and indeed really glad in my mind, for I was much
afeard, I dressed myself and to the office both forenoon and afternoon,
mighty hard putting papers and things in order to my extraordinary
satisfaction, and consulting my clerks in many things, who are infinite
helps to my memory and reasons of things, and so being weary, and my eyes
akeing, having overwrought them to-day reading so much shorthand, I home
and there to supper, it being late, and to bed. This morning Sir W. Pen
and I did walk together a good while, and he tells me that the Houses are
not likely to agree after their free conference yesterday, and he fears
what may follow.