and the house infinitely full. But the play, when it come, though there
was, here and there, a pretty saying, and that not very many neither, yet
the whole of the play had nothing extraordinary in it, at all, neither of
language nor design; insomuch that the King I did not see laugh, nor
pleased the whole play from the beginning to the end, nor the company;
insomuch that I have not been less pleased at a new play in my life, I
think. And which made it the worse was, that there never was worse musick
played--that is, worse things composed, which made me and Captain Rolt,
who happened to sit near me, mad. So away thence, very little satisfied
with the play, but pleased with my company. I carried them to Kensington,
to the Grotto, and there we sang, to my great content, only vexed, in
going in, to see a son of Sir Heneage Finch's beating of a poor little dog
to death, letting it lie in so much pain that made me mad to see it, till,
by and by, the servants of the house chiding of their young master, one of
them come with a thong, and killed the dog outright presently. Thence to
Westminster palace, and there took boat and to Fox Hall, where we walked,
and eat, and drank, and sang, and very merry. But I find Mrs. Horsfield
one of the veriest citizen's wives in the world, so full of little silly
talk, and now and then a little sillily bawdy, that I believe if you had
her sola a man might hazer all with her. So back by water to Westminster
Palace, and there got a coach which carried us as far as the Minorys, and
there some thing of the traces broke, and we forced to 'light, and walked
to Mrs. Horsfield's house, it being a long and bad way, and dark, and
having there put her in a doors, her husband being in bed, we left her and
so back to our coach, where the coachman had put it in order, but could
not find his whip in the dark a great while, which made us stay long. At
last getting a neighbour to hold a candle out of their window Mercer found
it, and so away we home at almost 12 at night, and setting them both at
their homes, I home and to bed.