difficult now, and troublesome to my mind to do it; but I this day made a
satisfactory entrance therein. Dined at home, and in the afternoon by
water to White Hall, calling by the way at Michell's, where I have not
been many a day till just the other day, and now I met her mother there
and knew her husband to be out of town. And here je did baiser elle, but
had not opportunity para hazer some with her as I would have offered if je
had had it. And thence had another meeting with the Duke of York, at
White Hall, on yesterday's work, and made a good advance: and so, being
called by my wife, we to the Park, Mary Batelier, and a Dutch gentleman, a
friend of hers, being with us. Thence to "The World's End," a
drinking-house by the Park; and there merry, and so home late.

And thus ends all that I doubt I shall ever be able to do with my own eyes
in the keeping of my journal, I being not able to do it any longer, having
done now so long as to undo my eyes almost every time that I take a pen in
my hand; and, therefore, whatever comes of it, I must forbear: and,
therefore, resolve, from this time forward, to have it kept by my people
in long-hand, and must therefore be contented to set down no more than is
fit for them and all the world to know; or, if there be any thing, which
cannot be much, now my amours to Deb. are past, and my eyes hindering me
in almost all other pleasures, I must endeavour to keep a margin in my
book open, to add, here and there, a note in short-hand with my own hand.

And so I betake myself to that course, which is almost as much as to see
myself go into my grave: for which, and all the discomforts that will
accompany my being blind, the good God prepare me!

May 31, 1669.

END OF THE DIARY.