Part 30

The curtain went up. I have never felt anything to compare with the cool breath of air from the stage, which fanned my heated brow. The first act was received sympathetically, and was followed by applause, and I seized the interval to run and see my mother. The second act passed without disapproval. The third, I knew, would mean success or disaster. It called forth cries of fear, but also thunders of applause; never before had they seen a dramatic situation so realistically, I had almost said so brutally, presented. Again I visited my mother; how I wished she could have been there! Then came the fourth and fifth acts, which were received by a tumultuous frenzy of delight; and when the author's name was called, the Duke of Orleans himself stood up to honour it.

The days of struggle were over, the triumph had come. Utterly unknown that evening, I was next morning the talk of Paris. They little knew that I had spent the night on the floor, by the bed of my dying mother.

* * * * *

JOHN EVELYN

Diary

John Evelyn, English country gentleman, courtier, diarist, and miscellaneous author, was born at Wotton, in Surrey, on October 31, 1620, and was educated at Lewes, and then at Balliol College, Oxford. He then lived at the Middle Temple, London; but after the death of Strafford, disliking the unsettled state of England, he spent three months in the Low Countries. Returning for a short time to England, he followed the Royalist army for three days; but his prudence overcame his loyalty, and, crossing the Channel again, he wandered for four years in France and Italy. His observations abroad are minutely recorded in the "Diary," which in its earlier part too often resembles a guide-book. Having married, in Paris, the British ambassador's daughter, Evelyn made his home, in 1652, at Sayes Court, Deptford, until he moved, in 1694; to Wotton, where he died on February 27, 1706. He was honourably employed, after the Restoration, on many public commissions, and was one of the founders of the Royal Society. Like his friend Samuel Pepys, Evelyn was a man of very catholic tastes, and wrote on a multitude of subjects, including history, politics, education, the fine arts, gardening, and especially forestry, his "Sylva, or a Discourse of Forest Trees," 1664, being, after the "Diary," his most famous work. Evelyn's character is very engaging in its richness, uprightness, and lively interests. His "Diary," like that of Pepys, lay long unpublished, and first saw the light in 1818.

I.--Early Years

I was born at Wotton, in the county of Surrey, October 31, 1620, after my father had been married about seven years, and my mother had borne him two daughters and one son.

My father's countenance was clear and fresh-coloured, his eyes quick and piercing, an ample forehead and manly aspect. He was ascetic and sparing; his wisdom was great, his judgement acute; affable, humble, and in nothing affected; of a thriving, silent, and methodical genius. He was distinctly severe, yet liberal on all just occasions to his children, strangers, and servants, a lover of hospitality; of a singular and Christian moderation in all his actions. He was justice of the peace, and served his country as high sheriff for Surrey and Sussex together, and was a person of rare conversation. His estate was esteemed about £4,000 per annum, well wooded, and full of timber.

My mother was of an ancient and honourable family in Shropshire. She was of proper personage, of a brown complexion, her eyes and hair of a lovely black, of constitution inclined to a religious melancholy or pious sadness, of a rare memory and most exemplary life, for economy and prudence esteemed one of the most conspicuous in her country.

Wotton, the mansion house of my father, is in the southern part of the shire, three miles from Dorking, and is upon part of Leith Hill, one of the most eminent in England for the prodigious prospect to be seen from its summit.

From it may be discerned twelve or thirteen counties, with part of the sea on the coast of Sussex on a serene day. The house large and ancient, suitable to those hospitable times, and sweetly environed with delicious streams and venerable woods.

November 3, 1640. A day never to be mentioned without a curse, began that long, foolish, and fatal Parliament, the beginning of all our sorrows for twenty years after.

January 2, 1641. We at night followed the hearse to the church at Wotton, where my father was interred, and mingled with the ashes of our mother, his dear wife. Thus we were bereft of both our parents in a period when we most of all stood in need of their counsel and assistance, especially myself, of a raw and unwary inclination.

II.--Travels Abroad

May 12, 1641. I beheld on Tower Hill the fatal stroke which severed the wisest head in England from the shoulders of the Earl of Strafford, whose crime coming under the cognisance of no human law, a new one was made to his destruction--to such exorbitancy were things arrived.

July 21. Having procured a pass at the custom-house, embarked in a Dutch frigate bound for Flushing, convoyed by five other stout vessels, whereof one was a man-of-war.

April 19, 1644. Set out from Paris for Orleans. The way, as indeed most of the roads in France, is paved with a small square freestone, so that there is little dirt and bad roads, as in England, only it is somewhat hard to the poor horses' feet.

October 7. We had a most delicious journey to Marseilles, through a country full of vineyards, oliveyards, orange-trees, and the like sweet plantations, to which belong pleasantly situated villas built all of freestone.

We went to visit the galleys; the captain of the galley-royal gave us most courteous entertainment in his cabin, the slaves playing loud and soft music. Then he showed us how he commanded their motions with a nod and his whistle, making them row out. The spectacle was to me new and strange, to see so many hundreds of miserably naked persons, having their heads shaven close, and having only high red bonnets, a pair of coarse canvas drawers, their whole backs and legs naked, doubly chained about their middles and legs in couples, and made fast to their seats, and all commanded by a cruel seaman. Their rising forward and falling back at their oar is a miserable spectacle, and the noise of their chains with the roaring of the beaten waters has something of the strange and fearful to one unaccustomed to it. They are chastised on the least disorder, and without the least humanity; yet are they cheerful and full of knavery.

January 31, 1645. Climbing a steep hill in Naples, we came to the monastery of the Carthusians, from whence is a most goodly prospect towards the sea and city, the one full of galleys and ships, the other of stately palaces, churches, castles, gardens, delicious fields and meadows, Mount Vesuvius smoking, doubtless one of the most considerable vistas in the world.

The inhabitants greatly affect the Spanish gravity in their habit, delight in good horses; the streets are full of gallants on horseback, in coaches, and sedans. The country people are so jovial and addicted to music that the very husbandmen almost universally play on the guitar, singing and composing songs in praise of their sweethearts, and will commonly go to the field with their fiddle; they are merry, witty, and genial, all which I much attribute to the excellent quality of the air. They have a deadly hatred to the French, so that some of our company were flouted at for wearing red cloaks, as the mode then was.

This I made the end of my travels, sufficiently sated with rolling up and down, since, from the report of divers experienced and curious persons, I had been assured there was little more to be seen in the rest of the civil world, after Italy, France, Flanders, and the Low Country, but plain and prodigious barbarism.

Thus, about February 7, we set out on our return to Rome by the same way we came, not daring to adventure by sea, as some of our company were inclined, for fear of Turkish pirates hovering on that coast.

III.--Evelyn in England

May 22, 1647. I had contracted a great friendship with Sir Richard Browne, his majesty's Resident at the Court of France, his lady and family, and particularly set my affections on a daughter.

June 10. We concluded about my marriage, and on Thursday 27, Dr. Earle married us in Sir Richard Browne's chapel, betwixt the hours of eleven and twelve some few select friends being present; and this being Corpus Christi, feast was solemnly observed in this country; the streets were sumptuously hung with tapestry and strewn with flowers.

July 8, 1656. At Ipswich--one of the sweetest, most pleasant, well-built towns in England. I had the curiosity to visit some Quakers here in prison--a new fanatic sect, of dangerous principles, who show no respect to any man, magistrate or other, and seem a melancholy, proud sort of people, and exceedingly ignorant.