rendered in indelible characters his passing thoughts of the moment. And this being the case, comparison between the two Diaries would be just as unfair as it is unnecessary. The one is the fruit of unrestrained freedom and a mirthful mind, while the other is the product of cultured leisure and a refined literary method. When Evelyn was Commissioner for the maintenance of the Dutch prisoners (1664-70) he had frequent communications with Pepys, then of the Navy, and there are special references to him in Evelyn’s memoirs. That an intimate friendship existed there is no doubt, and that they each held the other in great respect as a man of intellect, as well as of good business capacity, is equally clear. Thus, in June, 1669, he encouraged Pepys to be operated on ‘when exceedingly afflicted with the stone;’ and on 19 February, 1671, ‘This day din’d with me Mr. Surveyor, Dr. Christopher Wren, and Mr. Pepys, Cleark of the Acts, two extraordinary ingenious and knowing persons, and other friends. I carried them to see the piece of carving which I had recommended to the King.’ This was a masterpiece of Grinling Gibbon’s work, which Charles admired but did not purchase; so Gibbon not long after sold it for £80, though ‘well worth £100, without the frame, to Sir George Viner.’ Evelyn at this time got Wren, however, to promise faithfully to employ Gibbon to do the choir carving in the new St. Paul’s Cathedral.

Each of their Diaries teems with reference to the other. Pepys asked Evelyn to sit to Kneller for his portrait which he desired for ‘reasons I had (founded upon gratitude, affection, and esteeme) to covet that in effigie which I most truly value in the original.’ This refers to the well-known portrait, now at Wotton, that has been copied and engraved.

  It appears to have been begun in October, 1685, but it was not till July, 1689, that the commission was actually completed. The portrait exhibits the face of an elderly man distinctly of a high-strung and nervous temperament, though not quite to the extent of being ‘sicklied oer with the pale caste of thought.’ His right hand, too, which grasps his Sylva is one very characteristic of the nervous disposition. A bright, shrewd intellect, lofty thoughts, high motives, good resolves, and—last, tho’ by no means least—a serene mind, the mens conscia recti which Pepys bluntly called ‘a little conceitedness,’ are all stamped upon his well-marked and not unshapely features. It is eminently the face of a philosopher, an enthusiast, a studious scholar, and a gentleman.

No one can ever know Evelyn so well as Pepys did; and here is his opinion of John Evelyn, expressed in the secret pages of his cipher Diary on November, 1665:—‘In fine, a most excellent person he is, and must be allowed a little for a little conceitedness; but he may well be so, being a man so much above others.’ And this just exactly bears out the rough general impression conveyed by the perusal of Evelyn’s Diary and his other literary works. The long friendship of these two was only terminated by the death of Pepys on 26th May, 1703, not long before Evelyn had himself to depart from this life. ‘This day died Mr. Sam. Pepys, a very courtly, industrious and curious person, none in England exceeding him in knowledge of the navy, in which he had passed through all the most considerable offices, Clerk of the Acts and Secretary of the Admiralty, all which he performed with great integrity. When King James II., went out of England, he laid down his office and would serve no more..... He was universally belov’d, hospitable, generous, learned in many things, skilled in music, a very great cherisher of learned men of whom he had the conversation..... Mr. Pepys had been for near 40 yeares so much my particular friend, that Mr. Jackson sent me compleat mourning, desiring me to be one to hold up the pall at his magnificient obsequies, but my indisposition hinder’d me from doing him this last office.’

  II
Evelyn’s Childhood, Early Education, and Youth.

The essential facts of Evelyn’s life, as he himself would have us know them, are set forth at full length in autobiographical form, chronologically arranged in what is always spoken of as his Diary, although evidently this was (much of it, at any rate) merely a subsequent personal compilation from an actual diary, kept in imitation of his father, from the age of 11 years onwards and down even to within one month of his death in 1706.

The second son and the fourth child of Richard Evelyn of Wotton in Surrey, and of his wife Eleanor, daughter of John Stansfield ‘of an ancient honorable family (though now extinct) in Shropshire,’ he was born at Wotton on 31st. October, 1620. His father, ‘was of a sanguine complexion, mixed with a dash of choler; his haire inclining to light, which tho’ exceeding thick became hoary by the time he was 30 years of age; it was somewhat curled towards the extremity; his beard, which he wore a little picked, as the mode was, of a brownish colour, and so continued to the last, save that it was somewhat mingled with grey haires about his cheekes: which, with his countenance, was cleare, and fresh colour’d, his eyes quick and piercing, an ample forehead, manly aspect; low of stature, but very strong. He was for his life so exact and temperate, that I have heard he had never been surprised by excesse, being ascetic and sparing. His wisdom was greate, and judgment most acute; of solid discourse, affable, humble and in nothing affected; of a thriving, neat, silent and methodical genius; discretely 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; a Justice of the Peace and of the Quorum; he served his country as High Sheriff for Surrey and Sussex together. He was a studious decliner of honours and titles, being already in that esteem with his country that they could have added little to him besides their burden. He was a person of that rare conversation,   that upon frequent recollection, and calling to mind passages of his life and discourse, I could never charge him with the least passion or inadvertence. His estate was esteem’d about £4,000 per ann. well wooded and full of timber.’ As for his mother, ‘She was of proper personage; of a brown complexion; her eyes and haire of a lovely black; of constitution inclyned to a religious melancholy, or pious sadnesse; of a rare memory and most exemplary life; for œconomie and prudence esteemed one of the most conspicuous in her Country.’

Apparently John Evelyn thought he had made a very judicious choice of his father and mother when he wrote ‘Thus much in brief touching my parents; nor was it reasonable I should speake lesse to them to whom I owe so much.’

These passages, occurring in the first two pages of his Diary serve at once to illustrate a very characteristic feature of Evelyn’s mind, and one that is everywhere discernible in his writings. He was a man with a highly cultured and a very well balanced mind, but he was somewhat inclined to exaggerate; and he certainly had the rather enviable gift of considering everything pertaining to him, or approved or advocated by him, as very superior indeed. All his eggs had two yolks, and all his geese were swans. What he liked, he loved; and what he did not like, he hated. There was no golden mean with him; he was either very optimistic or else intensely pessimistic. Hence, naturally, he gave hard knocks to those who differed from him in opinion, and particularly after the Restoration; for he was one of the most expressive among King Charles II’s courtiers. Direct evidence of this special temperament was