6

had narrowly escaped destruction at the hands of a housemaid who was purloining the yellow sheets to light her fires. They were committed to the editorial care of Mr. William Bray, Treasurer of the Society of Antiquaries, who brought out the first edition in 1818. Mr. Bray derived special assistance from Mr. William Upcott of the London Institution, and it was under the superintendence of the latter gentleman, whose interest in the publication of this delightful book continued unabated until his death,' that the improved edition of 1827 was produced, the whole work being printed with great accuracy from the original MS. In 1850 John Forster incorporated the results of Mr. Upcott's latest labours in a new edition, of which successive reprints appeared under the same supervision. The last was published in 1858, with footnotes and numerous illustrations, in Bohn's Illustrated Library. This excellent edition, the latest revision of which was completed in 1887, has never been superseded, and leaves little to be desired.

6

The circumstances are now generally known which brought Mr. Pepys before the world in a different guise from that of ' a person of universal worth,' combining the severest morality of a philosopher, and all the polite accomplishments of a gentleman, who, discharging his duty to his prince and country with a religious application and perfect integrity, feared no one, courted no one, neglected his own fortune,'-so Collier, his contemporary, described him. Under the terms of his will, the collection of books on which he had spent the care of forty years came in 1724, on the death of his nephew and heir, Mr. John Jackson, into the possession of Magdalene College, Cambridge, the diarist's Alma Mater. There the three thousand volumes found a permanent home in the new buildings of the College (to the erection of which Pepys had contributed), the room containing them still bearing the inscription Bibliotheca Pepysiana,' on its front in the second court. Amongst the miscellaneous treasures of this collection were six small volumes, neatly and closely written in cypher, the whole comprising over three thousand pages. These had attracted little if any attention until, shortly after the appearance of Evelyn's diary, the Hon. and Rev. George Neville, Master of the College, showed them to his uncle, Lord Grenville. That statesman, recognising the character as a shorthand, recommended that some one should be sought, who for the lucre of gain' would devote a few months to the transcription of the whole MS., and promised to give him the benefit of his own knowledge of shorthand to assist him in the commencement of the undertaking. In accordance with this advice a

B 2

Mr.

Mr. John Smith was found, an undergraduate of St. John's College, who succeeded in accomplishing the task after the assiduous labour of three years. When the copy was complete, it was placed by Mr. Neville in the hands of his elder brother, Lord Braybrooke, by whom the principal portion of the diary was brought out in 1825. A fuller selection was given to the world in 1848. A revised edition, still further enlarged, was produced in 1853, to which additional notes were contributed by Peter Cunningham, Mr. James Yeowell, sub-editor of Notes and Queries,' and Mr. John Holmes of the British Museum.

Lord Braybrooke's treatment of the MS. entrusted to him has been severely criticised; but it cannot be denied that the notes furnished to his editions of Pepys are clear and valuable, manifesting much facility and success in the exploration of the untravelled region into which he had been so unexpectedly invited. It is easy to find fault with his selection on the ground of incompleteness. Nevertheless it is marked by sound discrimination, and the narrative, as abridged by him, if shorn of much interesting detail, is lucidly presented, and with sufficient fulness to satisfy the generality of readers. Still there were many who, sighing for the cruel something unpossessed,' rejoiced at the announcement of a new edition, based on a fresh transcription of the entire work, containing large additions of unpublished matter and edited by the Rev. Mynors Bright, Master of Magdalene.

Mr. Bright's edition, which was completed in 1879, is now being replaced by a practically complete presentment of the original diary. Whatever omissions were made by Lord Braybrooke, or Mr. Bright, were made deliberately, and cannot be attributed to any want of care on the part of either editor. Painstaking and enthusiastic as Lord Braybrooke was, he underrated the charm of those minute details which add so much to the effect, completeness, and reality of a picture. To peruse the pages of a secret diary is to be placed on terms of the closest intimacy with the writer. But the essence of intimacy is the cognizance of trifling occurrences. No selection from SO

ingenuous a record as that of Pepys could possibly satisfy the curiosity of the public. The desire to have the whole diary, the refusal to be satisfied with anything less, were sure to find expression. To Mr. Wheatley, therefore, a great debt of gratitude is due. In his pages we are able for the first time to read the actual diary. Both in bulk and in interest the additions are most important, throwing, as they do, fresh and vivid light on the character and doings of the diarist, and

including

including abundant references to the persons, places, customs, events, literature, and plays which bring before our eyes the social life of the Restoration era.

Mr. Wheatley produces everything that his predecessor discarded as tedious' or unfit for publication,' with the exception of a few passages which, as he plaintively protests, in fear of being reproached with an unnecessary squeamishness,' ' cannot possibly be printed.' The apology in our judgment is quite uncalled for. In fact the inclusion in this edition, for the first time, of many coarse, indecent, and disgusting entries, disgraceful to the diarist, and quite devoid of any legitimate interest, literary, social, or psychological, seems rather to require an explanation, the necessity for which does not seem to have occurred to the accomplished editor. It cannot be maintained that the character of Pepys would be incompletely portrayed if these nauseous passages were left out. His weaker side was always apparent; and if the extent of his moral aberrations and obliquities may have been underrated, still the publication of such details as are here obtruded to the eye of every reader cannot be considered either necessary or important for a just judgment of the man. That he recorded them in his private notebooks, concealed, be it remembered, by means of a rare cypher, further complicated by the use of dummy letters and a strange jargon of Latin, Greek, French, and Spanish, can be no excuse for their promiscuous diffusion more than two centuries after he made the last entry in the diary, expressing in its closing sentences his confidence in the secrecy of his cypher, and his resolve in future, in dictating it to his 'people,' to set down no more than is fit for them and all the world to know.' There can be no sufficient reason advanced to justify this new treatment of revelations which are in no sense confessions. It is clear that Pepys wrote his diary solely for his own satisfaction, and with no idea that it would ever be scanned by any eyes except his own. On the last day of 1664 he writes, "This Christmas I judged it fit to look over all my papers and books, and to tear up all that I found either boyish, or not worth keeping, or not fit to be seen, if it should please God to take me away suddenly.' Mr. Wheatley himself truly remarks: 'Other men have written diaries and confessions, but they have been intended either for the public or at least for a small circle of friends to see. This diary was only intended for the writer's eye. He wrote it in secret; and when he unguardedly told Sir William Coventry in the Tower that he kept a diary, he was sorry for the indiscretion immediately afterwards. It is therefore only fair to bear in mind that very few could bear

the

the accusing witness of such a truthful record of thoughts as well as actions as is here.'

The insertion of these objectionable entries serves no useful purpose. It must, as we think, seriously restrict the circulation of an otherwise excellent edition of a diary which must always be valued as an entertaining picture of the manners and chief personages of an exceptionally interesting period. The volumes are produced in a most attractive style, admirably printed, tastefully bound, and enriched with well-engraved portraits and other illustrations. A considerable amount of new matter has been incorporated with the notes of Lord Braybrooke and his coadjutors, which the present editor has wisely decided to supplement rather than attempt to supersede. Six of the eight volumes promised have now appeared, bringing the reader to that epoch of national disaster, the summer of 1667. The concluding volumes, we may hope, will be furnished with a complete index to the entire work, and also some valuable appendices, for which there would seem to be ample scope.

It is now time to turn from the history to the contents of the two diaries, in order to examine the sources of their widespread and well-established repute. Autobiography, whether in the form of continuous Memoirs, in which the personal fortunes of the narrator are interwoven with the history of his times, or as enshrined in the daily chronicle of his movements, and of the talk of the 'Change and the coffee-house, the market or the Court, became a favourite employment in the seventeenth century. Conscious, perhaps, that they were living in a period of rare social and political interest, men of thought and observation felt a pleasure in recording their impressions of occurrences which, if noticed at all in the Newesbooke' or the 'Gazette,' would certainly not be reflected there with either the fulness or the fidelity to all phases of contemporary feeling which have established the influence of the periodical literature of our own day. A great variety of such diaries and memoirs have been preserved. They repose for the most part on the shelves of libraries or of secondhand book-shops in their original editions. Some still remain in manuscript, either in private keeping or among the records of museums. A few have been reprinted by antiquarian societies or enterprising publishers in our own retrospective age. Two only, the volumes before us, have achieved universal fame, and appeared in those cheap editions which proclaim an undisputed acceptance. The Memorials of Clarendon and Whitelocke, Kennett and Burnet, Luttrell and Welwood, are now rarely consulted, except by the students of history. The diaries of Arch

The

bishop Laud and Bishop Lake, the autobiographies of Bishop Hall and Bishop Patrick, of Edmund Calamy and Richard Baxter, are chiefly of ecclesiastical interest. curious may turn to the pages of Aubrey and Ashmole, Hearne and Thoresby, or to the almost forgotten remains of Bishop Cartwright and Dean Granville, the diaries of Thomas Rugge and Henry Teonge, of Worthington and Ward; but the interest of these appeals only to a limited class of readers. Few sigh for the loss of the diaries of Coke and Camden; as few are those who study the Memoirs left us by Sir Symonds D'Ewes and Lord Anglesey, Henry Earl of Clarendon, and the Duke of Shrewsbury. Even the piquant reminiscences of Sir John Reresby and Count Anthony Hamilton are rarely to be met with. The very different fortune which has befallen the journals of Samuel Pepys and John Evelyn, enabling them to claim the undisputed title of the diarists of their age, is surely a phenomenon worthy of examination.

Differing as they did in many respects, not less in temperament and education than in their habits of life and social surroundings, the two men are linked together by one common characteristic, an unbounded curiosity. Each had the Athenian craving for some new thing,' happily accompanied by a peculiar facility in recording the information which rewarded their untiring inquisitiveness. With Pepys the curiosity was chiefly that of the gossip and the quidnunc; with Evelyn, who was above all things a virtuoso and philosophic observer, it took a more dignified form. As Pepys pushed his way into greater social importance, one mark of which was his admission into the privileged circle of the Royal Society, his interest in literary rarities and scientific experiments perceptibly increased. Evelyn on the other hand, whose opportunities of social observation were exceptional, was by no means averse to taking the measure of his acquaintances in a kindly way. Another link between the two men was their devotion to the public service, and this it was that laid the foundation of a connection between them which ripened in due course into a lifelong intimacy.

The account of their first meeting is related by Pepys. During the autumn of 1665 the great Plague was raging in London, and the Clerk of the Acts found it advisable to remove his household to Woolwich, remaining himself at his post in the Navy Office, until the business of the Admiralty was temporarily transferred to Greenwich, when he joined Mrs. Pepys at the lodgings which he had taken for her. This migration continued only for a few months; but the interval was sufficient to establish friendly relations between the vivacious official and the accomplished