INTRODUCTION xi 



afterwards a member of the Clothworkers' guild, Pepys was 

 a true Londoner. His tastes were centred entirely in the 

 town, and his pleasures were never sought either among 

 woods or green fields, or by the banks of trout streams and 

 rivers. His thoughts seem often tainted with the fumes of 

 the wine-bowl and the reek of the tavern ; and even when he 

 swore off drink, as he frequently did, he soon relapsed into 

 his customary habits. Educated in London and then at 

 Cambridge, where his love of a too flowing bowl already got 

 him into trouble more than once, he was imprudent enough 

 to incur the responsibilities of matrimony at the early age 

 of twenty-three, with a beautiful girl only fifteen years old. 

 Trouble soon stared this rash and improvident young couple 

 in the face, but they were spared the pangs of permanent 

 poverty through the aid and influence of Sir Edward 

 Montagu, afterwards Earl of Sandwich, who was a distant 

 relative of Pepys. Acting probably as Montagu's secret- 

 ary for some time, he was first appointed to a clerkship in 

 the Army pay office, and then soon afterwards became clerk 

 of the Acts of the Navy. Later on, like Evelyn, he held 

 various more important posts under the Crown, as well as 

 being greatly distinguished by promotion to non-official 

 positions of the highest honour. His official career was a 

 very brilliant one, and deservedly so from the integrity of 

 his work, from his application, despite frequent immoderation 

 in partaking of wine, and from his business-like methods of 

 work. As Commissioner for the Affairs of Tangier and 

 Treasurer, he visited Tangier officially. He twice became 

 Secretary to the Admiralty, and was twice elected to represent 

 Harwich in Parliament, after having previously sat for Castle 

 Rising. He was also twice chosen as Master of the Trinity 

 House, and was twice committed to prison, once on a charge 

 of high treason, and the other time (1690) on the charge of 

 being affected to King James II., upon whose flight from 

 England Pepys had laid down his office and withdrawn 

 himself into retirement. Elected a Fellow of the Royal 

 Society in 1665, he attained the distinction of being its 

 President in 1684. He was Master of the Clothworkers' 

 Company, Treasurer and Vice-President of Christ's Hospital, 

 and one of the Barons of the Cinque Ports. In 1699, four 



