(Monday).
Father’s servants (father having in the garden told me bad stories of my wife’s ill words), 14s.
one that helped at the horses, 2s.
menders of the highway, 2s.
Pleasant country to Bedford, where, while they stay, I rode through the town; and a good country-town;
and there, drinking, 1s.
We on to Newport; and there ’light, and I and W. Hewer to the Church,
and there give the boy 1s.
So to Buckingham, a good old town. Here I to see the Church, which very good, and the leads, and a school in it:
did give the sexton’s boy 1s.
A fair bridge here, with many arches: vexed at my people’s making me lose so much time;
reckoning, 13s. 4d.
Mighty pleased with the pleasure of the ground all the day. At night to Newport Pagnell; and there a good pleasant country-town, but few people in it. A very fair — and like a Cathedral — Church; and I saw the leads, and a vault that goes far under ground, and here lay with Betty Turner’s sparrow: the town, and so most of this country, well watered. Lay here well, and rose next day by four o’clock: few people in the town: and so away.
Reckoning for supper, 19s. 6d.
poor, 6d.
Mischance to the coach, but no time lost.
on the highway
through town drinking
the light in
a bridge with many arches
like a cathedral
and I go under
with sparrow and water
and the poor
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Monday 8 June 1668 (Pepys’ rough notes for a missing entry)