Buckingham, while busy with "The Rehearsal," threatened to bring Sir William Coventry (uncle of Sir John) into a play at the King's House, but Coventry's courage averted the attempt.[1] He challenged the Duke for the intended insult, and was committed to the Tower by the King for sending a challenge to a person of the Duke's distinction.
Charles's conduct was in no way changed by the personality of the abuse employed against him in the House of Commons. He still visited
His Clevelands, his Nells, and his Carwells.
Evelyn records a walk made on the 2nd March, 1671, in which he attended him through St. James's Park, where he both saw and heard "a familiar discourse between the King and Mrs. Nelly, as they called an impudent comedian, she looking out of her garden on a terrace at the top of the wall, and the King standing on the green walk under it." The garden was attached to her house in Pall Mall, and the ground on which Nelly stood was a Mount or raised terrace, of which a portion may still be seen under the park wall of Marlborough House. Of this scene, at which Evelyn tells us he was
- ↑ Pepys, 4 March, 1688-9.
