A full appearance at the Council. The matter in debate was, whether we should send a deputy to New England, requiring them of the Massachusetts to restore such to their limits and respective possessions, as had petitioned the Council; this to be the open commission only; but, in truth, with secret instructions to inform us of the condition of those Colonies, and whether they were of such power, as to be able to resist his Majesty and declare for themselves as independent of the Crown, which we were told, and which of late years made them refractory. Colonel Middleton, being called in, assured us they might be curbed by a few of his Majesty's first-rate frigates, to spoil their trade with the islands; but, though my Lord President was not satisfied, the rest were, and we did resolve to advise his Majesty to send Commissioners with a formal commission for adjusting boundaries, etc., with some other instructions.
19th August, 1671. To Council. The letters of Sir Thomas Modiford were read, giving relation of the exploit at Panama, which was very brave; they took, burned, and pillaged the town of vast treasures, but the best of the booty had been shipped off, and lay at anchor in the South Sea, so that, after our men had ranged the country sixty miles about, they went back to Nombre de Dios, and embarked for Jamaica. Such an action had not been done since the famous Drake.
I dined at the Hamburg Resident's, and, after dinner, went to the christening of Sir Samuel Tuke's son,[Pg 69] Charles, at Somerset House, by a Popish priest, and many odd ceremonies. The godfathers were the King, and Lord Arundel of Wardour, and godmother, the Countess of Huntingdon.