Just as I was coming into the lodgings at Whitehall, a little before dinner, my Lord of Devonshire standing very near his Majesty's bedchamber door in the lobby, came Colonel Culpeper, and in a rude manner looking at my Lord in the face, asked whether this was a time and place for excluders to appear; my Lord at first took little notice of what he said, knowing him to be a hotheaded fellow, but he reiterating it, my Lord asked Culpeper whether he meant him; he said yes, he meant his Lordship. My Lord told him he was no excluder (as indeed he was not); the other affirming it again, my Lord told him he lied; on which Culpeper struck him a box on the ear, which my Lord returned, and felled him. They were soon parted, Culpeper was seized,[Pg 227] and his Majesty, who was all the while in his bedchamber, ordered him to be carried to the Greencloth officer, who sent him to the Marshalsea, as he deserved. My Lord Devon had nothing said to him.
I supped this night at Lambeth at my old friend's Mr. Elias Ashmole's, with my Lady Clarendon, the Bishop of St. Asaph, and Dr. Tenison, when we were treated at a great feast.