He disliked Penn--thought him a 'mean rogue,' a 'coxcomb,' and a 'false rascal,' but he was very sore over the supersession of his patron, Sandwich, and so long as Penn abused Monck, Pepys was glad enough to listen to him, and ready to believe anything he said in disparagement of the late battle.

Penn was no less bitter against Monck, and when his chief, the Duke of York, was retired he had sulkily refused to serve under the new commander-in-chief.

For this reason Penn had not been present at the action, but he was as ready as Pepys to believe anything he was told against Monck, and we may be sure the stories of grumbling officers lost nothing when he repeated them into willing ears.

That Penn really told Pepys the English had not fought in line is quite incredible, even if he was, as Sir George Carteret, treasurer of the navy, called him, 'the falsest rascal that ever was in the world.' The fleet orders and the French testimony make this practically impossible.

But he may well have expressed himself very hotly about the new instruction issued by Monck and Rupert which modified his own, and placed the destruction of the enemy above a pedantic adherence to the line.