1665, 'for his extraordinary mercies and preservation of me this yeare, when thousands and ten thousands perish'd and were swept away on each side of me.' This hard work was a source of loss to Evelyn, as from time to time he advanced monies of his own to supply provisions for the needy committed to his care: and subsequent petitions for reinbursement were only partially successful.

But he was rewarded by the sunny warmth of that royal favour which cost nothing, because when the King returned from Oxford to Hampton Court and Evelyn went to wait upon his Majesty there at the end of January, 1666, he duly records how 'he ran towards me, and in a most gracious manner gave me his hand to kisse, with many thanks for my care and faithfulnesse in his service in a time of such greate danger, when every body fled their employments.' Poor Evelyn seems to have been rather easily duped in this sort of way.

'Then the Duke (of Albemarle) came towards me and embrac'd me with much kindnesse, telling me if he had thought my danger would have been so greate, he would not have suffer'd his Majesty to employ me in that station.' And so on, 'after which I got home, not being very well in health.' It certainly was such ridiculously insincere treatment that it might well have caused immediate sickening in one of robust health.
It was, forsooth, only in very minor matters that Evelyn profited by the royal favour or by his courtiership.

In April, 1666, Charles informed him that he must now be sworn for a Justice of the Peace, ('the office in the world I had most industriously avoided, in regard of the perpetual trouble thereoff in these numerous parishes'), and he only escaped this infliction by humbly desiring to be excused from fresh duties inconsistent with the other service he was engaged in.

So excused he was, by royal favour, for which he 'rendered his Majesty many thanks.' And on that same day he declined re-election to the Council of the Royal Society for the following year on 'earnest suite' of other affairs; for he had to be consistent in such different matters that would have engaged a portion of his time.
Besides his work in connection with prisoners and the Mint he was shortly afterwards nominated one of the Commissioners for regulating the farming and making of saltpetre and gunpowder throughout Britain, an appointment which was all the more appropriate from the fact that his grandfather, George Evelyn of Long Ditton and Wotton (1530-1603), had been the first to introduce the manufacture of gunpowder into England, when he established mills on both of his properties.