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Terry Foreman has posted 16,447 annotations/comments since 28 June 2005.

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Second Reading

About Wednesday 2 January 1660/61

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"I took a turn in the Hall, and bought the King and Chancellor’s speeches at the dissolving the Parliament last Saturday."

L&M: His Majestie's gracious speech, together with the Lord Chancellor's, to both Houses of Parliament; on Saturday the 29th day of December, 1660. Being the day of their dissolution :
as also that of the speaker of the Honourable House of Commons, at the same time. https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Re…

About Wednesday 7 November 1660

Terry Foreman  •  Link

:After dinner he bid all go out of the room, and did tell me how the King had promised him 4000l. per annum for ever, and had already given him a bill under his hand (which he showed me) for 4000l. that Mr. Fox is to pay him."

L&M : This grant was made to support Sandwich's title. Stephen Fox was Comptroller of the King's Household.

About Wednesday 2 January 1660/61

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"....being called up to my Lord he did give me many commands in his business. As about taking care to write to my uncle that Mr. Barnewell’s papers should be locked up, in case he should die, he being now suspected to be very ill."

L&M: Robert Barnwell was Sandwich's steward at Hinchingbrooke. He died on 4 June 1662, heavily in debt to his employer.

About Saturday 20 February 1668/69

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"after dinner out with my wife and my two girls to the Duke of York’s house, and there saw “The Gratefull Servant,” a pretty good play, and which I have forgot that ever I did see."

L&M: The play was a tragicomedy by James Shirley, licensed in 1629 and published in 1630. There is no previous notice of it in the diary. Downes (p. 27) notes that the title-role, Dulcino, was played by Mrs Long, and that this, her first appearance 'in Man's Habit, prov'd as Beneficial to the Company, as several succeeding new Plays' Roscius Anglicanus by Downes, John, fl. 1661-1719;https://archive.org/det…

About Friday 19 February 1668/69

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"This morning, among other things, talking with Sir W. Coventry, I did propose to him my putting in to serve in Parliament, if there should, as the world begins to expect, be a new one chose: he likes it mightily, both for the King’s and Service’s sake, and the Duke of York, and will propound it to the Duke of York: and I confess, if there be one, I would be glad to be in."

L&M: For Pepys's parliamentary career, see https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/… and https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…

About Sunday 4 August 1667

Terry Foreman  •  Link

More on the War of Devolution

In the fighting, the French encountered minimal resistance; however, Louis was more concerned to assert his inheritance rights in the Spanish Empire, and consequently returned much of his gains in the May 1668 Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle. The terms were agreed by Emperor Leopold in January 1668, reinforced by the Triple Alliance of England, Sweden and the Dutch Republic.

The conflict marked the end of the long-standing Franco-Dutch alliance, and was the first of the French wars of expansion that dominated Europe for the next 50 years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War…

About Tuesday 1 January 1660/61

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"Called up this morning by Mr. Moore, who brought me my last things for me to sign for the last month, and to my great comfort tells me that my fees will come to 80l. clear to myself, and about 25l. for him, which he hath got out of the pardons, though there be no fee due to me at all out of them."

L&M: Pepys and Moore acted as Sandwich's deputies at the Privy Seal;: for their fees, see https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/… In December 1660 Pepys had signed 'a deadly number' of free pardons: see https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…

About Sunday 16 December 1660

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"In the afternoon I to White Hall, where I was surprised with the news of a plot against the King’s person and my Lord Monk’s; and that since last night there are about forty taken up on suspicion"

L&M: Overton's Plot; hatched by discontented sectaries and disbanded soldiers, allegedly under the lead of Maj.-Gen. Lanbert, at the time a prisoner in the Tower. Its aims were said to include the burning of Whitehall Palace, and the killing of the King and Albemarle: CSPVen. 1659-61, pp. 228, 230-1; M. P. Ashley, John Wildman, pp. 161+. Some examinations of those arrested are summarized in CSPD 1660-1, pp. 413, 416+.

About Thursday 18 February 1668/69

Terry Foreman  •  Link

Marcello Malpighi (10 March 1628 – 29 November 1694) was an Italian biologist and physician, who is referred to as the "Founder of microscopical anatomy, histology & Father of physiology and embryology". Malpighi's name is borne by several physiological features related to the biological excretory system, such as the Malpighian corpuscles and Malpighian pyramids of the kidneys and the Malpighian tubule system of insects. The splenic lymphoid nodules are often called the "Malpighian bodies of the spleen" or Malpighian corpuscles. The botanical family Malpighiaceae is also named after him. He was the first person to see capillaries in animals, and he discovered the link between arteries and veins that had eluded William Harvey. Malpighi was one of the earliest people to observe red blood cells under a microscope, after Jan Swammerdam. His treatise De polypo cordis (1666) was important for understanding blood composition, as well as how blood clots. In it, Malpighi described how the form of a blood clot differed in the right against the left sides of the heart.[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mar…

About Sunday 21 July 1667

Terry Foreman  •  Link

What Pepys and his friends may have sung:

Samuel Pepys was an avid collector of broadside ballads, which were at the height of their popularity in the 1660s, when Pepys was writing his diary.

Printed a large, single sheet of paper (thus ‘broadside’), these cheap, everyday items usually consisted of a news item, rhyme or ballad. Some 10,000 broadside ballads have survived into the present day, with Pepys’ collection consisting of some 1,800 items.

Often they would include a woodcut illustration and a name of a popular tune to be set to the words. The ballads were written on several topics, and Pepys sorted his into different categories, such as ‘History, True and Fabulous’, ‘Love Pleasant’ and ‘Love Unfortunate’. https://magdlibs.com/2015/01/14/p…

His famous collection is available here: https://ebba.english.ucsb.edu/pag…