About Saturday 1 June 1661

JedidiahStott on 27 Feb 2015  •  Link

The fleet setting out will have to buy provisions and maybe water in foreign parts, perhaps pay sailors something on account, pay port and harbour dues, likely bribe various officials, make appropriate presents to grandees , and many other expenses.

The imprest is a "float" money advanced for such purposes. It would not do to have England's grand fleet stuck in some foreign port unable to buy provisions to get home.

The imprest will have to be accounted for on return and any left over returned. The accounting for is part of Mr Pepys's job.

About Sunday 12 May 1661

JedidiahStott on 26 Feb 2015  •  Link

Tent :

Today's more high tech version is usually called a "stent".

About Thursday 7 February 1660/61

JedidiahStott on 16 Feb 2015  •  Link

The Montagus claimed a (dubious) descent from the great mediaeval house of Montacute , quondam EE of Salisbury , perhaps through a natural son of Thomas , 4th and last Earl of that line.

The proximate ancestor of the contemporary line was, as noted, Edw Montagu, LCJ temp Hen VIII, q.d. two dukedoms (of Montagu and of Manchester) an Earldom (of Sandwich) and a Bishop of Winchester, a creditable enough lineage in its own right .

The Villiers, OTOH , were mere clodhoppers until the first D of Buckingham, temp Jac I , an elevation that some might think shed little honour, however much wealth it might have brought.