Saturday 31 May 1662

Lay long in bed, and so up to make up my Journall for these two or three days past. Then came Anthony Joyce, who duns me for money for the tallow which he served in lately by my desire, which vexes me, but I must get it him the next by my promise.

By and by to White Hall, hearing that Sir G. Carteret was come to town, but I could not find him, and so back to Tom’s, and thence I took my father to my house, and there he dined with me, discoursing of our businesses with uncle Thomas and T. Trice. After dinner he departed and I to the office where we met, and that being done I walked to my Brother’s and the Wardrobe and other places about business, and so home, and had Sarah to comb my head clean, which I found so foul with powdering and other troubles, that I am resolved to try how I can keep my head dry without powder; and I did also in a suddaine fit cut off all my beard, which I had been a great while bringing up, only that I may with my pumice-stone do my whole face, as I now do my chin, and to save time, which I find a very easy way and gentile. So she also washed my feet in a bath of herbs, and so to bed.

This month ends with very fair weather for a great while together. My health pretty well, but only wind do now and then torment me … [about the fundament – L&M] extremely. The Queen is brought a few days since to Hampton Court; and all people say of her to be a very fine and handsome lady, and very discreet; and that the King is pleased enough with her which, I fear, will put Madam Castlemaine’s nose out of joynt. The Court is wholly now at Hampton. A peace with Argier is lately made; which is also good news. My father is lately come to town to see us, and though it has cost and will cost more money, yet I am pleased with the alteracons on my house at Brampton. My Lord Sandwich is lately come with the Queen from sea, very well and in good repute. Upon an audit of my estate I find myself worth about 530l. ‘de claro’. The Act for Uniformity is lately printed, which, it is thought, will make mad work among the Presbyterian ministers. People of all sides are very much discontented; some thinking themselves used, contrary to promise, too hardly; and the other, that they are not rewarded so much as they expected by the King. God keep us all. I have by a late oath obliged myself from wine and plays, of which I find good effect.

40 Annotations

First Reading

Bradford  •  Link

"The Shorter Pepys" supplies the deficiency:

"My health pretty well, but only wind doth now and then torment me about the fundament extremely."

"Shorter" also gives special note to check "beard" in the glossary, which in this instance means not our full beard, but "moustache".

Robert Gertz  •  Link

"My house at Brampton..." Isn't it Dad's till he croaks, Sam?

Robert Gertz  •  Link

"...other troubles..."?

"Beth, would you comb my hair?"

Grimace as Elisabeth looks into the hideousness...

"Sarah, girl!"

Sarah takes a look and makes as if to flee the room. "Ma'am, no...Please." "Tis your job, girl!" Beth hisses in the corner.

Poor Sam sitting quietly, unaware of the brief struggle... "Would someone?" he looks to the ladies.

Sarah swallowing hard, faces her fate...

Oh, God! She turns away at the horrible sights.

Elisabeth watching, trying to chat pleasantly as Sam happily prattles about his day... "He's a good man, I love him...It's not his fault." Whisperingly repeated over and over.

Hmmn...Wonder what might be in my hair, she ponders with no little apprehension.
***

dirk  •  Link

"de claro"

Like many terms in accountancy, this expression is probably of italian origin. Sam also used "clear in the world" in an earlier entry, clearly meaning the same thing. But what exactly does it mean?

A. De Araujo  •  Link

"but only wind do now"
Is he constipated?

daniel  •  Link

"which I found so foul with powdering and other troubles, that I am resolved to try how I can keep my head dry without powder; "

this is good moment for all of us who are fascinated by the Pepys world to be grateful to live in our own.

Pauline  •  Link

"...and other troubles..."
From our lives to his, I wonder if he hasn't been scratching a bit at his scalp since his worry about the lousy birds yesterday. Enough talk about lice, and I find myself scratching--power of suggestion particularily strong for itchy things.

Cumgranissalis  •  Link

'Tis nice to have growth so that them their wenches can run their fingers through, "...and I did also in a suddaine fit cut off all my beard, which I had been a great while bringing up,..." but I be louzy now, after being on a hoy, and all them their fleas did come aboard and enjoy fresh skin.

Cumgranissalis  •  Link

Beard, it be, wot be called mutton chops or sideburns, now we doth have the picture of the pumice. Qu. how did he his remove beard or mutton chops, with a carving knife or would it be with a pirates cut-throat cutting blade. I wonder how many maidens [today] would sit down and comb out the lice et al, spoiling the ecology system?

Cumgranissalis  •  Link

no plums dried [pruning]"...then torment me . . . extremely..."\
from Robby Burns, where ere ye be, let the aire go free;", or sommut likez zat.

Australian Susan  •  Link

"declaro"
Dirk, I took this to mean that this is his net worth, once money due to others is paid out - that is, he actually has more cash in hand, but not all of it is 'available funds' as we might say now.

Cumgranissalis  •  Link

"de claro"
latin claro clare to illuminate to explain to make famous
[spanish light colored cigar ans mild]
declaro -are,-avi,-atum to make known announce
declare.? in anglaise,declarare publish
I make known my worth.

Cumgranissalis  •  Link

interesting : "...People of all sides are very much discontented; some thinking themselves used, contrary to promise, too hardly; and the other, that they are not rewarded so much as they expected by the King. God keep us all...."

Australian Susan  •  Link

Bradford points out that by 'beard' in this context, Sam actually means 'moustache' to us, so this probably means that the lost Savile portrait and the 'picture in little' showed Sam with not only his own hair and not a periwig, but also with a moustache - a very different Sam from the one known from later portraits.

Cumgranissalis  •  Link

"I may with my pumice-stone do my whole face, as I now do my chin, and to save time" My CHIN be the give away. Time be of the essence. 'tis a shame, we do not get this image of dashing Sam. I didith the rasputin look at one time. I doth think one does try out differing images to see if any look doth impress the gentler sex. The result usually be depressing, else one be getting prested from a passing collector of bodies required for the keel hawling.

jamie yeager  •  Link

"de claro"
maybe "de claro" could come across as "free and clear"...

Linda  •  Link

This diary entry led me to look at the history of razors. From plucking the hair to strange razors made of various items. Women, in Pepy's time, were leading up to the custom of totally plucking and shaving their eyebrows, if not their whole heads for the wearing of wigs.
http://www.quikshave.com/timeline…

GrahamT  •  Link

...wind do now and then torment me..:
All those peas he has been eating?
"Hark, hark, I hear thunder,
Must be the pease I ate last Sundah..."
Cumgranissalis is probablby old enough to remember this old childrens rhyme (and its crude ending!)

GrahamT  •  Link

de claro:
Clear: as in I have £350 clear, i.e. after all debts are … cleared.

Peter  •  Link

"Then came Anthony Joyce, who duns me for money...." I had always understood that "to dun" (ie chase payment of a debt) had its origin in the company Dun & Bradstreet, who offered such services. The fact that Sam uses it here suggests that it has a much earlier origin and that I've been the victim of a popular misconception. Any pointers on the origin? In any case Sam seems to feel that Anthony Joyce is chasing the debt very early ... and is clearly anxious to pay him. Presumably failure to pay on time will bring terrible consequences....if only to his reputation.

Mary  •  Link

to dun for payment.

Origin obscure according to OED. First used by Bacon after 1600 when quoting "the old besom-maker at Buxton". Blount (1636-1656) describes it as a "fancy" word, recently taken up.

Peter  •  Link

Also...love his use of the phrase "putting her nose out of joint". A favourite phrase still much used (at least by me) and clearly with a longer pedigree than I would have imagined.

Terry  •  Link

to dun for payment.
According to my 1977 Concise Oxford Dictionary, "dun" is an abbreviation of the obsolete word "dunkirk", meaning a privateer - from Dunkirk in France.

Stolzi  •  Link

Sam is pleased enough with his net worth to repeat it twice - yesterday and again today.

Would not Mr. Joyce's debt for tallow be one to be paid on the Navy's account, not a personal debt of Sam's?

Peter  •  Link

"Would not Mr. Joyce's debt for tallow be one to be paid on the Navy's account, not a personal debt of Sam's?” Stolzi, I agree…. but Sam seems to be taking it a bit personally, for some reason.

language hat  •  Link

de claro:
This is a medieval Latin phrase meaning 'net' (in the accounting sense). It's odd that it's not in the OED, since it was used pretty frequently down through the 17th century at least. You can see it used in a medieval Latin context ("Summa de claro .C.viij.s.xj.d.") in this very interesting page on the development of manorial accounts and accountancy:
http://paleo.anglo-norman.org/acc…

And in 17th-century English in the qualifications for a baronetcy (1611):
http://shop.store.yahoo.com/4cres…

"...and have also a certain yearly revenue in lands of inheritance of possession, one thousand pounds per annum de claro, or lands of the old rent, as good (in account) as one thousand pounds per annum of improved rents..."

Terry, does the SOED actually say that *is* the etymology, or is it just a suggestion? Because everybody else (including the Big Oxford) says the etymology is unknown.

JWB  •  Link

Dun
German Donner-to thunder, var. Dunder as in Dunder & Blitzen and of course our word thunder.

Stolzi  •  Link

Tallow and powder

Yes, that reference is helpful, Peter. If Pepys had done something in the nature of buying tallow himself and re-selling it at a profit to the Navy, he does need to come up with the money. (Ouch)

I'm wondering about the powder, as men did not powder their hair a la George Washington at this date. Was it something like today's "dry shampoo" to soak up the oil and, as Pepys says, keep his hair dry?

No wonder the scalp got revolting. Somebody needs to introduce our boy to soap and water.

A. De Araujo  •  Link

"de claro"
When I pass through customs, or when I file my income taxes I sometimes have something to de clare.

Robert Gertz  •  Link

Tony Joyce being a relative the whole tallow deal smells a bit suspicious...One can see why Sam would want to shut him up quick.

Second Reading

Terry Foreman  •  Link

Joyce had served in 20 barrels of hard English tallow to Deptford stores, and his bill (for £92 6s. 3d.) had been registered in the Navy Treasury on 29n April. Shish, the Deptford shipwright, on 4 June sent Pepys 'with haist' a certificate of its good quality, possibly at Pepys's request. Here's Pepys's promise to Joyce: "with Joyce about a project I have of his and my joyning, to get some money for my brother Tom and his kinswoman to help forward with her portion if they should marry. I mean in buying of tallow of him at a low rate for the King, and Tom should have the profit; but he tells me the profit will [ not ] be considerable, at which I was troubled, but I have agreed with him to serve some in my absence." http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"After dinner he departed and I to the office where we met" Sc. the Principal Officers had a meeting.
L&M note (also last post)

Terry Foreman  •  Link

The text of 'Charles II, 1662: An Act for the Uniformity of Publique Prayers and Administrac[i]on of Sacraments & other Rites & Ceremonies and for establishing the Form of making ordaining and consecrating Bishops Preists and Deacons in the Church of England.', Statutes of the Realm: volume 5: 1628-80 (1819), pp. 364-370. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/…

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

‘dun, v.3 . . compare dun n.2
1. trans. To make repeated and persistent demands upon, to importune; esp. for money due.
a1626 Bacon Apophthegmes in Baconiana (1679) The advice of the plain old man at Buxton that sold besoms..‘Friend, hast thou no money? borrow of thy back, and borrow of thy belly, they will never ask thee again: I shall be dunning thee every day’.
1656 T. Blount Glossographia To Dun, is a word lately taken up by fancy, and signifies to demand earnestly, or press a man to pay for commodities taken up on trust, or other debt . .

dun, n.2 . . Goes with dun v.3
. . 1708 Brit. Apollo No. 60. 2/1 The word Dun..owes its birth to one Joe Dun, a famous Bailif of the Town of Lincoln..It became a Proverb..when a man refused to pay his Debts, Why don't you Dun him? That is why don't you send Dun to arrest him?.. It is now as old as since the days of King Henry the Seventh.
1. One who duns; an importunate creditor, or an agent employed to collect debts.
1628 J. Earle Micro-cosmogr. liv. sig. K1, A Vniuersitie Dunne..Hee is an inferiour Creditor of some ten shillings or downwards... Hee is a sore beleaguerer of Chambers . . ’ [OED]

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"the old besom-maker at Buxton"

besom

Besom is a dialectal or historical word for what is now known as a broom, a household implement used for sweeping. The term "besom" is now mostly reserved for a "traditionally constructed" broom, made from a bundle of twigs tied to a stouter pole. The twigs used could be broom (i.e. Genista, whence the modern name "broom" for the tool), heather or similar.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bes…

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"The Queen is brought a few days since to Hampton Court; and all people say of her to be a very fine and handsome lady,"

L&M: She was short, plump an d of a good c olour, with prominent front teeth, fine eyes and a pleasant expression. Opinions about her looks varied greatly, though probably there cannot have been any real ground for doubt. They are collected in Burnet, i. 307, n. 4; to which may be added Monconys, ii. 19-20 (May 1662); Verney Mem., ii. 173; and James Yonge, Journal (ed. Poynter), pp. 43, 170. Charles himself wrote to Clarendon on 21 May that her eyes were 'excellent good', and that there was 'not any thing in her face that in the least degree can shoque one...': BM, Lansdowne 1236, f. 124r. Pepys' view was critical: https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/… He preserved several engraved portraits of her: J. Charrington, Cat. engraved portraits in PL, p. 29: PL 2973, p. 416. Later ib life she 'waddled like a duck': Yonge, p. 43.

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