Tuesday 17 June 1662
Up, and Mr. Mayland comes to me and borrowed 30s. of me to be paid again out of the money coming to him in the James and Charles for his late voyage. So to the office, where all the morning. So home to dinner, my wife not being well, but however dined with me.
So to the office, and at Sir W. Batten’s, where we all met by chance and talked, and they drank wine; but I forebore all their healths. Sir John Minnes, I perceive, is most excellent company. So home and to bed betimes by daylight.
20 Annotations
First Reading
Stephen Walkley • Link
When you click on Mr Mayland it brings details of Thomas Mallard.
Are they the same person?
A. De Araujo • Link
"and they drank wine:but I forebore all their healths."
One day at the time Sam;he is behaving more and more like an Alcoholic trying very hard to be sober.
Roboto • Link
"to bed betimes by daylight" It is hard to go to sleep in the daylight, but we are very near the longest day of the year.
David Ross McIrvine • Link
Perhaps Elizabeth was slow to get dressed on Sunday because she was ill? I suppose she'd have someone else dress her even when she was well (or help her dress)?
david
john lauer • Link
Just as modern American dictionaries have become descriptive rather than prescriptive, so also have Pepys's editors-translators confused 'forbear' (Sunday) with 'forebear' on Tuesday. 'Forbore' was and is the meaning intended.
daniel • Link
"but I forebore all their healths."
no wprries, Sam comes around soon enough.
Mary • Link
"to bed betimes...."
Depending on the style of the house, early retirement and sleep might have been assisted at this time of year by closing wooden shutters at the windows.
Mary • Link
Mayland/Mallard.
L&M gives Maylard as the name in this entry, with Mallard and Maylord as variant forms cited in the Companion volume
language hat • Link
"modern American dictionaries have become descriptive rather than prescriptive"
Excuse me? Has the OED (for instance) become American while I wasn't looking? *All* scientific/serious dictionaries are descriptive; that's what they're for, to describe the language.
And I have no idea what the dictionaries have to do with whatever you're trying to say about forebear/forebore. Nobody's "translating" Pepys; the editors are presenting what he wrote as accurately as they can.
Bradford • Link
Exactly what brownie points accrue from early bedtime?
Australian Susan • Link
Early bedtime
Having read the next day's diary entry, perhaps Sam went to bed early because he knew he had a busy day the next day, but was determined to make some time to do serious reading: all these long hours of daylight make this easier in June.
Mary • Link
Long days, short nights.
Pepys is possibly just being sensible; he wants a decent night's sleep before setting about work the following day and recognises that it's easier to fall asleep at the end of a busy day (even if it is still light) than to sleep on later in bright, morning light. One hour's sleep before midnight is popularly said to be worth two hours after midnight.
GrahamT • Link
...we are very near the longest day of the year.
Because of the 10 days difference between Pepys' calendar and the actual seasons, The summer solstice/longest day was on his 10/11th June, so he is on the long downward slope to winter. Winter draw(er)s on.
Todd Bernhardt • Link
re: dressing Elizabeth
David asked "I suppose she'd have someone else dress her even when she was well (or help her dress)?”
To which I can reply, absolutely. I was recently in London (and did both of the excellent Glyn Thomas’ excellent walks … pictures will be forthcoming on the discussion site in a week or two), and one of the things I did was tour the Globe Theatre on the South Bank. While waiting for the tour of the actual theatre space, I watched a demonstration called “Dressing Ophelia,” in which two women helped an audience member into what in Shakespeare’s day would have been considered casual clothes … even then, there were certain items (cuffs, the bodice, etc.) that could not be tied or otherwise secured by the person wearing them, usually because of the placement of the item on the body. If you were poor, you made do without these items of clothing, or wore another type (there was an interesting discussion of the bodice’s role in the origins of “straightlaced” as denoting a person of upright moral character), but if you were a person of means, who had to look a certain way, you simply had to have help dressing.
Jackie • Link
These were the days when requiring servants was seen as absolutely essential to being anywhere above the bottom rungs of society. Nowadays, needing help to get dressed suggests some incapacity on the part of the person being assisted, but in those days, it was a sign of social status.
There are many activities which Sam has done for him (including the barber shaving him) which a man of his status in society today would be expected to do himself. It's all to do with sending out the right signals that he's somebody to be reckoned with.
The ultimate example of the social pyramid of his day was the ncredible palaver which the King had to go through every night and morning, when careers in Court were made and destroyed by whether or not the King gave them a kind word when they handed him his shirt. King Charles II and Louis XIV spent hours each day in the formal getting dressed for the day and getting put to bed in the view of the Court, ensuring that each person present had an essential task to perform. (Then, of course when they'd finally gone, the King would often then scoot out of bed and nip down a handy corridor to sleep with his mistress).
Cumgranissalis • Link
"requiring servants was seen as absolutely..." natures answer to the unemployment problem or over population. All bodies need bread and clothing and housing, then there be little need for programmers, pilots and other make work projects etc..
Second Reading
Edith Lank • Link
In winter I get up at night
and dress by yellow candlelight.
In summer quite the other way
I have to go to bed by day...
--Robert Louis Stevenson
Gerald Berg • Link
Doesn't Sam eventually have eye trouble and have to quit the diary altogether? Reading/writing at night under low wattage is a big mistake.
Chris Squire UK • Link
Gerard Berg: you are correct but we shouldn't discuss this problem until it arises for SP.
Michaela • Link
This is nearly 30 years after today, but it gives an idea of the dressing process for a Lady - possible without help, but better with it. Probably less intricate for Liz:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M…