Saturday 6 September 1662
Lay long, that is, till 6 and past before I rose, in order to sweat a little away the cold which I was afraid I might have got yesterday, but I bless God I am well. So up and to my office, and then we met and sat till noon, very full of business. Then Sir John Minnes, both Sir Williams and I to the Trinity House, where we had at dinner a couple of venison pasties, of which I eat but little, being almost cloyed, having been at five pasties in three days, namely, two at our own feast, and one yesterday, and two to-day. So home and at the office all the afternoon, busy till nine at night, and so to my lodging and to bed.
This afternoon I had my new key and the lock of my office door altered, having lost my key the other day, which vexed me.
21 Annotations
First Reading
Bradford • Link
But did he get a duplicate key?
5 pasties + 3 days = 1 dose physic.
Terry F, • Link
Today SP preoccupied with his vexed body and soul.
Bradford, great query and mathematiques!
I expect all will out in the end.
A. De Araujo • Link
"in order to sweat a little away the cold"
I am lost,is he going to a sauna? do some exercise?
Todd Bernhardt • Link
re: "in order to sweat a little away the cold"
I think he lay long in bed under heavy covers in warm weather to work up his sweat (the old sweating-out/away a fever trick) ... no sauna for Sam.
Language Hat (or others), did "cloyed" have an additional meaning back then (of "bound" or constipated), or was it the modern meaning of feeling full to the point of surfeit?
Terry F, • Link
cloy verb cloyed, cloying
1. To supply with too much of something, especially something too rich or sweet; surfeit.
2. To satiate to the point of disgust.
See synonyms at glut, satiate, choke, gorge, sate, overindulge, surfeit; Antonym: whet.
[Short for obs. accloy, "to nail, hence, to clog, satiate. Middle English *inclavare*: from Latin clavus, nail.]
American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language
Australian Susan • Link
Sam is still worried about his health.
The trauma of the kidney stone passing episode (when a student) followed by the increasing discomfort and then pain leading to the trauma of the operation (see Tomalin for detailed account)still haunt him: he dreads a repeat of this sequence, even if a repeat operation of cutting was possible. And all this with no effective painkillers and no possiblity of anesthetic - not for years. You had to be tough. The author Fanny Burney underwent a mastectomy which she described in detail in her diary over a hundred years later, with no pharmaceutical assistance. Later still (1820s), the young Charles Darwin gave up a career in medicine after being tramatised by watching an operation on a child. Being at a loose end, he accepted an offer to be the companion of the young Capt Fitzroy on a ship called 'Beagle' - if he had had a stronger stomach, this wouldn't have happened. Queen Victoria was able to use ether during birth and this popularised anesthetics, but as late as the Boer War, army surgeons were reluctant to use them as they felt it was pampering troops (!) and Capt Oates (later of the Antarctic) wrote to his mother from South Africa that he felt he was 'weak'to accept anesthetic when he had a severe leg wound operated on. I think Sam would have been very glad to accept ether, chloroform or anything for his operation - all these references to his concerns for his health imply his anxieties.
dirk • Link
Menu of the month...
From:
"The Gentlewoman's Companion: or, A Guide to the Female Sex", 1675
Venison is not really in this month, according to "A Bill of Fare of Suitable Meat for every Month in the Year: September" - but then again Samuel is by now a real venison addict...
1. Capon and White-broth.
2. Neats-tongue and Udder roasted.
3. A powder'd Goose.
4. roast Turky.
Second Course.
1. A Potato-pye.
2. Roast Partridges.
3. A Dish of Larks.
4. Creams and Fruit.
http://chaucer.library.emory.edu/…
dirk • Link
From the same source as the above:
"Venison, how to recover when tainted?"
"Take a clean cloth and wrap your Venison therein, then bury it in the Earth one whole night, and it will take away the ill scent or favour."
Be my guest...
dirk • Link
Re Bradford:
This must be what they should call "constipational calculus" - a new and exciting (or at least very existential) branch of digestional algebra.
Cumgranissalis • Link
pasties; be they not scrap [left overs] ends of meat baked in a pastrie, waste not want not, 3 day old remakes dothe in this weather need a tough stumuck.
Kilroy • Link
What would be the cost of a new key and modified lock be in those times? That stuff had to be custom made then, no?
And how many gossips to tell Elizabeth on her return?
Sort of off topic. But has anybody else been thinking a recently berated employee http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1… may have had something to do with the disappearing key?
Robert Gertz • Link
"Brampton was...Ok." Bess notes as she alights from her carriage into Sam's waiting arms. "Oh, and Father Pepys sent along such a nice venison..."
Uhnn...
Mary • Link
superfluity of venison pasties.
Perhaps the keepers of deer-parks etc. were culling the older, less vigorous stags before the start of the rutting season; hence the sudden glut of venison. The pasties mentioned here were certainly regarded as celebratory dishes, not as the working-man's excuse for using up the left-overs.
Ruben • Link
Sam's waiting arms
In those days I do not think Sam would embrace his wife in public.
I would like to know that for sure. Any suggestion?
He would not, specially considering the smelly venison pasty in her baggage…
(who needs all those double g’s?!)
Nix • Link
Cloy --
Applicable meaning from OED:
5. To stop up, block, obstruct, choke up (a passage, channel, etc.); to crowd or fill up. Obs.
1548 W. PATTEN Expedition Scotl. in Arb. Garner III. 86 These keepers had rammed up their outer doors, cloyed and stopped up their stairs within, etc. 1570 LAMBARDE Peramb. Kent (1826) 89 The fresh is not able to checke the salt water that cloyeth the chanell. 1581 MULCASTER Positions xxxvii. (1887) 165 Those professions and occupations, which be most cloyed vp with number. 1611 SPEED Hist. Gt. Brit. IX. xvi. (1632) 841 The Dukes purpose was to haue cloyed the harbour by sinking ships laden with stones, and such like choaking materials. 1636 BOLTON Florus 204 The Alps themselves heapt high with winter snowes, and so the wayes cloyed up. 1636 G. SANDYS Paraphr. Div. Poems, Lam. ii. (1648) 5 Thy Anger cloyes the Grave.
BradW • Link
Cloy
If cloy is to clog as dray is to draught is to drag then does boy=bog?
Jeannine • Link
Robert and Ruben- Come off it!! Considering that Sam will only record taking one bath in the whole time he keeps the diary I highly doubt that anyone would "alight into his waiting arms"!
Jeannine • Link
In between high level math=physic (ie. "constipational calculus"); sweating out a cold, over-eating venison patties, which could have been tainted (ugh!) and wondering why Elizabeth will NOT alight into those waiting arms...Sam looks up into his mirror to catch a glimpse of himself before heading off to bed and it all starts to make sense, because....
http://www.kawaiigifts.com/catalo…
...and if this isn't true today, it probably will be tomorrow, once those patties kick in.....
Robert Gertz • Link
Oh,I think she will...After all Bess is not any more likely to be a steady bather. Besides, I hardly think they hold each other off at a distance when they lay long with much pleasure on those charming mornings. The real question, besides whether Margaret Pepys can cook a bearable venison pasty, will be just how much our girl is ready to say about the doin's at dear ole Brampton.
"So ....was very attentive?"
"Very attentive." Bess tries to look anywhere but at her beloved.
"Ah, so good of him. I see it must've been a very fine summer. Take a gander at the new house, we'll do the tour at dinner, must be off, busy times, my love, busy times." Sam happily strolls off...Beth staring after him...
Australian Susan • Link
Although it is from a later date, remember that Napoleon was supposed to prefer Josephine au natural - and would urge her not to bathe for a week before he returned home to her and not to wear scent. And what about all those women today who like sweaty men???
Second Reading
Bill • Link
“of which I eat but little, being almost cloyed”
to CLOY, to give one his fill, to glut.
---An Universal Etymological English Dictionary. N. Bailey, 1724.