Thursday 14 July 1664

My mind being doubtful what the business should be, I rose a little after four o’clock, and abroad. Walked to my Lord’s, and nobody up, but the porter rose out of bed to me so I back again to Fleete Streete, and there bought a little book of law; and thence, hearing a psalm sung, I went into St. Dunstan’s, and there heard prayers read, which, it seems, is done there every morning at six o’clock; a thing I never did do at a chappell, but the College Chappell, in all my life.

Thence to my Lord’s again, and my Lord being up, was sent for up, and he and I alone. He did begin with a most solemn profession of the same confidence in and love for me that he ever had, and then told me what a misfortune was fallen upon me and him: in me, by a displeasure which my Lord Chancellor did show to him last night against me, in the highest and most passionate manner that ever any man did speak, even to the not hearing of any thing to be said to him: but he told me, that he did say all that could be said for a man as to my faithfullnesse and duty to his Lordship, and did me the greatest right imaginable. And what should the business be, but that I should be forward to have the trees in Clarendon Park marked and cut down, which he, it seems, hath bought of my Lord Albemarle; when, God knows! I am the most innocent man in the world in it, and did nothing of myself, nor knew of his concernment therein, but barely obeyed my Lord Treasurer’s warrant for the doing thereof. And said that I did most ungentlemanlike with him, and had justified the rogues in cutting down a tree of his; and that I had sent the veriest Fanatique [Deane] that is in England to mark them, on purpose to nose —[provoke]— him. All which, I did assure my Lord, was most properly false, and nothing like it true; and told my Lord the whole passage. My Lord do seem most nearly affected; he is partly, I believe, for me, and partly for himself. So he advised me to wait presently upon my Lord, and clear myself in the most perfect manner I could, with all submission and assurance that I am his creature both in this and all other things; and that I do owne that all I have, is derived through my Lord Sandwich from his Lordship. So, full of horror, I went, and found him busy in tryals of law in his great room; and it being Sitting-day, durst not stay, but went to my Lord and told him so: whereupon he directed me to take him after dinner; and so away I home, leaving my Lord mightily concerned for me.

I to the office, and there sat busy all the morning. At noon to the ’Change, and from the ’Change over with Alsopp and the others to the Pope’s Head tavern, and there staid a quarter of an hour, and concluded upon this, that in case I got them no more than 3s. per week per man I should have of them but 150l. per ann., but to have it without any adventure or charge, but if I got them 3s. 2d., then they would give me 300l. in the like manner. So I directed them to draw up their tender in a line or two against the afternoon, and to meet me at White Hall. So I left them, and I to my Lord Chancellor’s; and there coming out after dinner I accosted him, telling him that I was the unhappy Pepys that had fallen into his high displeasure, and come to desire him to give me leave to make myself better understood to his Lordship, assuring him of my duty and service. He answered me very pleasingly, that he was confident upon the score of my Lord Sandwich’s character of me, but that he had reason to think what he did, and desired me to call upon him some evening: I named to-night, and he accepted of it. So with my heart light I to White Hall, and there after understanding by a stratagem, and yet appearing wholly desirous not to understand Mr. Gauden’s price when he desired to show it me, I went down and ordered matters in our tender so well that at the meeting by and by I was ready with Mr. Gauden’s and his, both directed him a letter to me to give the board their two tenders, but there being none but the Generall Monk and Mr. Coventry and Povy and I, I did not think fit to expose them to view now, but put it off till Saturday, and so with good content rose.

Thence I to the Half Moone, against the ’Change, to acquaint Lanyon and his friends of our proceedings, and thence to my Lord Chancellor’s, and there heard several tryals, wherein I perceive my Lord is a most able and ready man. After all done, he himself called, “Come, Mr. Pepys, you and I will take a turn in the garden.” So he was led down stairs, having the goute, and there walked with me, I think, above an houre, talking most friendly, yet cunningly. I told him clearly how things were; how ignorant I was of his Lordship’s concernment in it; how I did not do nor say one word singly, but what was done was the act of the whole Board. He told me by name that he was more angry with Sir G. Carteret than with me, and also with the whole body of the Board. But thinking who it was of the Board that knew him least, he did place his fear upon me; but he finds that he is indebted to none of his friends there. I think I did thoroughly appease him, till he thanked me for my desire and pains to satisfy him; and upon my desiring to be directed who I should of his servants advise with about this business, he told me nobody, but would be glad to hear from me himself. He told me he would not direct me in any thing, that it might not be said that the Lord Chancellor did labour to abuse the King; or (as I offered) direct the suspending the Report of the Purveyors but I see what he means, and I will make it my worke to do him service in it. But, Lord! to see how he is incensed against poor Deane, as a fanatique rogue, and I know not what: and what he did was done in spite to his Lordship, among all his friends and tenants. He did plainly say that he would not direct me in any thing, for he would not put himself into the power of any man to say that he did so and so; but plainly told me as if he would be glad I did something.

Lord! to see how we poor wretches dare not do the King good service for fear of the greatness of these men.

He named Sir G. Carteret, and Sir J. Minnes, and the rest; and that he was as angry with them all as me.

But it was pleasant to think that, while he was talking to me, comes into the garden Sir G. Carteret; and my Lord avoided speaking with him, and made him and many others stay expecting him, while I walked up and down above an houre, I think; and would have me walk with my hat on.

And yet, after all this, there has been so little ground for this his jealousy of me, that I am sometimes afeard that he do this only in policy to bring me to his side by scaring me; or else, which is worse, to try how faithfull I would be to the King; but I rather think the former of the two.

I parted with great assurance how I acknowledged all I had to come from his Lordship; which he did not seem to refuse, but with great kindness and respect parted. So I by coach home, calling at my Lord’s, but he not within.

At my office late, and so home to eat something, being almost starved for want of eating my dinner to-day, and so to bed, my head being full of great and many businesses of import to me.

37 Annotations

First Reading

Terry F  •  Link

"My mind being doubtful what the business should be...."

doubtful = suspicious

Robert Gertz  •  Link

Yikes! While I can't help suspecting Sandwich rather enjoyed making Sam quake with fear, what a terrible, humiliating, and insulting (if faintly comic) situation...And for poor Deane, likewise a good man simply trying to do his job. And Clarendon one of the ablest men in the government. At least he had the good sense not to overly torment an able man doing his level best. And of course it still happens today when the mighty and powerful are displeased by some poor fellow...Though at least now (usually) they can't threaten him/her with more than unemployment (You US attorneys won't harass Dems?! You all are fired!!!).

Yet given Clarendon's mild behavior at the end, I still can't help thinking Sandwich played up the nightmare scenario a bit. He's been quite annoyed with Sam recently and perhaps didn't mind a chance to remind his uppity former servant of his true place in the scheme of things.

But the CoA will have his day...

"You do your work as you do and they did what to you?!" Bess stares at the fuming Sam. "Break them, Sam'l! All of them!!!"

"Oh, I'll break them, Elisabeth. I'll see them all ruined and put down...And will outlast them all. See if I don't."

[Theme from "House of Cards" trilogy playing in background.]

Terry F  •  Link

A "little book of law" and the sound of "a psalm sung" are surely an auspicious start for the day of Samuel Pepys!

Terry F  •  Link

The issue

Pepys is at first blamed by Sir Edward Hyde for the marking of his standing trees with the King's arrow to be cut for the navy purveyors; but Pepys protests, not knowing Hyde's property (interest) was involved, he was but a member of the Navy Board who have but done the bidding of the Lord Treasurer, Thomas Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton , who was responsible for royal forests.

Paul Chapin  •  Link

my Lord Treasurer
The link goes to Southampton, Lord Treasurer of England, and Terry incorporates this identification in his excellent synopsis of the issue. This is certainly a defensible reading, and possibly the correct one, but I'm wondering if Pepys didn't actually mean Carteret, Treasurer of the Navy Board. There's been no indication earlier in the diary of Southampton's direct involvement in Navy matters in any way, and Hyde's ire is explicitly directed at Carteret, both in his talking to Sam and in his snubbing of Sir G. in the garden.

It's quite shrewd of Sam, by the way, to suspect that there's more going on here than just the trees. It's that kind of instinct that made him a successful public servant and political player throughout his career.

Jesse  •  Link

"[B]ut I rather think the former of the two"

I.e. "that he do this only in policy to bring me to his side by scaring me." Hyde almost admits as much when "thinking who it was of the Board that knew him least, he did place his fear upon me." And it works "I will make it my worke to do him service in it." There probably was some measure taken of each other, with an eye towards the future, when they "walked up and down above an houre." Rather a long and interesting day filled with the anxiety and "horror" at work that echos over time to similiar experiences in the office today.

Cumsalisgrano  •  Link

Cap in place was the first good sign. Strolling to-gether in quad allows for a sense of being on par, on semi neutral turf along with some of the board being on the spot getting tape-recordings in order.
Delicious entry.
The old headmaster/chief executive syndrom, water testong.

Michael Robinson  •  Link

" ... hearing a psalm sung, I went into St. Dunstan's, ..."

The Common Prayer psalms for the morning of the 14th. day:

Psalm 71 -- In thee, O Lord, have I put my trust, let me never be put to confusion : but rid me, and deliver me, in thy righteousness; incline thine ear unto me, and save me. ...

Psalm 72 -- Give the King thy judgments, O God : and thy righteousness unto the King's son. ...

The first, or both, might offer as much consolation to SP as book purchase in the anxiety of early rising.

j atkinson  •  Link

"Lord! to see how we poor wretches dare not do the King good service for fear of the greatness of these men." He might be asked to walk with the great and even keep his hat on, but they never will let him forget the he is not one of them.

jeannine  •  Link

In his book "All for the King Balleine" explains that Carteret got involved in a quarrel with Clarendon who "Deeply resented the cutting down of some timber in his park, which was requisitioned for the Navy, and complained that Carteret had sent the 'veriest fanatic in all England' to mark the doomed trees. 'He was never so angry in all his life', says Pepys, 'as he was in this business, in a great passion'. As a result the two old friends were never again on their former terms of intimacy." (p. 126), so, Balleine concurs with Paul's interpretation.

What is rather disheartening is that Clarendon and Carteret's friendship goes way back to the days when Carteret was the governor of Jersey Island and he offered refuge to the then Prince of Wales and Hyde (as he was known in those days) in 1646. Hyde stayed as a guest of Carteret for 2 years and wrote his famous "History" during that time. Hyde always spoke about Carteret in the warmest terms and was highly complimentary of his generosity, abilities, etc. Sad to see a friendship, well established for almost twenty years, damaged over this issue. I also have a hard time thinking that Carteret would have any "political agenda" in mind with the marking of these trees for the Navy, other than they needed the timber, they were (in his mind) 'the King's trees' and not Hyde's, and it was business for the King. When push comes to shove, Carteret would ALWAYS stand on the side that he believed was best for the King. He was never a man known for any back room politics, etc.

Robert Gertz  •  Link

Well, that said it's a little to both Carteret's and Clarendon's credit that neither seems to be trying to foist the responsibility for their dispute onto poor Pepys' shoulders. Though of course Sam has Sandwich, Coventry, and to some extent the Duke, looking out for him and no doubt assuring Hyde that young Pepys is one of "their" young men.

Poor Deane, however...

Interesting that he hasn't come running in panic to Sam for help...Yet.

language hat  •  Link

"He told me he would not direct me in any thing, that it might not be said that the Lord Chancellor did labour to abuse the King... but I see what he means, and I will make it my worke to do him service in it."

A sleazy business, public service. As Cumsalisgrano says, a delicious entry, but dispiriting as well.

Bradford  •  Link

"So, full of horror, I went": and whatever the outcome proves to be, a sentiment to which every bosom returns an echo. Talk about being unable to see the forest for the trees.

JWB  •  Link

sleazy business

1) "...that I was the unhappy Pepys..." So Uriah(son of Samuel)Heep(rhymes w/Peep)-ish, reminds me that Dickens was a Diary reader.

2)"He told me he would not direct me in any thing..." Quantum leaps since Henry II.

Terry F  •  Link

my Lord Treasurer and Carteret

Phil's link may go to Thomas Wriothesley, 4th Earl of Southampton, Lord Treasurer of England, because of an L&M note that I've quoted: "The Lord Treasurer was responsible for royal forests" -- which Carteret surely was not -- and Pepys refers to Carteret as "Sir G. Carteret" rather than as "my Lord Treasurer."

Perhaps my Lord Chancellor is esp. piqued at Sir G. Carteret because he expected his friend to have protected his interest, whereas Pepys was the unknown on whom he could have counted least to have played such a role, but whom he now shrewdly afrights into lining up on his side in whatever the Navy Board should discuss?

Pedro  •  Link

The Tree Fellers.

"The cause of the offence, for which Pepys had no difficulty in showing that he was in no way responsible, was the marking of standing timber in Clarendon Park for felling by the Navy purveyors acting under a warrant from the Treasury. Clarendon's temper at the best of times was at a short fuse. Inflamed by gout and irritated by the pettishness of unrestrained power a waft of thistledown was enough to detonate its explosion. He clearly liked Pepys and esteemed Sandwich."

(Cromwell's Earl by Ollard)

Pedro  •  Link

On this day Holmes sights the Portuguese island of São Tomé.

"São Tomé was not only well-sighted to control the coast of Angola and the Bight of Benin but of direct economic importance both as an entrepot for slaves and as a principal producer of sugar... São Tomé offered a useful rallying point. Holmes had therefore decided to land a considerable amount of stores there in case disaster should overtake the Company once he had gone."

(Man of War by Ollard)

Australian Susan  •  Link

Pedro - thanks for the two quotations: I especially liked "waft of thistledown" .

Michael Robinson  •  Link

" ... I should be forward to have the trees in Clarendon Park marked ..."

L& M note that Deane and his colleague Mayors [? Robert Mayers, appointed in 1660 purveyor of timber to the Navy, Woolwich] had sent in their report from the 'Three Lions,' Salisbury on July 4th. Ten days, from Salisbury to Pepys taking a walk in the garden, seems a short response time for any bureaucracy.

Cumsalisgrano  •  Link

"a short response " it be called poste haste.
Need new masts for the ones that be gunned down in the exercise of respecting the flag.

Mary  •  Link

the problem of the Clarendon Park timber.

According to an L&M footnote for this entry, whereas the Crown had reserved the right to felled timber on the estate to itself, Clarendon objects to Deane's marking of standing timber for the navy. Clarendon regards the standing timber as his own property.

However, according to an earlier note, Clarendon never did obtain full ownership of the estate (which had originally been mortgaged by Charles I, together with other lands, for the sum of £27,400). Although Sam notes that "he (Clarendon) seems to have bought [it] of my Lord Albemarle" that "seems" may be significant.

SMALL SPOILER:The estate reverted to Albemarle after Clarendon's disgrace in 1667.

Terry F  •  Link

The Diary of John Evelyn

July 14: I went to take leave of the two Mr. Howards now going to Paris & brought them as far as Bromely, thence to Eltham to see Sir John Shaws new house now building, the place is pleasant, if not too wett, but the house not well contrived, especialy the roofe, & roomes too low pitch'd, & Kitchins where the Cellars should be: The Orangerie & Aviarie handsome, & a very large plantation about it.

Sir John Shaw http://www.pepysdiary.com/encyclo…

Mary  •  Link

Sir John Shaw's new house.

This was Eltham Lodge, built in the grounds of the then largely ruined Eltham Palace. The Eltham estate had been leased to Shaw by Charles II for a virtually peppercorn rent in thanks for Shaw's support of him during his exile. Eltham Lodge was designed by a colleague of Wren's and still stands today as the clubhouse of the Royal Blackheath Golf Club. The Shaw family remained in Eltham until the 1820s.

Eltham Palace itself merits a google.

Michael Robinson  •  Link

Sir John Shaw's new house

Eltham Lodge was designed by Hugh May (1622-84) Paymaster of the King's Works, 1660, Comptroller 1668 whose father had been in royal service and was certainly in contact with the King's circle when traveling to Holland as Lely's servant in 1656 -- Eltham Lodge is is only surviving complete work. With Roger North, Sir. Roger Prat and William Samwell, May belonged to to the group of gentleman architects patronized by the court and its circle after the Restoration.

Eltham displays a restrained elegance and owes much to Dutch precedents, particularly Van Campen's Mauritshuis, The Hague. Brick Houses before the Restoration tended generally speaking to have stone quoins at the angles, or a brickwork imitation -- an Italian emphasis on firm treatment of the angles. At Eltham May follows Dutch practice; he does not emphasize any his angles by any break in the even surface of the brick work; stone is reserved for the giant order on the main front. This new combination of the two materials appears throughout England in many medium size houses of the period and later (houses which are popularly described as 'Wren' houses, though very few have even the slightest connection with Wren who had little time for domestic architecture) and of which Hugh May's Eltham is the prototype.

For photographs, incl. details of the surviving C17 interior (except the window sashes etc. which are
mid C 18th.)
http://viewfinder.english-heritag…

For a detailed description (from which I have drawn in part) and plan see:
Buildings of England London(2) South, p. 302-304. pl. 32.

Pedro  •  Link

More on Eltham.

Hugh May was the architect of choice in Restoration Court circles, eventually working for the King at Windsor. Evelyn followed his work closely and critically...

For Shaw, an English merchant based in Antwerp during the Interregnum and a close confidant of Clarendon, May designed Eltham Lodge, pleasantly sited on the rim of a saucer overlooking the Thames Estuary, bearing a similar relationship to the capital to St Germain-en-Laye does to Paris...a Dutch classical town house translated to the leafy hills above the distant dockyards of Woolwich and Deptford. The entrance was marked by giant pilasters and an ornamental pediment, the brickwork punctured by wafer thin sash windows and shallow blind arches, wrapped by a heavy stone cornice under the eaves. (The core of the house was probably top-lit, with a balustraded platform above the hipped roof.)...

Eltham Lodge survives the very image of the country seat of a Restoration magnate, but not the orangery or the "cabinet garden" and aviary upon which Shaw sought Evelyn's advice...

Twenty years later, May built Sir Stephen Fox an almost identical villa in Chiswick, later known as Moreton Hall.

(information from Darley's biography of Evelyn.)

Second Reading

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

"... the veriest Fanatique [Deane] that is in England ..."

I have read my notes, and everything on the site I can find, and nowhere do I find mention of Deane's religious leanings. This might just have been part of Clarendon's rant, but it could have blown up into a serious allegation.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

"... I to White Hall, and ... after understanding by a stratagem, and yet appearing wholly desirous not to understand Mr. Gauden’s price ... I went down and ordered matters in our tender so well that at the meeting ... I was ready with Mr. Gauden’s and his, both directed him a letter to me to give the board their two tenders, but there being none but the Generall Monk and Mr. Coventry and Povy and I, I did not think fit to expose them to view now, ... and so with good content rose."

Pepys is up to something, but what? After elaborate preparations, he decides to wait to show the two tenders for business and the letter he wrote for Gauden to sign and give back to him until a fuller board meeting (Monck, Coventry and Povy might see through his scheme? better wait for the elderly ones to sign off on it).

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

"... and thence to my Lord Chancellor’s, and there heard several tryals, wherein I perceive my Lord is a most able and ready man."

Maybe a trial in those days was more of a hearing? I can't imagine Clarendon having time to be a trial lawyer, but he would need to hear arguments over payments and non-payments, hiring and firing, property disputes, and other public business. Anyone know where his office was located?

Terry Foreman  •  Link

Edward Hyde commenced at Oxford at age 16, and went to London; after a year (in 1635.) he was admitted to and acquired a chamber at the Middle Temple.

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"I went, and found him busy in tryals of law in his great room"

clarendon then lived at Worcester House in the Strand. He transacted much public business in his private house; sessions both of Chancery and of the Privy Council were held there during his bouts of illness. (L&M footnote)

Tonyel  •  Link

"I was ready with Mr. Gauden’s and his, both directed him a letter to me to give the board their two tenders, but there being none but the Generall Monk and Mr. Coventry and Povy and I, I did not think fit to expose them to view now, ... and so with good content rose."

I suspect it's the old committee trick of waiting until everyone's talked out and bored - then you say "Oh, one more small item...." The bigger the committee, the easier it is.

Sasha Clarkson  •  Link

The story of the trees reminds me of an epigram by Alexander Pope (1688-1744)

"My Lord complains, that Pope, stark mad with gardens,
Has lopt three trees the value of three farthings:
"But he's my neighbour," cries the peer polite,
"And if he'll visit me, I'll wave my right."
What! on compulsion? and against my will,
A Lord's acquaintance? Let him file his bill!"

The background is here:
http://laudatortemporisacti.blogs…

Sasha Clarkson  •  Link

Wikipedia states of treasurer Southampton:
"He was remarkable for his freedom from any taint of corruption"
... and, from what I infer, the vindictiveness of many politicians of his day.

I was wondering if there'd been a personal grudge, as when former PM Stanley Baldwin's wrought iron gates were impounded and melted down for the war effort, upon the personal orders, allegedly, of his old enemy Lord Beaverbrook

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sta…

In March 1931, Baldwin had attacked press barons Lord Rothermere and Beaverbrook in a speech partly written by his cousin, Rudyard Kipling:

"The newspapers attacking me are not newspapers in the ordinary sense,” Baldwin said. “They are engines of propaganda for the constantly changing policies, desires, personal vices, personal likes and dislikes of the two men. What are their methods? Their methods are direct falsehoods, misrepresentation, half-truths, the alteration of the speaker's meaning by publishing a sentence apart from the context...What the proprietorship of these papers is aiming at is power, and power without responsibility – the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages.”

For more on this story, follow the link:
http://www.thisdayinquotes.com/20…

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

The following sound like the spies were reporting to Williamson:

Among the State Papers is a news letter (dated July 14, 1664) containing information as to the views of the Dutch respecting a war with England. “They are preparing many ships, and raising 6,000 men, and have no doubt of conquering by sea.”

“A wise man says the States know how to master England by sending moneys into Scotland for them to rebel, and also to the discontented in England, so as to place the King in the same straits as his father was, and bring him to agree with Holland.” (“Calendar,” 1663-64, p. 642).

See https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…

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