Friday 12 August 1664

Up, and all the morning busy at the office with Sir W. Warren about a great contract for New England masts, where I was very hard with him, even to the making him angry, but I thought it fit to do it as well as just for my owne [and] the King’s behalf. At noon to the ’Change a little, and so to dinner and then out by coach, setting my wife and mayde down, going to Stevens the silversmith to change some old silver lace and to go buy new silke lace for a petticoat.

I to White Hall and did much business at a Tangier Committee; where, among other things, speaking about propriety of the houses there, and how we ought to let the Portugeses I have right done them, as many of them as continue, or did sell the houses while they were in possession, and something further in their favour, the Duke in an anger I never observed in him before, did cry, says he, “All the world rides us, and I think we shall never ride anybody.”

Thence home, and, though late, yet Pedro being there, he sang a song and parted. I did give him 5s., but find it burdensome and so will break up the meeting. At night is brought home our poor Fancy, which to my great grief continues lame still, so that I wish she had not been brought ever home again, for it troubles me to see her.

31 Annotations

First Reading

Todd Bernhardt  •  Link

Who/what is "our poor Fancy"?

Also, is there a typo/scanning error in "how we ought to let the Portugeses I have right done them"?

Michael Robinson  •  Link

"... I was very hard with him, even to the making him angry, but I thought it fit to do it ..."

Demonstrating 'incorruptibility' to the outside world, while being seen by contractors to flex some muscle when required, and reminding Warren, I assume, that the promise on August 2nd. ("he confesses himself my debtor 100L for my service and friendship to him in his present great contract of masts,") has yet to be delivered upon!

http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…

Michael Robinson  •  Link

" ... brought home our poor Fancy ..."

From L&M, Pepys' dog - though he mentioned breeding her in the past, he did not give her a name.
[Spoiler - "her death is recorded on 16 Sept 1668"]

Michael Robinson  •  Link

"...how we ought to let the portugeses have right done them ..."

L&M text omits the 'I' and reads as above.

Terry F  •  Link

Todd, "how we ought to let the portugeses have right done them" read L&M.

cape henry  •  Link

"...I did give him 5s." Quite likely Seignor Pedro left feeling it was a miserly pinch while Sam, obviously, considers it too much. And too much to sustain. Withal, Sam has not proven to be a readily generous person, at least not up to this point.

Paul Chapin  •  Link

"Fancy" may not have been the dog's name. I have read English novels (not sure from which century) in which a country squire refers to his sporting hound as "my Fancy," where it is used as a term of endearment or pride, not a proper name. Wish I could have resurrected at least one such reference, but no luck.

Xjy  •  Link

Barely 4 years after the Restoration and the Duke is really beginning to feel his imperialist oats: "...the Duke in an anger I never observed in him before". For once, showing emotion regarding power relations. The usual 'poor us, no one shows us any respect'. "All the world rides us, and I think we shall never ride anybody." Wants to be firmly in the saddle. The New England masts, state of the navy, quality of commanders, all indicate a good enough horse... Now the committee is going on about the rights of the bloody Portuguese... Wick-dipping and flag-dipping is no longer enough for His Highness. Needs to try out his sharpened spurs. Sam feels stirred. Others more likely deterred.

A. De Araujo  •  Link

"All the World rides us..."
Stirring up nationalism to justify the coming war! nothing new.

Martin  •  Link

"My fancy"
Paul, a Google Books search ("my.fancy +dog") specifying books published before 1800 turns up only instances where "my fancy" means "my imagination". (Your recollection may be perfectly correct but not found in my search, but that usage does not appear to be very common.) If the capitalization is in the original, it seems to me Fancy is really the name of the pooch. Interesting, because Sam has never divulged the name of his own wife in the diary.

Pedro  •  Link

"and how we ought to let the Portugeses I have right done them"

Any ideas why the "I" is in this?

Bradford  •  Link

One possibility, Pedro: a mechanical scan can turn a physical imperfection on a page into a letter, as a speck above a comma can lead a typesetter to read it as a semi-colon. The fault may lie in whoever proofread the source text, or the poor soul who had to do the transcription, or even a stray mark by Pepys himself.

Robert Gertz  •  Link

Pepys would prefer not to see the beloved dog suffer at home...

"My dear old Dr. Young is busy. He can't be bothered with this sort of thing."

"Bothered?! But I'm gonna die!"

"That's exactly the kind of thing that bothers him."
(-Gilligan's Isle)

Spoiler...

One wonder if Sam will rather wish they hadn't brought Bess home in just over five years from now. "...I wish she had not been brought ever home again, for it troubles me to see her."

Michael Robinson  •  Link

Any ideas why the "I" is in this?

In my printed copy of the Wheatley text the word 'Portugeeses' is followed by a half size superscript "1," indicating a footnote. I assume the scanning program recorded the mark but not its position.

For the record the note reads: "Portuguese has frequently been treated as a plural, and a false singular, Portuguee formed from it. See an interesting paper by Mr. Danby P. Fry, 'On the words Chinese, Malay, Portuguee, Yankee, Pea, Cherry, Sherry, and Shay.' ('Philological Society Transactions,'1873-74, p. 253)"

jeannine  •  Link

Fancy,

Hmm, Michael tells us that L&M mentions Fancy as Sam's dog. He has mentioned 2 dogs in the recent past -the one that he had tried to breed with the "good looking" smaller dog (whom he had to literally assist-talk about lending out a helping hand! http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1… ) AND the dog that he sent to his father's house that got attacked by a group of other dogs (as I think we ASSUMED, but can't recall if it was actually confirmed that this dog died in the attack??).

Perhaps the dog that is coming home that's lame was the one sent to his father and the lameness could be the after effect??? Where Sam is usually such a thorough reporter on these things it seems strange to me that he would not have recorded his house dog getting hurt and /or going somewhere??? Or, maybe, in my over fondness for our furry friends I am just having a moment of wishful thinking and naive denial???

Michael Robinson  •  Link

Fancy & Towser

Jeannine -- The mastif was Towser. ("where I found an excellent mastiffe, his name Towser, sent me by a chyrurgeon." http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1… ); his exile to Brampton was arranged by letter on the following day, and his demise noted on June 29th. 1664 ("He tells me how my brave dogg I did give him, going out betimes one morning to Huntington, was set upon by five other doggs, and worried to pieces, of which I am a little, and he the most sorry I ever saw man for such a thing." http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1… )

Gerry  •  Link

In the country I have heard horses called "My Fancy".
Another very common useage, or at least it was when I was a lad,is refering to a woman's lover as her "fancy man".
I believe that bastion of liberal journalism The Daily Star once refered to Charles as "Camiilla's fancy man".

Michael Robinson  •  Link

Fancy & Towser

Also a consulting group in Fleet Alley; 'specialists in the management of short-term human resources interface and interaction.'

Cumsalisgrano  •  Link

Fancy nice olde english word for fantasy even a whim, so maybe this dogge be got on a whim.

1600 SHAKES. A.Y.L. III. ii. 381 If I could meet that *Fancie-monger, I would giue him some good counsel.
1590 SHAKES. Mids. N. II. i. 164 The Imperiall Votresse passed on, In maiden meditation *fancy free.
the foot loose and fancy free and fancy man [pimp] came later;

7. a. Caprice, changeful mood; an instance of this, a caprice, a whim. Also concr. a whimsical thing. 1579

1646 SIR T. BROWNE Pseud. Ep. II. iv. 82 Cardans Mausoleum for a flye, is a meere phancy.

1676 LISTER in Ray's Corr. (1848) 124 The addition of the French names would have been but a fancy.

Robert Gertz  •  Link

"...where I was very hard with him, even to the making him angry..."

"Home!! And quick about it!!" Slam of coach door.

"Yes, Sir William. Home, Tom!"

"Uppity little son of a..."

"Sir William? Anything wrong at the Naval Office, sir?"

"Nothing that a sack, rope, and some heavy rocks won't cure."

"Ah, the usual. Yes...I thought Mr. Pepys might eventually prove a trial. Shall I see to it myself, Sir William?"

"Yes, Creed. Thanks."

"Of course, Sir William."

***

Pedro  •  Link

The usual 'poor us, no one shows us any respect'. "All the world rides us, and I think we shall never ride anybody."

It's the same the whole world over,
It's the poor what gets the blame,
It's the rich what gets the pleasure,
Isn't it a blooming shame?

I think that the "poor" Portuguese are caught in the middle here.

To make the marriage treaty tempting to Charles the great diplomat, Queen Regent Luísa Francisca de Gusmão (Catherine's mother) added Tangier to the dowry. On paper this looked like a great acquisition, and so much so, that she omitted it from the final reading before the Council of State. She feared that the inhabitants of Lisbon would get to hear and oppose it.

So the Portuguese inhabitants of Tangier would have been the last to know when Sandwich turned up to take possession. About 800 decided that they wanted to return to Portugal and were shipped back by Sam's Lord, and all Catholics that remained were given freedom to practice their religion. This left Tangier virtually without a civilian population.

My guess is that many would need compensation, and that the Portuguese would hold it as the responsibility of the English. Here we see the attitude of the typical attitude of the Duke of York.

(Spoiler? I cannot find at the moment the source but like other occasions, such as the payment of troops on duty in Portugal, Charles sends money to help the situation.)

Pedro  •  Link

Another reference to the Tangier problem...

"the Tangier Committee met, but the Duke and the Africa Committee meeting in our room, Sir G. Carteret; Sir W. Compton, Mr. Coventry, Sir W. Rider, Cuttance and myself met in another room, with chairs set in form but no table, and there we had very fine discourses of the business of the fitness to keep Sally, and also of the terms of our King's paying the Portugees that deserted their house at Tangier, which did much please me,"

http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…

Second Reading

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

"... going to Stevens the silversmith to change some old silver lace and to go buy new silke lace for a petticoat ..."

Elizabeth just happened to have some old silver lace lying around the house? Perhaps this was something she acquired on the recent Brampton trip (elderly relatives turning out their treasurers)? Fashion favored dresses with a split up the middle of the front, so the lacy petticoat below could be seen and admired. She, like Pepys, needed to display their new-found prosperity in order to belong in society.

Extracted from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Met…

Lace made using gold wire has been produced since antiquity, with examples of gold netting found in Egyptian and Assyrian tombs from 1500-1000 BCE. It was mainly produced as an embellishment for religious vestments and high status garments.

Metal lace, including gold and silver point de Venise, was produced in Italy until the 15th century, when high taxation and sumptuary laws led to textile threads such as linen replacing the use of metal.

To avoid these costs, the production of metal lace moved to France, where a high demand by royalty and the French aristocracy led to Arras, Aurillac and other locations becoming renowned for gold lace production. From the 15th century on, most metal lace was a combination of metal and textile threads, rather than made of pure metal.

Gold lace and braiding was a popular option for military uniforms because it resisted tarnish, unlike other metal laces.

Copper lace -- Lace made from copper wire was widely used in Elizabethan era theater costuming as a substitute for more expensive gold and silver laces. It was a major import, with several tons of copper thread being imported into England between 1594-1596, and at the turn of the 16th and 17th centuries, cost between 9 and 16 pennies an ounce. It had a tendency to tarnish, and was less hard-wearing.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

I'm rethinking my post, as I find:

http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
Friday 24 June 1664

"Thence with him to the Parke, and there met the Queene coming from Chappell, with her Mayds of Honour, all in silver-lace gowns again: which is new to me, and that which I did not think would have been brought up again."

To which jeannine on 25 Jun 2007 added:

"silver-lace gowns" I believe it's a trend in fashion. In L.C. Davidson's book Catherine of Bragança, she explains that Queen Catherine's "most becoming costume was black velvet, but this summer she and her ladies all adopted the fashion of silver lace gowns, in which they flashed and shimmered in the sunshine in the Tour and St. James's Park. When she went to chapel at St. James's, they walked from Whitehall in this dazzling raiment. They carried the great green shading fans Catherine had brought with her from Portugal, when dust and sun did not force them to use riding masks. These fans were used in promenades at balls and plays, and even at church, where faces were delicately hidden by them at devotions."

In which case someone has tried to make Elizabeth fashionable, but she's trading the silver lace in for silk lace. Maybe the summer fad is over now?

Mary K  •  Link

Note for newer annotators.

It's almost always worthwhile reading the annotations that others have been making over the past 10 years before adding one's most recent thoughts and observations. Sometimes one can correct or expand an earlier note in light of more recent or more thorough research. On other occasions one may simply repeat or overlook a point that has already been noted.

In addition to showing the daily annotations, Phil has supplied us with an extremely useful Encyclopedia facility which draws together information into useful categories of specific interest.

Marquess  •  Link

I couldn't agree with you more Mary K, I always lament that I wasn't on this site 10 years ago to exchange views with my fellow readers in the annotations; which give great insight to the diary. It is always nice to see recent postings.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

I agree, Mary K and Marquess ... please keep posting!

RSGII  •  Link

Interesting new comments, but hard to have a dialog when 2017 annotators, unlike in 2007, are commenting weeks before the page is released.

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Re: ‘fancy’:

OED just has:

‘fancy, n. and adj. < A contraction of fantasy n < Old French . .
B. adj. . .
. . 3. . . resulting from the exercise of fancy or caprice.
. . c. Of an animal or bird: Of a kind bred for the development of particular ‘points’ or qualities . .
. . 1851 H. Mayhew London Labour II. 54/2 A dog recommended by its beauty, or any peculiarity..is a ‘fancy’ animal.
1880 Gainsburgh Times 20 Feb. in E. Peacock Gloss. Words Manley & Corringham, Lincs. ‘What sort of a dog was it?’..‘A fancy dog’. . . ‘

Edith Lank  •  Link

A propos the case to keep his kidney stone in --
Years ago I spoke on Sam Pepys at our local English-Speaking Union, and a man in the back of the room got up to say he'd seen that stone, in a museum in London.

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