Sunday 14 May 1665

(Lord’s day). Up, and with my wife to church, it being Whitsunday; my wife very fine in a new yellow bird’s-eye hood, as the fashion is now. We had a most sorry sermon; so home to dinner, my mother having her new suit brought home, which makes her very fine. After dinner my wife and she and Mercer to Thomas Pepys’s wife’s christening of his first child, and I took a coach, and to Wanstead, the house where Sir H. Mildmay died, and now Sir Robert Brookes lives, having bought it of the Duke of Yorke, it being forfeited to him. A fine seat, but an old-fashioned house; and being not full of people looks desolately. Thence to Walthamstow, where (failing at the old place) Sir W. Batten by and by come home, I walking up and down the house and garden with my Lady very pleasantly, then to supper very merry, and then back by coach by dark night. I all the afternoon in the coach reading the treasonous book of the Court of King James, printed a great while ago, and worth reading, though ill intended. As soon as I come home, upon a letter from the Duke of Albemarle, I took boat at about 12 at night, and down the River in a gally, my boy and I, down to the Hope and so up again, sleeping and waking, with great pleasure, my business to call upon every one of… [Continued tomorrow. P.G.]

27 Annotations

First Reading

JWB  •  Link

"...old-fashioned house...looks desolately."

Sam's got a little Thurber in him.

Michael Robinson  •  Link

" ... the treasonous book of the Court of King James, printed a great while ago, and worth reading, though ill intended."

Weldon, Anthony, Sir, d. 1649?. "The court and character of King James," 1650. now part of PL 52. http://www.pepysdiary.com/encyclo….

Per L&M footnote "... the work of an embittered man who had in 1617 been dismissed from his post at court. It had first appeared in 1650 as part of a campaign of the anti-Stewart propaganda campaign which followed the execution of Charles I."

SP noted its receipt from the binder on February 10th.:-
"Up and abroad to Paul’s Churchyard, there to see the last of my books new bound: among others, my “Court of King James,” and “The Rise and Fall of the Family of the Stewarts;” and much pleased I am now with my study; it being, methinks, a beautifull sight."
http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…

Michael Robinson  •  Link

” … the treasonous book of the Court of King James, printed a great while ago, and worth reading, though ill intended.”

Yesterday: "going home bespoke the King’s works, will cost me 50s., I believe." A curious juxtaposition; are the Commonwealth origins in conflict with the present loyal crown servant 'Clerk of the Acts,' who has a working acquaintance with James Duke of York and Charles II ?

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"(failing at the other place)" transcribe L&M, instead of "(failing at the old place)"

andy  •  Link

my wife and she and Mercer to Thomas Pepys’s wife’s christening of his first child

A clear divison of labour between the sexes here...

Pedro  •  Link

Young Sydney Montagu sailed with his father!

On this day Sandwich records the Fleet being 8 leagues off Yarmouth, and that his son Sydney (with others) went ashore at Lowestoft.

The background says Sydney was born in 1650 and would therefore would be 15 years old.

Mike Donnelly  •  Link

We know the plague is nearby, and Sam writes "my wife very fine in a new yellow bird’s-eye hood, as the fashion is now"

I greatly wonder if Sam is referring to this bird shaped hood?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imag…

Mike Donnelly  •  Link

That image was from a Doctor in 1656, but it's reasonable to think others of means to afford it, would wear something similiar. By 1665 the Plague had hit London with full force and by September of 1665 was killing 7,000 per week. By July of this year the King will flee the city.

I wonder if Sam holds to his post or flees to the countryside as well...

Mary  •  Link

bird's-eye

"spotted fabric of muslin or silk" according to the L&M footnote.

Generous hoods were fashionable items of women's wear at this point. Nothing to do with the sinister-looking plague-masks.

John in Newcastle  •  Link

"the treasonous book of the Court of King James, printed a great while ago, and worth reading, though ill intended.”

Is Sam courting danger in buying such seditious books? I bet he would not want the guys at the office to know what he has ben reading.

Todd Bernhardt  •  Link

"my mother having her new suit brought home, which makes her very fine"

Nice to hear that Mom has gotten a chance to get decked out, and that her son is pleased by it...

Cactus Wren  •  Link

By "a fine seat", I take it Sam means the house (for all its drawbacks) is in a good or attractive location?

dirk  •  Link

The plague - also mentioned in the Rev. Josselin's diary entry for today:

"God good in manifold outward mercies the plague certainly in London. 9. died last week, the drought does not only continue, but the heat grows very much(.) 9 died of the plague at London, lord help us to get into the gap to turn away thy wrath, god be gracious to me and accept me in the beloved"

Willy  •  Link

One definition of "seat" is "A place of abode or residence, especially a large house that is part of an estate: the squire's country seat."

(thefreedictionary.com)

A quick search turns up many references to mansions as "fine seats." Here is one from 1841:

"The Earl of Pomfret is lord of the manor of Towcester, and holds his court annually, at which the constables for the parish are chosen. This nobleman has a fine seat, Easton Neston, within about half a mile of the place."

northamptoncastle.homeip.net/nort…

Australian Susan  •  Link

The slight, quiet, fleeting mentions of the plague are like the phrasal hints of themes to come (March to the Scaffold and Dies Irae) in the earlier parts of Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique - icy trickling down the spine.

Paul Chapin  •  Link

Thanks to Dirk for providing us occasional glimpses of Rev. Josselin's exasperating (to me) ruminations. Today he observes people dying of the plague, the drought continuing, the heat growing, but unfailingly begins by declaring "God good in manifold outward mercies." I wonder what it would take for him to decide that his God wasn't being so good after all.

Robert Gertz  •  Link

"This castle hath a pleasant seat..." King Duncan, Macbeth.

Hopefully no one at Wanstead (great name) wishes to replace the current CoA.

Andrew Hamilton  •  Link

"A curious juxtaposition; are the Commonwealth origins in conflict with the present loyal crown servant ‘Clerk of the Acts,’ who has a working acquaintance with James Duke of York and Charles II ?"

Michael, I've had this same question from time to time when a dissonant note or two from Pepys's Commonwealth-era upbringing and education comes into the diary. I suppose it is particularly ironic that in later days he was accused of being a Papist.

Second Reading

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"to Wanstead, the house where Sir H. Mildmay died, and now Sir Robert Brookes lives, having bought it of the Duke of Yorke, it being forfeited to him."

This was Old Wanstead House, Essex (replaced c. 1715 by another house pulled down in 1823; on the site of what is now Wanstead golf course). Sir Henry Mildmay, Brookes's father-in-law (d. ?1664), a regicide, had, with others of his family, possessed it since 1619. Sir Robert Brooke (M.P. for Aldeburgh, Suff.) lived there 1662-7. The house was sold to Sir Josiah Child in 1673. (Per L&M note)

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"A fine seat, but an old-fashioned house"

It had been extensively rebuilt under Edward VI and again under Elizabeth. According to D. Lysons (Environs of London (1792-1811), iv. 235), a small print of the house was published by Stent in 1649. (L&M note)

Terry Foreman  •  Link

" Thence to Walthamstow, where (failing at the old place)"

L&M read "other place", sc. Penn's house at Walthamstow. (L&M note)

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"the treasonous book of the Court of King James, printed a great while ago, and worth reading, though ill intended. "

Sir Anthony Weldon's Court and character of King James
[ http://www.pepysdiary.com/encyclo… ] was the work of an embittered man who had in 1617 been dismissed from his post at court. It had first appeared in 1650 as part of the anti-Stuart campaign which followed the execution of Charles I. (L&M note)

Sasha Clarkson  •  Link

The phrase "the wisest fool in Christendom" apparently originates in Weldon's book.

A little more on him here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ant…

One can just imagine Sam chortling gleefully at scurrilous but "treasonous" comments, and then reproving himself: "I should take less pleasure in this wickedness - but just another page or two..."

Sasha Clarkson  •  Link

"After dinner my wife and she and Mercer to Thomas Pepys’s wife’s christening of *his* first child"

Even if Thomas had married a widow with children, the use of "his" not "their" says something about the society they lived in.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

For what it's worth, Master of the Jewel House, Sir Henry Mildmay MP's Parliamentary biography gives Pepys Diary a shout out for the wrong reasons:

http://www.historyofparliamentonl…

They say did not Sir Henry Mildmay MP die at Old Wanstead House, which was settled on his son-in-law (Sir) Robert Brooke†,143. The rumor that he did is based on a mis-transcription in an early edition of Samuel Pepys’† diary.144
• 143. VCH Essex, vi. 324.
• 144. Cf. Pepys Diary ed. H.B. Wheatley, iv. 386 and Pepys Diary ed. R.C. Latham and W. Matthews, vi. 102.

They are firm that Mildmay was ordered in 1664 to be transferred to Tangiers from the Tower, where he apparently died four years later [1668].

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