Monday 6 November 1665
Up, and to my office, where busy all the morning and then to dinner to Captain Cocke’s with Mr. Evelyn, where very merry, only vexed after dinner to stay too long for our coach. At last, however, to Lambeth and thence the Cockpitt, where we found Sir G. Carteret come, and in with the Duke and the East India Company about settling the business of the prizes, and they have gone through with it.
Then they broke up, and Sir G. Carteret come out, and thence through the garden to the water side and by water I with him in his boat down with Captain Cocke to his house at Greenwich, and while supper was getting ready Sir G. Carteret and I did walk an houre in the garden before the house, talking of my Lord Sandwich’s business; what enemies he hath, and how they have endeavoured to bespatter him: and particularly about his leaving of 30 ships of the enemy, when Pen would have gone, and my Lord called him back again: which is most false. However, he says, it was purposed by some hot-heads in the House of Commons, at the same time when they voted a present to the Duke of Yorke, to have voted 10,000l. to the Prince, and half-a-crowne to my Lord of Sandwich; but nothing come of it.1 But, for all this, the King is most firme to my Lord, and so is my Lord Chancellor, and my Lord Arlington. The Prince, in appearance, kind; the Duke of Yorke silent, says no hurt; but admits others to say it in his hearing. Sir W. Pen, the falsest rascal that ever was in the world; and that this afternoon the Duke of Albemarle did tell him that Pen was a very cowardly rogue, and one that hath brought all these rogueish fanatick Captains into the fleete, and swears he should never go out with the fleete again. That Sir W. Coventry is most kind to Pen still; and says nothing nor do any thing openly to the prejudice of my Lord. He agrees with me, that it is impossible for the King [to] set out a fleete again the next year; and that he fears all will come to ruine, there being no money in prospect but these prizes, which will bring, it may be, 20,000l., but that will signify nothing in the world for it. That this late Act of Parliament for bringing the money into the Exchequer, and making of it payable out there, intended as a prejudice to him and will be his convenience hereafter and ruine the King’s business, and so I fear it will and do wonder Sir W. Coventry would be led by Sir G. Downing to persuade the King and Duke to have it so, before they had thoroughly weighed all circumstances; that for my Lord, the King has said to him lately that I was an excellent officer, and that my Lord Chancellor do, he thinks, love and esteem of me as well as he do of any man in England that he hath no more acquaintance with.
So having done and received from me the sad newes that we are like to have no money here a great while, not even of the very prizes, I set up my rest2 in giving up the King’s service to be ruined and so in to supper, where pretty merry, and after supper late to Mr. Glanville’s, and Sir G. Carteret to bed. I also to bed, it being very late.
12 Annotations
First Reading
Terry Foreman • Link
"However, he says, it was purposed by some hot-heads in the House of Commons, at the same time when they voted a present to the Duke of Yorke, to have voted 10,000l. to the Prince, and half-a-crowne to my Lord of Sandwich; but nothing come of it."
Cf. the Diary entry of 28 October and the House of Commons of 26 October http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
(The insult to the Lord of Sandwich is not mentioned.)
cape henry • Link
"...that my Lord Chancellor do, he thinks, love and esteem of me as well as he do of any man in England that he hath no more acquaintance with."
What a terrific and unintentionally humorous line.
Robert Gertz • Link
"... only vexed after dinner to stay too long for our coach."
Well, things aren't any better today, Sam. Say, why not take some of that prize goods cash and buy a sleek little number of your own. Nothing like that four horsepower drive and you'd be sure to be driving green.
Robert Gertz • Link
"So having done and received from me the sad newes that we are like to have no money here a great while, not even of the very prizes, I set up my rest in giving up the King’s service to be ruined and so in to supper, where pretty merry..."
What will be, will be.
Say why not just declare you are bailing out the Navy with 700 million pounds, source unknown but the money to be found...Somewhere...?
cgs • Link
Prizes be bonuses for the Barons of the emerald Isles,
forget the payments for debts incurred in losing limb or a nights kipp with ones doxie, the tars have no one in the Temples on the strand to take Carlos to Old Bailey for recovery of lost income and fair share of the [legal] loot obtained from those foreign wealthy Hollanders, after being inducted into unfurling and furling and running guns in and out of port holes.
Evelyn doth try and Samuel be unhappy but neither have real power over the Parliamentarians to get means to provide the writs to get actuall funds for having a defense against the brigands of the seas.
The question is always. Who pays,and who spends,
'tis always easy to play with some one else's money.
JWB • Link
"Albemarle did tell him that Pen was a very cowardly rogue, and one that hath brought all these rogueish fanatick Captains into the fleete..."
Tarpoulins besmerched by by tars demanding their due.
Terry Foreman • Link
Carteret, who's been cut out of the loop, "fears all will come to ruine, there being no money in prospect but these prizes, which will bring, it may be, 20,000l."
L&M note the navy *did* receive £100,000 from the two Dutch East India prizes; Albemarle had expected twice as much.
Terry Foreman • Link
"this late Act of Parliament for bringing the money into the Exchequer, and making of it payable out there"
The Act for an Additional Aid of £1 1/4 m. (17 Car. II c.i passed on 31 October) would be “a new venture in English public finance” (L&M) in which bills would be paid by the Exchequer on credit, bypassing the Treasury, denying Carteret his poundage and other profits. SPOILER - On 31 Oct. we will see Pepys’s scapticism of financing on credit (a concern he will share with Carteret and the bankers); but the scheme is a success. (L&M note 6 November 1665. http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
cgs • Link
money be like honey some sticks,
Second Reading
Terry Foreman • Link
My Lord Sandwich decried for "his leaving of 30 ships of the enemy, when Pen would have gone, and my Lord called him back again: which is most false."
L&M: On 22 October Sandwich had hurried from Oxford to London on receiving news from Penn that a fleet of 10 Dutchmen was off the Gunfleet. He gathered together a badly-equipped squadron and was off the Nore by 29 October. A storm scattered the Dutch and Sandwich found little to do except to play his guitar.
Terry Foreman • Link
The Act for an Additional Aid
....Promoted by Downing and Coventry, with the King's help, but without co-operation of the Council, put into effect after 25 December, it provided for the appropriation of supplies to war purposes, allowing loans and goods to be advanced on its credit. The principal of the loans was to be repaid in strict rotation....Pepys persuaded Wareren to send in over £3,000-worth of of timber on its credit: https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/… and he cashed one of Warren's repayment order s, making a handsome profit: https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/… The act led to the introduction of assignable Treasury orders , and to the use of appropriation in the Poll Tax of 1666. [Sources, etc.]... (Per L&M note)
San Diego Sarah • Link
'"... only vexed after dinner to stay too long for our coach."
'... Say, why not take some of that prize goods cash and buy a sleek little number of your own. '
While Pepys enjoys the good things in life, and saves a good proportion if he can figure out how, buying a coach would trigger conversation and speculation on how the Clerk of the Acts can possibly afford such a luxuary, and his empire would be exposed.
Then there is the nightmare of finding a place to keep your coach and horses. I suspect that would be as expensive as having a car in the City is today. [In San Francisco in 1980 my friend paid as much for off-street parking as her apartment cost -- I dread to think what it would cost today.] I think he wants the money on hand, not in feed and stable hand pay and rentals. I can't see him mucking out the stalls himself, can you?