Wednesday 29 November 1665
Up, my wife and I talking how to dispose of our goods, and resolved upon sending our two mayds Alce (who has been a day or two at Woolwich with my wife, thinking to have had a feast there) and Susan home. So my wife after dinner did take them to London with some goods, and I in the afternoon after doing other business did go also by agreement to meet Captain Cocke and from him to Sir Roger Cuttance, about the money due from Cocke to him for the late prize goods, wherein Sir Roger is troubled that he hath not payment as agreed, and the other, that he must pay without being secured in the quiett possession of them, but some accommodation to both, I think, will be found. But Cocke do tell me that several have begged so much of the King to be discovered out of stolen prize goods and so I am afeard we shall hereafter have trouble, therefore I will get myself free of them as soon as I can and my money paid. Thence home to my house, calling my wife, where the poor wretch is putting things in a way to be ready for our coming home, and so by water together to Greenwich, and so spent the night together.
12 Annotations
First Reading
Terry Foreman • Link
"But Cocke do tell me that several have begged so much of the King to be discovered out of stolen prize goods and so I am afeard we shall hereafter have trouble, therefore I will get myself free of them as soon as I can and my money paid."
Cf. 18 September: "After dinner Cocke did pray me to helpe him to 500l. of W. How, who is deputy Treasurer, wherein my Lord Bruncker and I am to be concerned and I did aske it my Lord, and he did consent to have us furnished with 500l., and I did get it paid to Sir Roger Cuttance and Mr. Pierce in part for above 1000l. worth of goods, Mace, Nutmegs, Cynamon, and Cloves, and he tells us we may hope to get 1500l. by it, which God send! Great spoil, I hear, there hath been of the two East India ships, and that yet they will come in to the King very rich: so that I hope this journey will be worth 100l. to me." http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
Right. Mr. Oblivious and his mates.
Robert Gertz • Link
"'Poor wretch'?"
"Term of endearment, love."
"I know that...But you swore you'd only used it between us."
"But I never intended a lot of strange people would read it. Anyway, 'tis better than what you used to call me..."
"'My little bug-eyed pricklouse' is sweet. 'Poor wretch' sounds pathetic if you don't know the context."
"Poor wretched lovely Bess...So forlorn and lost...But hark! Is this a gallant hero I spy on horseback on the crest of the hill?"
"Hanging round the corner of the bookstall with his handkerchief hanging out of pocket looking like a pervert's more like it..."
"...A hero, ready to swoop down and rescue the forlorn heroine from her miserable existence...No thought of his future holding him back, I might note..."
"You would...But you were so cute and pathetic that day."
"Gallant and charming...And you wrote that..."
"A little gallant, a tad charming... And I wasn't that wretched...Though poor enough..."
"Poor somewhat wretch..."
"...And you were brave enough...I guess..."
"I'd go though another stone cut today for you, you know..."
"The heck you will...I really was wretched that day."
"Pooooor wretch..."
"Bug-eyed pricklouse...."
Ruben • Link
After 5 years of reading our Samuel's diary, I understand that he is molesting a lot of females and describing all this in detail, but I am not sure what he means by "doing what I would", and the like.
How do we know he had sexual intercourse with the ladies, when in our own days a President did not considered "doing what he did" as sex?
Is it possible that all this time he has no sexual relations with all this ladies but only what we would call today masturbating together, or only Samuel fondling and masturbating?
Could it be that he had sexual relations (penetration) only with his wife, (something we never see in the diary in spite of so many quarrels to amend...)?
Robert Gertz • Link
The evidence suggests he did more with Betty Martin and Diana Crisp...And la Bagwell. But as for the others, I agree with Ruben. I think he in his interesting way felt everything short of the actual act was while not right at least, not so great a sin and feared the possibility (the humilating as well as likely fatal possibility) of catching a sexual disease.
Spoiler...
In fact avoiding the "main act" with his most serious relationship is probably the one thing that will save him in his greatest marital crisis.
***
Heaven...
"It was your 'greatest marital crisis'...Until I got to read this thing through."
"Bess...I did come clean when I got out of Purgatory.."
"With whose help...?"
"Right...And 'a grant of complete forgiveness' was what you said..."
"I retained the right to sarcastic commentary...And to throw things..."
"What? Not my flagon...Bess!!"
"In the small print, there...See?"
"Ah, yes...Right. You know, you've really spelled the details out expertly there, dear. Good for you."
"Well...I had a fine teacher."
"My dearest...OW!!!!"
"As for the flagon it's solid silver...It'll only dent your skull."
Australian Susan • Link
Fear of sexually transmitted disease was a potent enforcer of fidelity in those days. And much earlier too. If you read something like The Elizabethan Underworld by Gamini Salgado (see http://www.clarebooks.co.uk/item1…, which I know is oop, but it's the book I have.), the accounts he edits are full of these fears expressed and ways to avoid them (such as p***ing with great vigour after the act, only doing it standing up etc.)as well as gruesome details of the cures [sic] on offer. Even a hundred years before Sam, they had got the general idea that if you did not penetrate, you would not get ill, and they also liked "clean" country girls, the younger the better, (no age of consent in either 16th or 17th century)which possibly explains Sam's penchant for girls. For his age, Sam was quite fastidious (he hated cooks with grubby fingers), which added to the care he took not to get too close to a source of possible infection no matter how aroused he was. Still, it's all rather repellent - but that's a 21st century and personal value judgment!
cgs • Link
Ruben's:"How do we know he had sexual intercourse with the ladies, when in our own days "
We will never know as the phrase only became fashionable much later.
OED d. Sexual connexion.
1798 MALTHUS Popul. I. ii. (1806) I. 21 note, An illicit intercourse between the sexes. 1804 ABERNETHY Surg. Obs. 143 Propagated by promiscuous intercourse.
language hat • Link
The fact that the phrase we now use was not current at the time did not mean that he was unable to talk about the fact. The problem is his mealy-mouthed circumlocutions, not lack of linguistic resources.
cgs • Link
Samuell:was he adulterer, fornicator,
or a satyr or just lecherous young man or just on occasion just lewd or trying to be rakish.
there be no sin if no begetting????
or just a pleasure seeker and not wanting to be bad.
Second Reading
Terry Foreman • Link
"stolen prize goods"
Have we seen this admission/accusation before?
Terry Foreman • Link
"therefore I will get myself free of them as soon as I can and my money paid."
Pepys sold his interest in the goods to Cocke, and, as a result, his name does not appear among those listed in the prize officers' report (February 1666) on the affair: PRO, SP 29/149, no. 89. (L&M footnote)
San Diego Sarah • Link
"stolen prize goods" -- Have we seen this admission/accusation before?
That's why Howe is in the slammer.
Anyone who read the Prize Goods rules knew Sandwich and Evelyn were being very pragmatic liquidating the assets for the cash they so urgently needed for doctors, food, etc.
They thought all those letters and explanations to Monck and the Stuart Brothers had covered their behinds, but Oxford politics and greed have turned pragmatic problem solving into crimes.
Jonathan V • Link
@Ruben - Only a decade later, but yes, I too have had the same questions running through my mind about what happens between him and his liaisons. It does seem to be mostly heavy petting with his willing partners. But he also tries to cop a feel when he can, and engages in what we would call molestation today. I really wonder about those encounters he has with women in dark corners of bars and public houses. I wonder if they're darker and more secluded corners than what I picture.