Monday 22 January 1665/66

Up, and set my people to work in copying Tangier accounts, and I down the river to Greenwich to the office to fetch away some papers and thence to Deptford, where by agreement my Lord Bruncker was to come, but staid almost till noon, after I had spent an houre with W. Howe talking of my Lord Sandwich’s matters and his folly in minding his pleasures too much now-a-days, and permitting himself to be governed by Cuttance to the displeasing of all the Commanders almost of the fleete, and thence we may conceive indeed the rise of all my Lord’s misfortunes of late. At noon my Lord Bruncker did come, but left the keys of the chests we should open, at Sir G. Carteret’s lodgings, of my Lord Sandwich’s, wherein Howe’s supposed jewells are; so we could not, according to my Lord Arlington’s order, see them today; but we parted, resolving to meet here at night: my Lord Bruncker being going with Dr. Wilkins, Mr. Hooke, and others, to Colonell Blunts, to consider again of the business of charriots, and to try their new invention. Which I saw here my Lord Bruncker ride in; where the coachman sits astride upon a pole over the horse, but do not touch the horse, which is a pretty odde thing; but it seems it is most easy for the horse, and, as they say, for the man also. Thence I with speede by water home and eat a bit, and took my accounts and to the Duke of Albemarle, where for all I feared of Norwood he was very civill, and Sir Thomas Ingram beyond expectation, I giving them all content and I thereby settled mightily in my mind, for I was weary of the employment, and had had thoughts of giving it over. I did also give a good step in a business of Mr. Hubland’s, about getting a ship of his to go to Tangier, which during this strict embargo is a great matter, and I shall have a good reward for it, I hope. Thence by water in the darke down to Deptford, and there find my Lord Bruncker come and gone, having staid long for me. I back presently to the Crowne taverne behind the Exchange by appointment, and there met the first meeting of Gresham College since the plague. Dr. Goddard did fill us with talke, in defence of his and his fellow physicians going out of towne in the plague-time; saying that their particular patients were most gone out of towne, and they left at liberty; and a great deal more, &c. But what, among other fine discourse pleased me most, was Sir G. Ent about Respiration; that it is not to this day known, or concluded on among physicians, nor to be done either, how the action is managed by nature, or for what use it is. Here late till poor Dr. Merriot was drunk, and so all home, and I to bed.

24 Annotations

First Reading

Bryan M  •  Link

...among other fine discourse pleased me most, was Sir G. Ent about Respiration; that it is not to this day known, or concluded on among physicians, nor to be done either, how the action is managed by nature, or for what use it is.

A reminder that, despite the similarities, Sam's view of the world was in many ways fundamentally different from our own.

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"Howe’s supposed jewells"

Cf. 16 November 1665: "Madam Williams...did give me information of W. Howe’s having bought eight bags of precious stones taken from about the Dutch Vice-Admirall’s neck...." -- details of diamonds and rubies follow. http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…

tg  •  Link

" Dr. Goddard did fill us with talke, in defence of his and his fellow physicians going out of towne in the plague-time; saying that their particular patients were most gone out of towne, and they left at liberty; "
And of course they wouldn't want to sully their hands with the poor patients in the inner city of London who were dying by the hundreds weekly for a while. I guess that was still left to the religious class, who I assume were still manning hospitals and other charitable institituions to look after the poor, rather than the doctors of the rich families. I wonder what brought about Dr. Goddard's defence to the Royal Society? Had there been some clamoring about the lack of doctors in London during the summer? Did someone invite the doctor or did he take it upon himself to defend his peers?

GrahamT  •  Link

"Here late till poor Dr. Merriot was drunk..." and the note against his name says he was a pioneer in the production of sparkling wine. Obviously a man with an enthusiasm for booze.

A.Hamilton  •  Link

"I giving them all content and I thereby settled mightily in my mind, for I was weary of the employment"

After the storm of Saturday and the unusual calm of Sunday, a nice breeze for Sam. I think he has been anxious about this Tangier accounting and his reception, that his beating of the boy on Saturday was brought on by this stress, and that the beating (and his own mortification in bruising his thumb) discharged the pent-up unease and gave him a peaceful mind Sunday and Monday. Poor young scapegoat, the boy.A pretty common fate, I'd guess, for apprentice lads. If it hadn't been him, however, it could have been Elizabeth who would have borne the brunt of Sam's anxiety.

(Thank you Dr. Freud)

A.Hamilton  •  Link

Lord Bruncker did come, but left the keys of the chests we should open

This business about the missing keys and missed rendezvous has comic (or exasperating) overtones, but escapes editorial comment by Sam, perhaps because he is so relieved by passing the Tangier test.

Australian Susan  •  Link

Sparkling wine

Hmm. Was Dr M's idea to speed up the process and produce cheaper wine but inferior to proper methode champenoise?

Are there any pictures of the experimental chariots? I cannot see how the pole as described is attached?!

With all the chasing about over keys and appointments, it does seem that everyone concerned is being very careful *not* to find any jewels.

A.Hamilton  •  Link

Here late till poor Dr. Merriot was drunk.

At the grand Academy of Lagado I saw many projectors doing valuable experiments. In one chamber I saw one Dr. Merrett (or as some style him, Merry Ott) demonstrating his method of inducing gaseous bubbles in wine without having the bottles explode. He was also engaged with Sir George Ent to resolve whether the bubbles aid human respiration. The two had resolved to test the bubbly wine until one of them collapsed. I came in as the experiment ended.(Later I was told Le Methode Merrettoise is now widely used to produce the best wines in Laputa.)

Robert Gertz  •  Link

"...after I had spent an houre with W. Howe talking of my Lord Sandwich’s matters and his folly in minding his pleasures too much now-a-days, and permitting himself to be governed by Cuttance to the displeasing of all the Commanders almost of the fleete, and thence we may conceive indeed the rise of all my Lord’s misfortunes of late."

Hmmn? What happened to William Howe, petty thief...Whom Sam was encouraging milord practically to send off to prison? Looks like the boys behind the "rise of all my Lord's misfortune's..." have agreed to create a common memory hole and assign blame to my Lord's sudden want of character.

"Prize goods? What prize goods?" Sam, innocently.

"Indeed. And what rubies, by-the-by?" Howe chimes in.

What rubies, indeed...he notes to Sam in aside. My God, goose eggs!

"Hooowwwe. Remember why we're here?"

"Oh, right. Key? What key?"

cgs  •  Link

'Tis always best to be where the the money be, no money no pill???"...Dr. Goddard did fill us with talke, in defence of his and his fellow physicians going out of towne in the plague-time; saying that their particular patients were most gone out of towne, and they left at liberty; and a great deal more..."

According to some statistics, it was safer if thee stayed away from sweet talking giver of remedies, elixirs and panceas, the odds be in thy favor of not having thy life and bank account being bled to death, but be able to donate thy life savings to the preacher..

jeannine  •  Link

"According to some statistics, it was safer if thee stayed away from sweet talking giver of remedies, elixirs and panceas, the odds be in thy favor of not having thy life and bank account being bled to death, but be able to donate thy life savings to the preacher.."

Well said, you might even happen to bump into the infamous Dr. Bendo (i.e. The Earl of Rochester) who seemed to have created some interesting cures of his own.....(mostly along the lines of sperm donation!)
http://www.pseudopodium.org/repre…

Happy Friday and stay away from Quack doctors!

Robert Gertz  •  Link

"We doctors must never condone murder...Unless it's caused by our own incompetence."-Steve Martin, "The Man With Two Brains".

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"getting a ship of his to go to Tangier...during this strict embargo is a great matter,"

L&M note that since the war's onset ships required a license to go to sea (by a Proclamation of 1 March 1665).

Second Reading

Terry Foreman  •  Link

'W. Howe talking of my Lord Sandwich’s matters and his folly in minding his pleasures too much now-a-days, and permitting himself to be governed by Cuttance to the displeasing of all the Commanders almost of the fleete"

L&M: Sir Roger Cuttance was not a flag-officer, and his influence in the prize-goods scandal had been disastrous.

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"with Dr. Wilkins, Mr. Hooke, and others, to Colonell Blunts, to consider again of the business of charriots, and to try their new invention. Which I saw here my Lord Bruncker ride in; where the coachman sits astride upon a pole over the horse, but do not touch the horse, which is a pretty odde thing; but it seems it is most easy for the horse, and, as they say, for the man also."

Thomas Blount had been one of the most vigorous supporters of parliament and the Commonwealth in the country. After a brief spell in prison in 1660 he retired into private life, devoting himself to mechanical inventions, a plough, new chariot, waywiser [odometer], etc., some of which Pepys describes. He was elected FRS in 1665, but withdrew from the Society in 1668. The present experiment was one of a series made with chariots by members of the Royal Society. The design (which was claimed to be better than the rival French design) was by Hooke and Wilkins and Hooke had in September 1664 taken out a patent for its manufacture. It held one passenger, and the driver sat in a sprung saddle. Brouncker rode in it from London to Wricklemarsh (where Blount lived) on one occasion. Sir William Petty made similar experiments in the 1670s. (Per L&M, Companion and footnote)

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"the first meeting of Gresham College since the plague"

Per L&M: An informal meeting (not recorded in the society's minutes) of which there were several. It seems that the first Council meeting after the Plague was on 21 February, and the first meeting of the society on 14 March: http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"I did also give a good step in a business of Mr. Hubland’s, about getting a ship of his to go to Tangier, which during this strict embargo is a great matter, and I shall have a good reward for it, I hope."

L&M: Since the beginning of the war, ships had been forbidden, by a proclamation of 1 March 1665, to go to sea except under license. The Houblons sent two ships: http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1… http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1… and Pepys received £200 on 5 March for what appears to be this service: http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"what, among other fine discourse pleased me most, was Sir G. Ent about Respiration; that it is not to this day known, or concluded on among physicians, nor to be done either, how the action is managed by nature, or for what use it is."

L&M: The discovery by William Harvey (d. 1657) of the circulation of the blood had led investigators to examine the difficulty of explaining the change from venous to arterial blood, and the part played in the process by the lungs. It was English scientists who in this generation made the greatest contributions to the subject -- Boyle, Hooke, and Ent himself, who published a book on it in 1672. Lower showed that it was the lungs not the heart which effected the change; Mayow that the active agent was not the whole air, but only part of it (what we now know as oxygen). See Sir M. Foster, Lectures on his. physiol., pp. 172+; D. McKie in Science medicine and history (ed. E.A. Underwood), i. 469+; T.S. Patterson in Isis, 15/47+, 504+.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

Jeanine's comment about Dr. Bendo is misleading or those of you not familiar with John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester:

An episode in 1676 involving a drunken fight with the night guard resulted in one of John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester's friends being killed, and Rochester was -- again -- banished by Charles II.
Unwilling to return to the boring life in the country with his long-suffering wife, Rochester decided to go into hiding by disguising himself as a quack doctor named Dr. Bendo.

"When the profligate Earl of Rochester, under the name of "Alexander Bendo," played the part of a mountebank physician in the City, he took up his lodgings in Tower Street, next door to the Black Swan, at a goldsmith's house, where he gave out that he was sure of being seen "from 3 of the clock in the afternoon till 8 at night."

"Being under an unlucky accident, which obliged him to keep out of the way, he disguised himself so that his nearest friends could not have known him, and set up in Tower Street for an Italian mountebank, where he [had a stage and] practised physic some weeks not without success." — Burnet's Life, p. 37, ed. 1680. -- London, Past and Present. H.B. Wheatley, 1891.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

Another amazing day ... from the City to Greenwich, to Deptford, to Wricklemarsh south of Blackheath, and back to the City for lunch with Elizabeth and pick up his accounting, then off to Whitehall, then back to Deptford, and to the City again for a meeting. And he would have had to have send notes to everyone ahead of time -- and received confirmations back -- so people would be in place for each meeting. The Thames in January is very cold. He presumably shot the Bridge at least once today. You would be hard pressed to achieve this today, with reliable public transportation.

Frank  •  Link

I have the shorter Pepys by Latham and really appreciate the comments and links that readers take time to post.

The Greenwich Patriot  •  Link

To be fair, Greenwich and Deptford and Wricklemarsh (north and east of Blackheath) are all very close to each other, but certainly a day crammed with appointments. The time taken on the river to and from Depteford would vary according to the tide and the amount of rain (I don't think it had rained much recently).

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