Thursday 8 March 1665/66

Up betimes and to the office, where all the morning sitting and did discover three or four fresh instances of Sir W. Pen’s old cheating dissembling tricks, he being as false a fellow as ever was born. Thence with Sir. W. Batten and Lord Bruncker to the White Horse in Lumbard Streete to dine with Captain Cocke, upon particular business of canvas to buy for the King, and here by chance I saw the mistresse of the house I have heard much of, and a very pretty woman she is indeed and her husband the simplest looked fellow and old that ever I saw. After dinner I took coach and away to Hales’s, where my wife is sitting; and, indeed, her face and necke, which are now finished, do so please me that I am not myself almost, nor was not all the night after in writing of my letters, in consideration of the fine picture that I shall be master of.

Thence home and to the office, where very late, and so home to supper and to bed.

21 Annotations

First Reading

cgs  •  Link

"...discover three or four fresh instances of Sir W. Pen’s old cheating dissembling tricks, he being as false a fellow as ever was born...."
'tis a word that I have never heard used or misheard as in disassemble.

dissembling.
di'ssembling, ppl. a
That dissembles; deceiving; hypocritical.
1526 Pilgr. Perf. (W. de W. 1531) 299b, Ye most vnkynde & dissemblynge disciple Iudas. 1535 COVERDALE Prov. x. 18 Dissemblynge lippes kepe hatred secretly. 1590 SHAKES. Mids. N. II. ii. 98 What wicked and dissembling glasse of mine, Made me compare with Hermias sphery eyne? 1707 Curios. in Husb. & Gard. 117 Double-hearted, dissembling, trickish..Men.

dissemble, v.1
1. trans. To alter or disguise the semblance of (one's character, a feeling, design, or action) so as to conceal, or deceive as to, its real nature; to give a false or feigned semblance to; to cloak or disguise by a feigned appearance.
......

1665 MANLEY Grotius' Low C. Warres 715 Among the Bodies..was found a Woman, who had dissembled her Sex, both in courage and a military Habit.

2. To disguise. Obs.
1508

cgs  •  Link

interesting; female doing a mans work.
Samuel, beware of a dissembled person.

Mary  •  Link

"female doing a man's work"

Women had long been essential to the provision and sale of ale and beer (the ale-wife) in both town and country, so it is not surprising that they also extended their roles to the more general one of managing (or helping to manage) taverns.

Robert Gertz  •  Link

"...sitting and did discover three or four fresh instances of Sir W. Pen’s old cheating dissembling tricks, he being as false a fellow as ever was born."

Shocking...

"Oh, Pepys. Your profits from the prize goods pillaging..."

"Ah, thank you Cocke."

Robert Gertz  •  Link

"...and, indeed, her face and necke, which are now finished, do so please me that I am not myself almost, nor was not all the night after in writing of my letters, in consideration of the fine picture that I shall be master of."

"Sam'l?"

"Hmmn...?"

"Sam'l, darling?"

"Hmmn? What...?"

"Sam'l...The real thing is right here, you know." Bess fumes at the icon-adoring Sam.

"Mr. P., sir...I've got those contracts from Captain Cocke...Oh, my dear Lord?!!" Will Hewer, staring...

"Will?" Bess eyes the adoring Hewer...

"Isn't it incredible, Will?" Sam notes.

"Oh, I have dreamed...." Will begins, rapt...

Uh...He eyes the two Pepys eyeing him. Bess unable to keep a slight beam out of her hard stare.

***

Actually interesting that Sam shows no sign of any nervous residual Puritanism at Bess' rather ... portrait.

Michael Robinson  •  Link

" ... do so please me that I am not myself almost, ... , in consideration of the fine picture that I shall be master of."

Easier for domestic harmony than a prior instance of SP's 'portrait lust:'

"... to Mr. Lilly’s, the great painter, who came forth to us; but believing that I come to bespeak a picture, he prevented us by telling us, that he should not be at leisure these three weeks; ... and here, among other pictures, saw the so much desired by me picture of my Lady Castlemaine, which is a most blessed picture; and that that I must have a copy of."
http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…

Australian Susan  •  Link

'....the simplest looked fellow and old that ever I saw...."

oh dear, oh dear. Are we about to see Chaucer's The Merchant's Tale played out......

Women and ale houses. NB The surname Brewster derives from a female beer-maker (as spinster derives from a female spinner).

Ric Jerrom  •  Link

...and a Baxter was a female baker. Mary, I think cgs was referring to the finding of the body of a woman in a (man's) soldier's uniform after a battle in the Low Countries: there are a good few well-attested stories of woman dissembling thus, and going off to war as soldiers and even as sailors in the navy. "The Handsome Cabin Boy" is only one among loads of folk songs on this subject.

cgs  •  Link

Ric: 'tis 'wot' I be alluding too,girl carrying gun , of course there be a king that dissembled being a man too. There were always girls following the gravy train, but it has been known for some time that a wife would pick up a husband's gear and carry on the battle.
Long live Bodacia, She did not need to dissemble herself.
There was another case of dissembling female, discovery of a general that had died before finding out at the autopsy that she had practice the art of warfare.

Robert Gertz  •  Link

Wasn't it Robert Guiscard's wife Sichelgaita who joined her husband on the field against the Byzantines and others in battle armor, screaming war cries and terrifying her opponents? Not to mention Antony's wife, Fulva, who gets a nod from Shakespeare as a war leader...And of course Henry VI's Margaret.

A. Hamilton  •  Link

N'oubliez pas Jeanne d'Arc.

cgs  •  Link

"Oui": but she did nae hide behind a man's visage,acting like a male, only to be discovered after the bonfire.

Robert Gertz  •  Link

Be nice to get more accurate figures on Soviet women fighting during WWII. While I don't buy the usual Nazi general claims..."the Russians outnumbered us six, eight, twenty to one", it is hard to imagine the USSR made up its shattering losses so quickly during the latter parts of the war without enormous numbers of female soldiers, given that most figures suggest they had only three times the German population (backed by recruits from fascist Europe as well), 240 vs 80 million at best.

Civilization yet again saved by women...And as usual the thanks they get...Putin.

language hat  •  Link

From Ivan's War: Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939-1945, by Catherine Merridale (Picador, 2006), p. 165:

"The most conspicuous innovation, which began in earnest in the summer of 1942, was the recruitment of young women. In the first weeks of the war women had been discouraged from applying for active service roles. But a labor shortage everywhere, at the front line and in the factories, changed everything. That summer, the military expressed itself keen to recruit 'healthy young girls.' To some extent the idea was to shame the men into greater effort. The other goal was to make civilian women more effective, to shame them, too, into working long hours in armament plants or on the farms. Either way, some 800,000 women would serve at the front during the war. Smirks and official condescension followed them. Unlike the men, they found it hard to fit their bodies into the heroic mold, to see themselves as warriors. There had been women at the front in Russia's other wars, but never on this scale."

(There's considerable further discussion on the experience of the women, and of course on that of the men; anyone interested in the Russian army at this period should read the book.)

Second Reading

john  •  Link

And we arrive at today, when the SAS is accepting women.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

Women are sometimes better suited for a mission, especially if it entails small spaces. Brute strength isn't as vital as it used to be. We've just got to encourage our daughteers to like math, work out and be proud of being smart when they are 14. I'm not sure which of these three is easier.

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"and here by chance I saw the mistresse of the house I have heard much of, and a very pretty woman she is indeed and her husband the simplest looked fellow and old that ever I saw."

L&M: She was Frances, second wife of Abraham Browne. She committed suicide the following year: 4 February 1667.

Jerry  •  Link

Hi Terry, and thanks for above. Are you able to point us to a reference or source for Frances's name and why she committed suicide? Excuse my ignorance if this should be obvious, I'm new to the site.

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