Wednesday 27 November 1667
Up, and all the morning at my Lord Bruncker’s lodgings with Sir J. Minnes and [Sir] W. Pen about Sir W. Warren’s accounts, wherein I do not see that they are ever very likely to come to an understanding of them, as Sir J. Minnes hath not yet handled them. Here till noon, and then home to dinner, where Mr. Pierce comes to me, and there, in general, tells me how the King is now fallen in and become a slave to the Duke of Buckingham, led by none but him, whom he, Mr. Pierce, swears he knows do hate the very person of the King, and would, as well as will, certainly ruin him. He do say, and I think with right, that the King do in this do the most ungrateful part of a master to a servant that ever was done, in this carriage of his to my Lord Chancellor: that, it may be, the Chancellor may have faults, but none such as these they speak of; that he do now really fear that all is going to ruin, for he says he hears that Sir W. Coventry hath been, just before his sickness, with the Duke of York, to ask his forgiveness and peace for what he had done; for that he never could foresee that what he meant so well, in the councilling to lay by the Chancellor, should come to this. As soon as dined, I with my boy Tom to my bookbinder’s, where all the afternoon long till 8 or 9 at night seeing him binding up two or three collections of letters and papers that I had of him, but above all things my little abstract pocket book of contracts, which he will do very neatly. Then home to read, sup, and to bed.
5 Annotations
First Reading
Terry Foreman • Link
"Sir W. Coventry hath been...with the Duke of York, to ask his forgiveness and peace for what he had done; for that he never could foresee that what he meant so well, in the councilling to lay by the Chancellor, should come to this."
18 October Coventry had said to Pepys in part "the King did take him into his special notice, and, from that time to this, hath received him so; and that then he did see the folly and mistakes of the Chancellor in the management of things, and saw that matters were never likely to be done well in that sort of conduct, and did persuade the King to think fit of the taking away the seals from the Chancellor" http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
Robert Gertz • Link
Well, I love see a bookbinder work too, Sam but seems a bit excessive.
"Here, is that fellow from the Naval Office, Pepys, still waitin'?"
"Won' leave he says till his stuff's bound."
"Our tax money at work, eh?"
john • Link
Robert wrote: "Sam but seems a bit excessive."
I wonder if this is more a matter of the importance of the material bound, namely "above all things my little abstract pocket book of contracts".
Carl in Boston • Link
till 8 or 9 at night seeing him binding up two or three collections of letters
I'm sure this was security and watching everything get sewn and glued together on the back tapes (where the threads pass over) and no financial papers going missing. Once the body is sewn and glued, it has to dry overnight in a bookpress, but the book can be left with security. The door would be locked, and anything torn out would be noticed. The office is run in a public way and there is nothing that could be read and repeated that would be embarrassing. Besides, Sam likes books and probably likes the smell of glue.
Second Reading
Terry Foreman • Link
"till 8 or 9 at night seeing him binding up two or three collections of letters and papers that I had of him, but above all things my little abstract pocket book of contracts, which he will do very neatly. "
(While waiting, the bookbinders is a good place to find out how others are binding their books and there are the other books that can be, ah, perused....)