Friday 8 January 1668/69
Up, and with Colonel Middleton, in his coach, and Mr. Tippets to White Hall; and there attended the Duke of York with the rest, where the Duke was mighty plain with the Treasurers, according to the advice my Lord Brouncker and I did give him the other night, and he did it fully; and so as, I believe, will make the Treasurers carefull of themselves, unless they do resolve upon defying the Duke of York. Thence with W. Hewer home, and to dinner, and so out again, my wife and I and Mr. Hater to White Hall, where she set us down, and she up and down to buy things, while we at the Treasury-Chamber, where I alone did manage the business of “The Leopard” against the whole Committee of the East India Company, with Mr. Blackburne with them; and to the silencing of them all, to my no great content. Thence walked to my wife, and so set out for home in our coach, it being very cold weather, and so to the office to do a little business, and then home to my wife’s chamber, my people having laid the cloth, and got the rooms all clean above-stairs to-night for our dinner to-morrow, and therefore I to bed.
8 Annotations
First Reading
Terry Foreman • Link
"I alone did manage the business of the "Leopard” against the whole Committee of the East India Company, with Mr. Blackburne with them -- and to the silencing of them all, to my great content."
So L&M transcribe, and note that, in this dispute (dating back to 1663), one of the issues was whether the company had been responsible for the under-freighting of the "Leopard." This was discussed after dinner last 25 January: http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
Mary • Link
"she up and down to buy things"
It's that £30 burning a hole in her pocket.
Terry Foreman • Link
"the Duke was mighty plain with the Treasurers, according to the advice my Lord Brouncker and I did give him the other night"
See Monday http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
"By and by I met my Lord Brouncker; and he and I to the Duke of York alone, and discoursed over the carriage of the present Treasurers, in opposition to, or at least independency of, the Duke of York, or our Board, which the Duke of York is sensible of, and all remember, I believe; for they do carry themselves very respectlessly of him and us. We also declared our minds together to the Duke of York about Sir John Minnes’s incapacity to do any service in the Office, and that it is but to betray the King to have any business of trust committed to his weakness. So the Duke of York was very sensible of it and promised to speak to the King about it."
AnnieC • Link
"...and to the silencing of them all, to my no great content."
Is that "no" a slip of the keyboard? At first glance I read it as "own".
Terry Foreman • Link
That "no" is perhaps a text mis-scan. L&M didn't find it.
pepfie • Link
>the business of the “Leopard”< - under-freighting and over-charging.
"... down to Woolwich, and mustered the three East India ships [Dunkirk, Leopard, Mary Rose] that lie there, believing that there is great-juggling between the Pursers and Clerks of the Cheque in cheating the King of the wages and victuals of men that do not give attendance, and I found very few on board."
http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
Second Reading
Terry Foreman • Link
"I alone did manage the business of the "Leopard” against the whole Committee of the East India Company, with Mr. Blackburne with them"
Robert Blackborne, the uncle of Will Hewer -- who intrduced him to Pepys -- was now the Secretary to the East India Company.
Stephane Chenard • Link
The Treasurers' minutes (at https://www.british-history.ac.uk…) do not record quite so much hoo-hah and only note, sandwiched between resolutions on salaries for the Grooms of the Bedchamber and another mystery budget for Col. Fox, that "the East India Co. and the Navy Commissioners [attend] about the 'Leopard' and 'Convertine'. As to the 'Leopard' they make a dispute: as to the 'Dunkirk' my Lords remit it. In the whole my Lords demand 7,600L."
Faced with the usual avalanche of warrants to endorse and problems to resolve, the Treasurers may well have looked on with some impatience as Sam made his dispute with the Company, and seized the moment when the Company men paused to think to gavel it off to the next session. The Leopard, a ship good enough to carry Ambassador Harvey and his retinue to Constantinople, could be expected to have above-average comforts but, post-Diary, it will keep making trouble, surfacing in the State Papers for this year with complaints in London about its expenses, and complaints from its captain (maybe just a troublemaker) about rations that were so bad and stank so much that they nearly caused a mutiny and had to be stored on the deck.
The minutes do not record the Duke of York being in attendance. Maybe he "was mighty plain with the Treasurers" in the hallway before they started their session, heads bowed and worrying about being sent to the Tower. HRH in fact only appears in this day's minutes in the passing of a "Warrant, or privy seal if needful, for the remainder due to the Duke of York's rockers and nurses".
The Duke has rockers and nurses! Now our Imagination runs wild. We dismiss one vision of York's entourage including a posse of dudes with leather jackers, handlebar moustaches and guitars, and of gals in short white dresses and toting syringes, though his Royal Highness might have enjoyed that (let's keep in view that York is 24 right now, as old as James Dean ever got). Instead we conjure a line of periwigged gentlemen in gold-trimmed liveries, arms half-extended and ready at all hours to receive and soothe the Duke's babies. They think of the privy seal that's coming their way, and wink knowingly at the nurses...