Tuesday 29 January 1660/61

Annotations

• N dirk on Thu 29 Jan 2004, 11:18pm

  “The Maid in the Mill”

  Another Beaumont & Fletcher play (1647).
  Cfr. also background info:
  http://www.pepysdiary.com/p/289.php#c10022
  

• N Andrew Hamilton on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 12:19am

  This passage reminds me, apropos
  manly feats including hard riding, which we discussed recently, that today’s hardest-riding billionaire sheikhs manage less than 11 mph on the best mounts - one more sign that Sam rides well. I cite the following item from the Khaleej Times- Gulf News of September 17, 2002 (condensed):

  “Sheikh Ahmed bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum was crowned world champion after he won the World Endurance Championship in Jerez, Spain, yesterday. Sheikh Ahmed crossed the finish line three minutes ahead of his nearest challenger… The brilliant UAE rider … took his 13-year-old gelding Bowman [over] the 160 kilometre race in 9 hours, 19 minutes and 29 seconds.” (I work that out to 10.64 mph, including rests. The Maktoums own the best horseflesh available, and it is superbly trained. Sam was riding rental horses, and did nearly as well, although his ride of Jan 16 was considerably shorter - 3-plus hours vs. 9-plus.)

• N language hat on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 01:44am

  “The Mayd in ye Mill”:
  This “ye” is, of course, a graphic representation of “the,” and would not have been pronounced with a y; the OED says:

  Another value of y arises from the assimilation of y and

• N Mary House on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 03:11am

  What is meant by “some catches?” Does this refer to music or games?

• N The Bishop on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 03:44am

  Catches are what we now call ‘singing in the round’.

• N vincent on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 03:44am

  “Catches” Just how my mind works ? Reading between the lines, there was a little gamboling going on, frisky maybe, Fresh maybe, note the weather spring like , It does bring out the best in men? at least the word is impertinent
  “…and after that a great deal of impertinent mirth by Mr. Davis, and some catches, and so broke up…”
  [disrespectful,] the synonym, being saucy,insolent,impudent, pert, fresh, rude,audacious, cheeky, sassy. Take your pick?
  

• N The Bishop on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 03:50am

  ‘The Maid in the Mill’ was actually by Fletcher and Rowley (Wm. Rowley).

  It was licensed for publication in 1623 (and presumably performed about then), long after Beaumont was dead. It was, however, included in the 1647 collection of Beaumont and Fletcher’s plays, which is what dirk’s 1647 date refers to.

• N Emilio on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 03:53am

  “we three went to (White)fryers”

  Sam has goofed here: “Pepys cannot be referring to the famous Blackfriars Theatre used by the King’s Men from c. 1608 until 1642, because it had been pulled down on 5 August 1655. His ‘Blackfryers’ is an error for ‘Whitefriars’, i.e. the Salisbury Court Theatre, at which the Duke of York’s company was performing at this time. Cf. below [on 9 Feb], where Pepys again makes the error but corrects it.” (L&M footnote)

  I’m surprised that Wheatley didn’t footnote this fact as well—it seems exactly the sort of historical detail he would revel in. The upcoming Feb 9 entry should confirm the situation by reading ‘Whitefriers’ rather than ‘Black-‘.

  From a later L&M footnote: “Not the Whitefriars Theatre opened c. 1605, but the Salisbury Court Theatre (opened in 1629), situated in the Whitefriars district east of the Temple and south of Fleet St. The Duke of York’s company, managed by Sir William Davenant, played here before he transferred it to a new theatre in Lincoln’s Inn Fields in June 1661.”
  

• N vincent on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 04:50am

  Bishop’s comment on Rowley, William
  (b. 1585?, London, Eng.—d. 1642?), English dramatist and actor who collaborated with several Jacobean dramatists, notably Thomas Middleton
  appears to be correct.
  http://search.eb
  Fletcher, John and Rowley, William The maid in the mill..com/shakespeare/micro/511/98.html

  press release of the day about one of Fletchers works.
  : Poets lives; wonder not how or why
  Fletcher revives, but that he er’e could dye:
  Safe Mirth, full Language, flow in ev’ry Page,
  At once he doth both heighten and aswage;
  http://emsah.uq.edu.au/drama/fletcher/ff/frontmatter_23.htm
  the most famous line from the play a song [poem]

  How long shall I pine for love? /
  first staged: (performed 1623) The Maid in the Mill (licensed 1623 … The Elder Brother (printed 1637)
  

• N dirk on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 05:36am

  catches

  “… what would nowadays be called ‘coarse music’ was not left out of an evening’s entertainment in the seventeenth century. Both in tavern and home, the ‘catches’, normally written for three unaccompanied voices in canon as a round, were widely heard. The words of many or most catches have been thought unsuitable for mixed company in most ages between the seventeenth century and our own century, but their musical invention is often remarkable”
  From:
  http://www.ecwsa.org/entofdrinkandsong.html

  There is a CD available with some of these 17th c. catches:
  “The Art of Bawdy Song” by the Baltimore Consort and the Merry Companions, CD Ref: DOR 90155
  You can hear some samples from this CD on:
  http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000001Q93/026-6208702-3580445
  

• N Mary on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 08:00am

  ..by water through the bridge home….

  Bearing in mind our earlier discussion of the perils of ‘shooting’ London Bridge, it’s interesting that Sam finds it noteworthy that he achieved passage through the bridge rather than around it. Presumably the benign weather and a slack tide allowed this.

• N Leslie Silberhans on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 10:24am

  The defining characteristic of a ‘catch’ (as opposed to a ‘glee’), is that words from, say, the second line insert themselves into the first, thereby changing the meaning, commonly in a ribald manner. they are very clever and ofttimes beautiful. I recommend Purcell’s, in particular.

• N Hic retearius (ut fluminis nauta!) on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 03:01pm

  Mary, catching the tide.

  The impression Sam created here was just the opposite, he was in a rush to get home and took advantage of the current in the river. To this reader; the facts of

• N Rex Gordon on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 03:06pm

  For a great collection of English song lyrics, many of them bawdy, visit this site:

  http://www.acronet.net/~robokopp/english.html

  Songs from Sam’s era are particularly featured in the “Cavalier Ballads” section. Although bawdy songs are always the ones I enjoy the best, the satirical, political songs commenting on the momentous events of the era and how people perceived and felt about them are also fascinating. (The Baltimore Consort, mentioned above, hails from my hometown, Baltimore, in the state of Maryland in the USA. Maryland was founded and settled by English Catholic families in the first part of the 17th century: Calverts, Howards, Somersets, Crosslands and others … Cavalier ballads must have been familiar to the first English-speaking Marylanders.)

• N Brian McMullen on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 03:11pm

  From a later L&M footnote:

• N mary on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 03:36pm

  Catching the tide?

  It’s not many weeks since Sam got an unwelcome soaking when passing beneath the bridge. He’s on his way to dinner and certainly wants to get there quickly, but surely isn’t going to risk another soaking en route if the river looks less than calm. We noted earlier that passage beneath the bridge, through the very narrow waterways between the stanchions, could be uncomfortable and dangerous when the tide was either ebbing or flowing. Hence my surmise that it was slack when Sam needed passage; he was lucky to be able to avoid the delay normally incurred when leaving one boat, walking past the bridge and taking another on the other side.

• N vincent on Fri 30 Jan 2004, 07:15pm

  Catch as catch can: no doubt catching the tide [rising ]singing bawdy songs especially those rugger songs { Rolling in the h…. oh! sweet memories}

• N PHE on Sat 31 Jan 2004, 12:54am

  {memories sweet oh!…h the in Rolling}
  songs rugger those especially songs bawdy singing [rising] tide the catching doubt no : can catch as catch.
  Any better? Worth a try.
  

• N john lauer on Sat 31 Jan 2004, 03:47am

  re: Catches and Glees
  The three 12” LPs I find still in my collection are
  allegro 107 (3008), Catches and Glees of the English Restoration, Purcell, et al.;
  allegro 3046, More Catches and Glees, the Glee Singers, John Bath, Dir. (1953); and
  EA-0312, Catch That Catch Can (1958), the NY Catch Club.