Wednesday 12 February 1661/62

Annotations

• N vicenzo on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 02:32am. Flag this

  “considerable businesses at Mr. Phillips the lawyer, with Prior” a follow up of cashing for his brother .

• N Jenny Doughty on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 02:55am. Flagged

  The

• N dirk on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 02:57am. Flag this

  “half a 100 poor Jack”

  “100” = scanning error? Somebody with L&M to the rescue…

• N Pauline on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 03:04am. Flagged

  half a 100 poor Jack

  The

• N Pauline on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 03:06am. Flag this

  I mean “But What is a “half a 100”?

• N vicenzo on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 03:37am. Flag this

  Trinculo: What haue we here, a man,
  or a fish? dead or aliue? a fish, hee smels like a fish: a
  very ancient and fish-like smell: a kinde of, not of the
  newest poore-Iohn: a strange fish: were I in England
  now (as once I was) and had but this fish painted; not
  a holiday-foole there but would giue a peece of siluer:
  there, would this Monster, make a man:
  The Tempest ll. ii 26-29

• N vicenzo on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 03:46am. Flag this

  May be it be just be 50 salted Hakes from Maine:He is a one for getting bushels of this and barrells of that be cheap? vino from Spain or Oysters from Malden mud flats. Never to be declared on gifte forme, to stear a contract this a way, now we are much more sutler. A nice vice presidency in a high flying company or winning that put & bet on 21 st green at the local rabbit warren.

• N Australian Susan on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 06:14am. Flag this

  “half a hundred” might refer to half a hundredweight - were dried fish at that time sold by the hundredweight?

• N Australian Susan on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 06:15am. Flag this

  For hundredweight, see http://www.sizes.com/units/hundredweight.htm

• N Mary on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 07:21am. Flag this

  “a 100 poor jack” is the L&M reading.

  That quantity ought to be enough to keep the Pepyses going through Lent, without recourse to speculation about hundredweights.

• N Mary on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 09:13am. Flag this

  poor jack/poor john

  Pepys specifies ‘poor jack’ which is, strictly speaking, dried, salt cod. ‘Poor john’ ( which is not specified by Pepys, but only by the annotator) is the name more usually applied to hake. OED.

• N E on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 11:56am. Flag this

  Thanks, Australian Susan, for the link about weights. I didn’t know about the “butcher’s stone” weighing only 8 pounds, which might be a partial explanation of the extraordinary amounts of food that people are reported to have eaten at feasts in the past.

• N Bob T on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 02:46pm. Flag this

  Poor Jack

  Poor Jack in Shakespear’s time, which wasn’t all that much before Sam’s, was the name for salt cod. It was anything but “poor fare”, but was a food of the highest quality. Sam’s fish probably came from Newfoundland, where a fish export trade had been going on for almost two hundred years.

  If buying goods by the hundred weight was a common practise, whether it be coal, fish or turnips, then we must expect that the term might be shortened. “half a hundred”, is just as good as “half a hundred weight”, if everyone knows what it means.

  Looks as though Sam got a deal on some dried fish, and bought enough for himself, and enough to give to his immediate family. Because, even if he had it for three meals a day, fifty pounds or so of dried fish, makes an awful lot of “wet” fish.

  Dried salt cod is wonderful good, when it’s used to make fish and brewis with scruncheons.

• N Bob T on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 03:31pm. Flag this

  Poor Jack/Fish and Brewis

  Here is a url for the recipe for Fish and Brewis, which is pronounced fish n’ brews in Newfoundland, (new-fun-land)

  www.tidespoint.com/food/fishnbrewis.shtml

• N Al Pinkham on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 06:00pm. Flag this

  Downeast,this meal, made with potatoes is called New England Turkey Dinner and is a fine lunch if you have to work the afternoon in the cold. Considered a great treat and always served with soused onions. How things change and how they stay the same.

• N JWB on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 07:37pm. Flagged

  Fish, Newfoundland (pisc

• N JWB on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 07:47pm. Flag this

  Link to above quote: http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:mIrOUDRJh6sJ:www.bris.ac.uk/Depts/History

• N vicenzo on Sun 13 Feb 2005, 09:59pm. Flag this

  re: salting Most fish had to be salted within 24 hrs. That may be why the bard did have his say about that stink of fish, it was still a rotting before being salted. The great banks were a great source of Cod wars.

• N john lauer on Mon 14 Feb 2005, 03:40am. Flag this

  In JWB’s quote above, the confusing 16, 17, & 18 are superscript references to notes.

• N vicenzo on Mon 14 Feb 2005, 04:03am. Flag this

  salted hake appears to be the worse of eating, but fresh be delightful, but cod fresh not so good, but salted be good. photo of a hake http://www.photolib.noaa.gov/historic/nmfs/figb0320.htm

  Discussion The Silver Hake has a good flavor if eaten when fresh, but it deteriorates too quickly for commercial exploitation.

  http://www.enature.com/fieldguide/showSpeciesSH.asp?curGroupID=3&shapeID=995&curPageNum=7&recnum=FI0068
  on the continent it be Known as Merluche Blanche or Loca banca

• N Jenny Doughty on Tue 15 Feb 2005, 02:50am. Flag this

  ‘Downeast,this meal, made with potatoes is called New England Turkey Dinner and is a fine lunch if you have to work the afternoon in the cold. Considered a great treat and always served with soused onions.’

  My husband - a lifelong inhabitant of the great state of Maine - wonders if you mean fish chowder, but he’s never come across the term New England Turkey Dinner.

• N John Lord on Fri 23 Dec 2005, 10:17pm. Flag this

  I believe these dried fish were sold by tale, not weight, and that half a 100 was 60 fish.

• N in Aqua Scripto on Tue 27 Dec 2005, 03:05am. Flag this

  fishy tale: fish sold by the long hundred/hundred,last,cast. A tale be the last fish cast aside from a Hundred. A hundred be differing number, be it Devon or Whitby. In Devon it be 120 or 40 cast [a cast it be 3 fish] then for the Robins Hood Bay fisherfolk, cast in a cast[that be 3 more] [that be 123 herrings not red yet ] to wet thy whistle. But Last not leased, there be a Last which be 100 hundreds, for the avoirdupois set, that be 2 tons of ‘erring or 13200 fish, ready to be pickled for barrell or become blota’s or ****** Kippers. Gleaned from a book on Herrings.
  so the half a hundred it be 61 bloatas and half thrown in if it be from the North Country. As it be December, it be from Yarmouth catch of the day.
  A ton, to me, be doing 100 MPH on saddle of a black shadow.