Thursday 7 August 1662

Annotations

• N Tom on Sun 7 Aug 2005, 11:03pm

  So this is how Mr Cooper gets paid for his lessons.

• N Robert Gertz on Sun 7 Aug 2005, 11:22pm

  Aye, that’s fine, fancy mathematics you’ve got there, Mr. Cooper. Been countin’ your way to Master all this time? (think “Jaws”)

  Anything, Sam? All right, lets see you appoint yourself head of the Royal Navy.

  (heh, heh, sir. No need. In effect, I am head of the Royal Navy. Broad grin.)

  Or better yet, open up the service to women…Bess might like that.

  (But I would not, sir. Stern frown.)

• N A. De Araujo on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 12:16am

  “to my drinking no wine”
  Well I guess the headaches were not that bad.

• N Terry F. on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 12:44am

  Mr. Cooper’s not Richard-come-lately, as the Background info shows
  See Pauline from L&M Companion: “The one-eyed sailing master (iv.133). Pepys had known him in the

• N Mark Ynys-Mon on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 02:00am

  No news of that mouse then?…

• N Cumgranissalis on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 02:07am

  His ideas are taking root and are being acted upon as he makes his valid points, feedback [a necessary ingredient to future success] gives one a warm feeling “…my interest still growing, for which God be praised…”

• N Cumgranissalis on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 02:09am

  Nah! Mark, it be toy for one of the cats now, not worth an entry . ‘No news of that mouse then’

• N Cumgranissalis on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 02:45am

  ref: earlier to kitty.
  “…My boy taking a cat home with him from my Lord

• N A. Hamilton on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 02:46am

  The mouse

  Personally, I think the tale of the mouse was unconsciously given for literary effect- just so are the unwary plunderers of HM Navy taken. Also the tale of the house (roofless & open to the weather) could be a metaphor for the condition of the Navy.

• N Cumgranissalis on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 03:00am

  Hamilton I doth believe, many entries have a second meaning, in case some nosey parker, reads his entree, he be not the only learned ladd that has used this shorthand, because their be books available on St Paul’s book stalls. He has to protect his thoughts [and rump ] in more ways than one, not every one be on the same team, as he be finding out. their be snitches, as he has already be warned at an earlier date.

• N Alan Bedford on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 03:10am

  “This morning I got unexpectedly the Reserve for Mr. Cooper to be maister of…”

  Not a bad first berth for a new master. A fourth-rate ship of 34 guns and 150 total crew plus Marines. Downside: he’ll no doubt have to put up with a military commander.

• N Mary House on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 03:58am

  Thank you Cungranissilis for those references. I’d forgotten about the mouse problem in the Pepys household. Interesting that he mentions buying mouse traps. So we know that there was a 17th century version.

• N Terry F. on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 04:13am

  mouse traps

  A. Hamilton and Cungranissilis, you do us a service to remind us of the common use — of Pepys’ use here (disguised from us by transcription) — of cipher = disguise ~ a common feature of the Baroque, whose artistic and architectual trompe l’oeil was complemented by the flourishing of cryptography — hidden meanings.
  “Here there be mice: let us get a trap!”
  I think I need a wigg (hair thinning, as it is, or no).

• N Terry F. on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 05:15am

  No plays? As Cungranissilis says, using Shelton’s tachygraphy hides nada, wherefore Sam’l, having *apparently* foresworn (lit.) attending the theatre, uses some of what he has learned there to encrypt in his journall dramas that unfold around him, and reserving for himself ever-choicer rolls therein.

• N Xjy on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 08:01am

  feedback and interest
  Cgs writes: “His ideas are taking root and are being acted upon as he makes his valid points, feedback [a necessary ingredient to future success] gives one a warm feeling

• N Todd Bernhardt on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 03:33pm

  re: hidden meanings

  I don’t know, fellas, I remain unconvinced. Nothing I’ve read about the Diary — or in it, for that matter — has indicated to me that Sam is speaking metaphorically or allegorically. One of the wonderful things about the Diary, for me, is the absolute straightforwardness of the writing. Its concentration on the mundane, everyday events in Sam’s life, and on his feelings and actions, is the foundation of its absolute brilliance, and of its connection with our modern-day lives (because so much of human nature and circumstances are shared).

  Just as we should shy from judging Sam by our standards, I think we should think twice (or more) before trying to read too much into his entries (unless we have the facts to back it).

  My tuppence, FWIW…

• N Glory, Glory on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 04:06pm

  Todd B.I agree with you on the straightforwardness of the diary and that one of the glories of Pepys is his direct and modern approach to his own life and his times. No Riccoco here I think

• N language hat on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 04:18pm

  “my interest still growing”

  Xjy, if you’re thinking of the normal modern subjective meaning of interest (‘feeling of personal concern’), that wouldn’t develop for another century. The meaning in the 17th century was an objective concern in something: ‘fact or relation of being legally concerned; right or title to a share in something; relation of being concerned or affected; good, benefit, profit, advantage,’ and the sense I think is most likely here: ‘influence due to personal connexion; power of influencing the action of others; personal influence with a person or body of persons.’

  I agree with Todd about “hidden meanings.”

• N Glyn on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 04:28pm

  Were there Marines in the 1660s?

  By the way, whatever the adjustment for the different calendars, if he is going to work at 4 am then he is going to work in the dark, and working in a deserted office by candlelight or lamplight.

  He’s probably the first to arrive there even before the clerks, I doubt if many of them needed to start work before the regular weekly Board Meetings at 8 to 9 am.

• N Nix on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 04:59pm

  Were there marines in the 1660s?

  Per OED, “marine” was an established usage for “sailor or mariner” — the first reference for the modern sense of seaborne soldiers is dated 1672. (However, some of the earlier citations for “marine” could also be read in this sense.)

  2. a. A sailor or mariner. Obs.
  
  c1575 J. HOOKER Life Sir P. Carew (1857) 33 He had in his ship a hundred marines, the worst of them being able to be a master in the best ship within the realm. 1617 F. MORYSON Itinerary III. III. i. 126 They haue few Marrines, and those vnexperienced and fearefull. 1634 W. BRERETON Trav. (1844) 14 If any soldier, marine, or tradesman die. 1723 H. ROWLANDS Mona Antiqua Restaurata II. 331 Their Marines..told them it was a Hyperborean or Northern Island.
  

  b. Originally: a soldier enlisted and trained to serve on board ship (and, in certain circumstances, on shore, esp. in the dockyards). Now chiefly: a member of the British Royal Marines or the U.S. Marine Corps. Cf. HORSE-MARINE n.2
  
  1672 S. TAYLOR Let. 30 May in L. Edye Hist. Rec. Royal Marines (1893) I. 148 Those marines of whom I soe oft have wrote to you behaved themselves stoutly. 1703 London Gaz. No. 3912/1 A Detachment of 400 Men, and the Regiment of Marines. 1709 R. STEELE Tatler No. 79 {page}2 An honest rough Relation of ours..who is a Lieutenant of Marines. 1740 London Mag. 413 Sir, a Soldier and a Marine are, I may say, quite different creatures. 1804 W. CRUISE Digest Laws Eng. Property III. 164 A commission in the marines. 1855 E. E. STUART Let. 31 Jan. in R. Stuart et al. Stuart Lett. (1961) II. 685 At 9 A.M. all hands were called to witness the punishment. The officers in full uniform with their swords & pistols, marines drawn up with their muskets loaded and bayonets fixed. 1914 F. T. JANE Your Navy as Fighting Machine x. 83 A marine when afloat does bluejacket duty under his own officers, manning guns, etc., while ashore his duties are of a military nature. 1988 D. A. THOMAS Compan. Royal Navy iii. 243/2 The destroyer Anthony landed 50 marines.
  

• N A. Hamilton on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 05:57pm

  Hidden meanings

  I confess I was being fanciful. I don’t think Sam was being intentionally metaphorical. But the Batten-mouse sequence is almost novelistic — even if unintended — don’t you think?

• N Alan Bedford on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 06:36pm

  “…the first reference for the modern sense of seaborne soldiers is dated 1672.”

  Thanks, Nix, for the correction. I hadn’t actually researched the history of the Royal Marines before presuming that they would have existed in the mid-17th century. I note that the first regiment of seagoing British soldiers - the Duke of York and Albany’s Maritime Regiment of Foot - won’t be formed until October, 1664.

• N Todd Bernhardt on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 07:33pm

  re: Bat(ten) and mouse

  Yep, Mr. H, I agree! Such “happy accidents” are one of the highlights of the Diary for me. I think they may very well provide us with a tiny glimpse into Sam’s unconscious … but then again, they may not! :-)

  Glyn pointed out something that struck me, too — it’s pretty amazing that Sam is able to get “up and at ‘em” at 4 a.m. In my younger daze I could make do on much less sleep, but nothing on the scale of Our Man in the Navy Office. I wonder if it’s because people could more easily live by their circadian rhythms then … fewer external time cues than now.

• N Cumgranissalis on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 07:39pm

  Nursery rhymes be more than a fanciful kid pacifier or ridelin. There are “those that keep ones tongue ‘til they be in charge”, those that say wot they be thinking usually end up sidelined at a minimum, sometimes even be minus a head, leaving a trail of loose talk has ended many a career, thus I doth think Samuell being very observing has done the same, using the double entendre to remind himself that times be dangerous still, for example preachers who have no ethics will keep their income while others be collecting at park corner.

• N Terry F. on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 08:04pm

  “hidden meanings”

  Since I dropped the phrase, I’m accountable for it. Todd B., in my intellectual economy (such as it is) your tuppence are worth a lot, and perhaps the case for this phrase will fail entirely or in great part (risk taken). I *was* waxing a bit eloquent, wasn’t I; now let me see if I can wane with honor.

  While also appreciating greatly Sam’s candor and self-discovery as a diarist (aka, “journalist”, (1) I imagine him exploiting analogies gladly, am pretty much with A. Hamilton, but would perhaps not say “novelistic” (the notion being a few decades away): methinks Sam’s sense of *drama* is alive and well, as the “interest” passage shows (I retract “encrypt”). (2) Sam has already used what Tomalin terms a “coded passage” to obscure a sexual adventure (September 4, 1660: http://www.pepys.info/bits2.html#one (3) (SPOILER) Sam’s use of “coded passages” will become more frequent a year from next January, as evidence of the private/public split of the age. (4) The Baroque with its architectual trompe l’oeil is indeed upon us, as “patches” will give way to masks and wigs: cf. John Spurr’s aptly subtitled *England in the 1670s: This Masquerading Age* or, Charles II’s England goes the way of France (for the Background later). (Rococo is usually dated 1720-60.)

  Perhaps “veiled meanings” works? (“masked meanings” later)….
  

• N Todd Bernhardt on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 08:43pm

  re: Hidden meanings

  Well said, Terry, and I think we really all agree on this, for the most part. I also believe that Sam gets dramatic in his writing at times (consciously or not), and has a good sense for puns. Because he’s a smart guy and such a good writer, his writing can be read — rightfully or not — at several levels. That’s one of the things that keeps these annotations interesting … we all bring something different to the table, and sometimes take something different from it.

  His “coded passages” are meant to make his dalliances a bit harder to figure out, but one has to wonder if he really thought they’d be effective. I can read them quite easily with my (very) basic French, and certainly any contemporary codebreakers could have, too (or could have found someone to do it).

  But obfuscation about his sexual encounters is much different than writing allegorically or emblematically (i.e., instead of writing details about a sexual act, he describes it as a mundane occurance: “Visited Betty Lane after dinner, and thoroughly examined her books *wink wink nudge nudge* … Robert Gertz could certainly help me here :-)

  Do you see what I mean?

• N Terry F. on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 09:03pm

• N A. Hamilton on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 09:52pm

  from whose eyes were these to be hidden

  An interesting question. I’m inclined to think that the foreign phrases are a method for Sam to distance his conscious, book-and-diary keeping mind from his (don’t look) not-to-be-spoken-of-in-plain -English indiscretions. As Terry suggests, maybe he’s shielding his actions from his conscience.

• N Pedro on Mon 8 Aug 2005, 10:59pm

  My tuppence, your tuppence.

  Put another way

• N Australian Susan on Tue 9 Aug 2005, 02:59am

  Interest
  The idea of interest which is being used here by Sam (as explained by language hat) is the concept which gives rise, soon, to the beginnings of politcal parties - the first being The King’s party, aka those in the king’s interest. Even though parties were well-established in the 19th century, it is still possible, if voting patterns are analysed (I took part in such research c. 1979, when the computational tools became available)to see that people voted according to their “interest” as much as according to their party.

  The disguised bits
  I always thought Sam wrote like that because he was describing things he could only just bring himself to verbalise and he could only put them in writing, even secret, private writings if they were further hidden in a foreign language. He is very ambivalent about his sexual urges and stumbles about uncertainly being prodded firmly by his conscience one moment and hustled along by his libido the next. It makes for a good read! Endless descriptions of endless conquests get very boring (Fanny Hill, Casanova, Shirley Conran - fill in your own gaps)