Saturday 16 June 1666
Up betimes and to my office, and there we sat all the morning and dispatched much business, the King, Duke of Yorke, and Sir W. Coventry being gone down to the fleete. At noon home to dinner and then down to Woolwich and Deptford to look after things, my head akeing from the multitude of businesses I had in my head yesterday in settling my accounts. All the way down and up, reading of “The Mayor of Quinborough,” a simple play.
At Deptford, while I am there, comes Mr. Williamson, Sir Arthur Ingram and Jacke Fen, to see the new ships, which they had done, and then I with them home in their boat, and a very fine gentleman Mr. Williamson is.
It seems the Dutch do mightily insult of their victory, and they have great reason.1 Sir William Barkeley was killed before his ship taken; and there he lies dead in a sugar-chest, for every body to see, with his flag standing up by him. And Sir George Ascue is carried up and down the Hague for people to see.
Home to my office, where late, and then to bed.
14 Annotations
First Reading
Terry Foreman • Link
June 16 - John Evelyn's Diary
16 in the Jemmy Yach’t (an incomparable sailer) to sea, arived by noone at the Fleete in the B of Nore, dined with Pr: Rupert & Generall:
http://www.geocities.com/Paris/Le…
JWB • Link
Loevestein, where Ascue imprisioned:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loev…
Michael Robinson • Link
"... reading of “The Mayor of Quinborough,” a simple play. "
Link to an e-text:-
http://www.tech.org/~cleary/hengi…
Australian Susan • Link
On the BBC website is a picture of men re-enacting the playing of pell mell in Pall Mall.
Here's the link. There is no explanation as to why they are doing it this week.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pic…
Robert Gertz • Link
Still no fears directed at what Louis may be planning. One wonders if Sam just doesn't want to start thinking about that or if he has info to calm fears in that direction.
Ric Jerrom • Link
A quick glance at the BBC website - thanks, Susan - shows "gentlemen" in 17th.Century costume supposedly playing "paille - maille": their equipment is distinctly that of croquet players, however. Is croquet "pell - mell", anyone?
Ric Jerrom • Link
Apparently Pell - Mell was an aristocratic game played on a huge - 1000 yard - pitch: players bashed the ball as far as they could with mallets, but finished with something like a golfer's "spoon" to whack the ball into the air and through a suspended hoop. So more like golf than Croquet: BBC's re - enactors are innaccurate, it seems. Clarity at www.tradgames.org.uk/games/Croque… (There's a hint of a link to Sam, too...)
JWB • Link
"Arterial embalming is believed to have been first practiced in the Netherlands in the 17th century by Frederik Ruysch but his liquor balsamicum preservative was kept a secret to the grave and his methods were not widely copied."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emba…
GrahamT • Link
Not only is it not Paille Maille, but that is not the Pall Mall I drive down every day. This what it really looks like:
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q…
Australian Susan • Link
Yes, I was posting in a hurry before work - but I thought that the only accurate thing was the costume, but probably an expert on historical costume would correct me on that! Croquet is not Pell Mell.
cgs • Link
Shakespeare's Richard III, 1597
March on! Join bravely, let us to it pell-mell–
If not to heaven, then hand in hand to hell!(5.3.313-14)
Second Reading
Terry Foreman • Link
"At Deptford, while I am there, comes Mr. Williamson, Sir Arthur Ingram and Jacke Fen, to see the new ships, which they had done"
None of those named is a shipbuilder. "The new ships" may include The Greenwich, built by Christopher Pett and launched at Woolwich 9 days ago.
http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
Terry Foreman • Link
"Sir William Barkeley was killed before his ship taken; and there he lies dead in a sugar-chest, for every body to see, with his flag standing up by him."
His body was embalmed by the anatomist Frederik Ruysch https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fre… and lay in the Grote Kerk in the Hague https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gro… . It was brought home and buried in Westminster Abbey in August. London Gazette, 15 July; Gent. Mag., 57 (1757)/214. (Per L&M note)
San Diego Sarah • Link
"... and a very fine gentleman Mr. Williamson is."
Pepys may or may not know that Secretary of State Joseph Williamson is responsible for intelligencing ... if anyone knows where the French fleet is, and what Louis XIV intends for his cousin Charles in this unwelcome conflict, it's that very fine gentleman, Mr. Williamson.