Tuesday 16 June 1668
(Tuesday).
| So paying the reckoning, | 14s. 4d. |
| and servants, | 2s. |
| poor | 1s. |
| set out; and overtook one coach and kept a while company with it, till one of our horses losing a shoe, | |
| we stopped and drank and spent | 1s. |
| So on, and passing through a good part of this county of Wiltshire, saw a good house of Alexander Popham’s, and another of my Lord Craven’s, I think in Barkeshire. Come to Newbery, and there dined, which cost me, and musick, which a song of the old courtier of Queen Elizabeth’s, and how he was changed upon the coming in of the King, did please me mightily, | |
| and I did cause W. Hewer to write it out, | 3s. 6d. |
| Then comes the reckoning, forced to change gold, | 8s. 7d. |
| servants and poor, | 1s. 6d. |
| So out, and lost our way, which made me vexed, but come into it again; and in the evening betimes come to Reading, and there heard my wife read more of “Mustapha,” and then to supper, and then I to walk about the town, which is a very great one, I think bigger than Salsbury: a river runs through it, in seven branches, and unite in one, in one part of the town, and runs into the Thames half-a-mile off one odd sign of the Broad Face. W. Hewer troubled with the headake we had none of his company last night, nor all this day nor night to talk. Then to my inn, and so to bed. |
Terry Foreman Link to this
"a river runs through it"
Terry Foreman Link to this
Phrasemaker.
john Link to this
So what happened to the horse with the lost shoe?
Jenny Link to this
The lost horse shoe.
They all stopped for a coffee while the tire was changed.
Terry Foreman Link to this
"a song of the old courtier of Queen Elizabeth’s, and how he was changed upon the coming in of the King" -[ L&M note the song's story may be otherwise ]
This music is An Old Song of the Old Courtier of the Kings, / With a New Song of a new Courtier of the Kings.
The Tune is, The Queens Old Courtier.
Written by T. Howard, Gent. / London, Printed for F. Coles, in Wine-street, on Saffron-Hill, neer Hatton-Garden.
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The English Broadside Ballad Archive / University of California at Santa Barbara, Department of English offers Pepys 2.211 • 20822, 1665 in these useful forms:
1) Ballad Facsimile http://ebba.english.ucsb.edu/ballad/20822/image
2) Text Transcription http://ebba.english.ucsb.edu/ballad/20822/xml
3) Recording http://ebba.english.ucsb.edu/ballad/20822/recor...
***
GrahamT Link to this
Reading is now the county town of Berkshire, replacing Abingdon when the county boundaries changed in 1974 and Abingdon "moved" to Oxfordshire.
Coincidentally, there is still a pub in Abingdon (though no longer in Reading) called the Broad Face. It was supposedly so named because the inn had a good view of the gallows at the nearby prison. The Reading Gaol of Oscar Wilde fame wasn't built in 1668, but it is on the site of the old county prison, so maybe the inn sign seen by Pepys had a similar history.
Reading is a favourite to gain City status next year: Salisbury is of course already a Cathedral city, though Reading is much larger and has 3 times the population.
JWB Link to this
Note the ballad printer's address in Terry's post.
Terry Foreman Link to this
"...there is still a pub in Abingdon (though no longer in Reading) called the Broad Face."
http://www.heraldseries.co.uk/news/hsabingdonne...
Broad Face Pub Abingdon unveils the recently found "Old Pub Sign". It is named as the Broad Face in a 1794 document. The name thus predates the opposite Abingdon Gaol by 71 years undoing the legend that the Broad Face referred to the swollen face face of a man hanged in the prison.
A certain Robert Carter was named as the landlord of the Saracens Head in 1694/1702 and this evolved into the Broad Face.
The Broad Face is one of Abingdon's most popular Restaurant Pubs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wfwle3nGlnE
If it's on teh Internets it must be true.
Grahamt Link to this
My son lives in Abingdon and works in a brewery there. he visits the Broad Face often and the story was told him by old brewery workers and regulars at the Broad Face. Folk fable isn't always reliable, which is why I said "supposedly so named".
Terry Foreman Link to this
Grahamt, the Broad Face only predates the Gaol by 17 years, the BBC site and others say, if I understand aright http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-oxfordshir... Pic here http://www.abingdonblog.co.uk/2007/06/old-gaol.... Shows what's on the Internet is NOT always true.
john Link to this
Jenny wrote: "...the tire was changed..."
Horses are not typically ridden for a day or so after reshoeing, especially after the shoe has been thrown -- at least, not in modern times.