On the Lord Mayor just "betaking himself" to a sulk, rather than being "forced to go": Venetian ambassador Piero Mocenigo begs to differ with our more benign assessment, and relates the incident in his weekly intelligence as a very big deal, big enough that the Doge and Senate should know:
================================================== Serious trouble was narrowly averted here these last evenings owing to the readiness of the people to revolt. This was because when the lord mayor, who has the office and charge of governing the city, entered the college of the Templars who are all gentlemen students, these last claimed as a privilege of that place, that they should lower the sword carried before him by the justiciar. When he objected to do this, they took away the sword and detained the mayor ignominiously for some hours in the College as a prisoner. As the people were gathering their forces on his behalf the king found it necessary to send the guards to put down the tumult. By their efforts the young gentlemen were persuaded to let the lord mayor go, and peace was restored; and so with great ease a fire was extinguished that might very easily have renewed the fire of London with the worst consequences.
Sam would have put a laugh-out-loud emoji in his diary next to this report of his captaincy, if he could. Indeed the Jersey is a bit of a comic-opera set right now. Its record at https://threedecks.org/index.php?… indicates it's fairly old (launched in 1654), and sadly does not mention Capt. Pepys as in-filling between Capts. Francis Digby (which ended in January) and William Poole (whose command will start on April 1 and fittingly enough take the ship to Tangiers).
At this time the Jersey is in dock at Woolwich to have its mainmast replaced (says a letter of 28 January), providing a stable enough deck for its interim captain to pace while brandishing his saber, but in late November it came to notice in the State Papers (https://play.google.com/books/rea…) for its botswain, its gunner, its purser and its cook all being AWOL.
It seems there are different views on whether the Lord Mayor was, as Sam puts it, "forc[ed] to go" into that closett, and sequestered there by the proud students. John Bulstrode, in his diary (at https://archive.org/details/bulst…, page 102) says upon the mayor's entry with his sword, "the gentlemen of the house (...) begun soe great a disturbance that they would not suffer his Lordship to proceed, soe as betaking himselfe to a gentleman's chamber in the house where he was obliged to stay all the day". So the mayor "betook himselfe" and went to sulk, leaving at 7 "with his sword up, without any dinner". He wasn't necessarily frog-marched and thrown into that room.
And serjeant Beck with his watchmen, if they were trotting as we phant'sied, may have been headed to the Temple but not to grab Coventry, because Bulstrode also informs us that the latter won't be arrested until tomorrow morning, March 4. The warrants against Coventry, dated this day, must have been signed after a Council meeting held tonight, perhaps more or less at the same time as the mayor, his mood foul and his stomach rumbling, was slinking out of his hideaway. Why, we say, can't everyone just relax?
On the Mall, Sam's coach encounters that of Sir William Coventry, in which servants are busy stuffing bags and travel-cases.
"I say, Sir William, good-morrow! What a happy surprise", Sam exclaims, still high from last night's revels.
Coventry, in his coach, starts almost to the ceiling and drops a booklet, "100 usefull French sentences for All Situations". "Why, yes, Mr. Pepys. I'm afraid..."
"Have you seen those papers the East India Company wants to introduce at the Treasurers' this day fortnight, my lord? I have a rebuttal with me already, if you have but a minute" - Coventry twitches, gestures to the servants to hurry it, scans the Mall in all directions - "it's only twelve pages. To begin with..."
"Yes, yes, very good Pepys. We'll discuss". Grabs Sam's proferred papers, stuffs them in Sir Duncomb's lap, who almost spills the bag of coins he was tying up. "Now if you will excuse us..."
"I was hoping, Sir William, that you would honor my humble house when leisure allows you. I have now but the most admirable collection... No? Some coffee or chocolate at yonder house at least".
"Mr. Pepys, I have an even grander idea. A masque! As in Venice".
"Why, Sir William, I never suspected... Shall we say, next week?"
"Nay, why delay our pleasure? Right now! Know you, I always fant'sied being a coachman". Coventry starts shrugging off his coat. "Your coachman's green livery is the talk of London, you know? Let me trade clothes with your man and drive your beautiful coach in his stead".
Sam is about to give his enthusiastic support to the project - this must be some new Italian fad at Court, a show of support for Candia! But Hewer cuts in, "Alas, my lord, we're late to the theater already. Mr. Pepys' wife is unstinting, as you may know! Farewell now, my lords" Knocks the ceiling, "Billy! Let's move!"
Billy cracks his whip smartly and bewildered Sam sees Coventry's coach recede in the distance. Why, is that searjant Beck, with a detachment of the Watch, whom they just passed trotting in the other direction?
Aye, Sir William Coventry would be well advis'd to get busy:
-------------------------------- March 3. Warrant to James Beck, serjeant-at-arms, to apprehend Sir William Coventry, and convey him to the Tower for having sent a challenge to the Duke of Buckingham. March 3. Warrant to Sir John Robinson, Lieutenant of the Tower, to receive Sir William Coventry. --------------------------------
State Papers, https://play.google.com/books/rea…. C'mon, Sam, you told us on Monday that all of London knew about it, how can you not be connecting ye dots presently. How can Sir William himself be so blinde as not to be half-way to France already.
So, between a routine morning at the office and the theater, Mr. Pepys "put a mouthfull of victuals in [his] mouth" - unusual language - then took the "upper part of [Queen Katherine's mummified] body in [his] hands". An interesting day indeed, though given the mummy's fragile condition images of Sam "manhandling" it and waltzing with it through the abbey seem unlikely. We phant'sy that Captain John Tinker of Portsmouth, who on Sunday last had asked Sam for leave to come up to London, mayhap brought from a ship come from Tangiers certain remarkable Herbs grown there, whose vapors when smok'd are renown'd to soothe the eyes, with minor side effects on the Minde.
This is not Sam's first encounter with the Leathery Ones. Last spring, on his way back from a merry party at Sir G. Whitmore’s, "by moonshine (...) I having there seen a mummy in a merchant’s warehouse there [sic], all the middle of the man or woman’s body, black and hard" (...) it pleased me much, though an ill sight", so much so that the merchant offered "a little bit, and a bone of an arme". This had been Sam's first - "I never saw any before" (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…). But not the last, then, and only the vanguard of the flood of mummies that are soon to come to London and end ground up in paintpots and medicine jars, walking about in Victorian phantasms and (with luck) stored away between clay pots in museums, a 200-year British love-story with mummies that will be reconsidered with the advent of synthetic pigments but also because the Egyptians tired of it and clamped down.
With less of a magickal pretext, we also note that this hadn't been the first time that Sam, who's always got to touch everything, makes contact with a cadaver out of curiosity, see https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…. And yes, many cultures do refuse to consider their dead as necessarily best served by being locked away and out of sight - why, we ourselves confess to have once been honor'd to share a bedchamber with our hosts' ancestral mummy, who was very decent and quiet company. But of course there are mummies, whose worship may well be idolatrous, and then there are Royal Mummies. Hundreds still come to King Charles to be touched for the King's Evil. In an antique, mummified Queen this virtue must have been distillated & concentrated by the dessication process!
Oh, and by the way, 'tis Carnaval season, halfway 'tween the winter solstice and spring, and a time when mummies are so potent, they almost glow in the dark.
John Bullstrode reports in his Diary for February 13 (at https://archive.org/details/bulst…) that the Spanish Ambassador, doing his job, has, with optimism or grim resignation we do not know, complain'd about all the piracy. "They say a meeting has been had with that ambassador by certain Lords thereto appointed, in order to give him all satisfaction on that point, which they say is like to end in making a more plaine and evident declaration of the peace in the West Indyes, &c." &c indeed. The story doesn't say if the meeting was held at the Spanish Embassy and was a chance to pocket some silverware.
May we point out, in hope of perswadding this Assembly to suspend the customary One Hundred Lashes, that the weather last night was most inclement, and the Lady whose hand Mr. Pepys did hold, may have indeed welcomed this help from a local resident in navigating, in the dark, a construction area likely less familiar than her distant home in Charing Cross. Mr. Gadbury reports "Wind, rain, snow, hail" in London. From the Channel ports, the Letters (at https://play.google.com/books/rea…) contain nothing but Newes of Aeolian disasters and woe, viz. six shipwrecks with casualties and ships dragging their anchors for as much as 2 miles in Yarmouth, and three shipwrecks (one "to pieces") in Deal. We pray that the Lady herself was not broken to pieces in her long journey.
'nother thing. Mr. Bullstrode in his Journall (at https://archive.org/details/bulst…) notes already (though he seems to write with up to a week's delay, and so benefits from the gossip) that "his Majesty was much offended" by my Lord Rochester's conduct, so the King having "pardoned it to Rochester already" seems a hasty Interpolation. We surmise that Sam saw, from a distance, the King nod at the rake's embarrassed salute this morning. Perhaps at Versailles, the dismissal would have been harsher.
But on this matter, Terry's note "L&M note Lord Sandwich's Journal" led us to chase my Lord's journal, post the one ending in 1665 that is most readily found and oftentimes quoted. Las! The chase ends at https://discovery.nationalarchive…, with a catalog reference to a journal indeed ending in 1671, but "held privately (...) not available". We still rejoice that my Lord's not so deeply buried in the Audit of his Ambassadorial accounts (which aren't going so well for him, actually) as to miss Court dinners.
"Gov. Modyford lent Morgan's fleet a massive English Man-o-War named the HMS Oxford (...) The night that the raid was going to commence, there was a huge celebration aboard the ships. A few drunk soldiers during this accidentally destroyed the HMS Oxford". That's what we call a successful pyrate's party. Phant'sy they drank the captain's wine and stole his clothes, too.
A reminder of the Unpredictability of Kings, or maybe of the Blindeness of Great Men: Wasn't my lord Ormond writing to his pal Ossory just four days ago, on the 9th instant, of being "confident that the King neither is, nor will be, prevailed to remove him from the government of Ireland..."? And this, after months of presence at Court precisely to find out. (Carte calendar, https://web.archive.org/web/20191…).
In the Treasury Commission's minutes for this day (at www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-tre…) we find not a Word of this 50,000L. tussle with the Navy. We phant'sy that mayhap it took place before or after the official meeting, or the commission's Remembrancer had dropped his quill, or he got a Significant Look from my Lord Ashly, to go and water ye flowers for a minute.
The only Naval business pertains to the Commission's consideration on the 27th instant of my Lord Anglesey having "diverted" supply funds (we evok'd it at https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…): "The King to be moved in the 4,000L. paid by the Earl of Anglesey to other uses but which should have been for buying stores: that another fund may be appointed for it". This looks like a careful climb-down from accusations against one of the Big Men.
Incidentally we also find in today's State Papers (https://play.google.com/books/rea…) an annoyed request from White Hall, "referenc[ing] (...) the petition of John Chase, his Majesty's apothecary, to find a way for payment of his arrears of 7,000L. and provide for his future payment, the King being wishful to relieve his extremity. With a repetition of the recommendation thereof, the King being displeased that it has not been attended to". The-king-being-displeased, aye gentlemen, let's get moving now, for all we know this Chase may be withholding deliveries of quicksilver for the royal elaboratory next door...
Let the Treasurers chafe and wiggle. Our Sam is walking on water; eating the Duke's sauce right out of his Grace's spoon, and today, seeing them getting dressed down right after a matter-of-fact popping by the State Council. Oh, and the minutes for last Wednesday said "Process against Mr. Pepys to be stopped till sealing day".
Sam is invited today into a sordid little affair that is likely to become the Navy's scandal du jour before long, the State Papers (https://play.google.com/books/rea…) indicate.
On 22 January Roger Baker, purser of the Dartmouth - a busy 5th class workabee frigate which often shows up in reports on convoy and supply missions - wrote to the Commissioners a long and pretty graphic complaint against his captain, Richard Trevanion. Following some unclear muddle (at least as summarized in the Papers) about beer bought on credit, wine issued to the crew for Christmas and an altercation between the two of them, Baker says Trevanion suddenly "gave me 200 blows with his cane, and took me by the hair of my head, intending to dash my brains out (...) he so mangled my face that I fear I shall lose an eye". The 200 blows alone (if we take them literally) must have taken a good 15 minutes at least, but it's not finished: "While I was under the doctor's hands he commanded the boatswain to clap me into the bilboes [leg shackles] atop of the forecastle [the upper deck] where I continued 10 hours, being nailed down with a staple to the davit [a crane often used to suspend the lifeboat]" - sounds dangerous, and wickedly inventive. It gets better: The boatswain gets trashed too for looking like he would help, Trevanion threatens other officers with a council of war or "to have them hanged". So, bad captain; a captain Bligh before the hour. Baker apparently has the letter smuggled out while the madman is on shore.
Letters on 31 January and 2 February then suggest that the Dartmouth, which was to sail to Cadiz and Tangiers on resupply duty, has not; it was wrongly sighted on its way home, and it's unclear where it's been, if anywhere. On 3 February it's in Holehaven, in Essex, so unless it has supernaturall engines we doubt if it went to Tangiers and back. On that day Baker reappears, still locked up in his cabin and reporting that Trevanion has gone rogue, "has not yet rated his men, and God knows when he will" - we're a bit unsure if this is a bureaucratic offense or something worse that could lead to a Bounty situation. The ship, https://threedecks.org informs us, has 110 men on board, who are likely not shrinking lilies themselves but must be more than a bit uneasy about the cap'n by now.
And finally today Baker is writing to Sam, god of the pursers. Apparently some action has been taken, and he offers to "justify on oath the business impeached against my commander", however he "durst[s; dares] not go near the commander, for fear of being murdered". You betcha.
Sam will want the Trevanion file. There's one at https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…, which shows him to be on his second command only, and to have lasted less than a year on the first, a 4th class ship called the Marmaduke that was quite a bit larger - so the Dartmouth could have been a demotion already. Hmm.
In a further indication of how badly the King wanted today's meeting to happen, we find in an aside in the weekly dispatch sent home by the Venetian ambassador, the excellently informed Piero Mocenigo, that "the exceptionally cold weather has so aggrevated the usual catarrh of the Lord Keeper (...) that since he has passed from chronic convalescence to a painful illness, the king has only once been able to go and hold a consultation at his house [since] last week". Now that must be some catarrh. From other minutiae in Piero's letter - dated February 8 in his calendar, so January 30 old style - that exceptional meeting, with all its bother, protocol and my Lord Keeper surely having to dress up, would seem to be the one which Sam attended today. Poor Lord Keeper.
It seems Piero had no wind of what the meeting was about, but his letter (found at www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-sta…) also passes on rumors, indeed also found with increasing insistence and detail in other papers, of French plans to tear up the Triple Alliance and return to Flanders both by land and by sea. England could perhaps stay neutral, but at the very least it would mess up the neighborhood and make a solid naval deployment a good idea for this Summer.
Speaking of watchdogs. The Treasury commissioners, in their minutes today (at https://www.british-history.ac.uk…), record that "Auditor Wood [is] to certify on Monday what is the stop in stating Mr. Pepys' account for Tangier. Process [against Pepys] to stay till then".
Then they move on to the usual kaleidoscope of business, which overall gives the commission a rather judicial look, such being the amount of disciplinary stuff it has to get into. Delightfully, among the crowd of gentlemen called in, to give hat in hand their best explanations, is one Dacquet, who "remembers not that he had put the broad arrow on the bacon in May's house". The "broad arrow" is, we understand, a stamp applied for taxation purposes, but we hope the image brought some brief jocularity to the commission's stern meeting, in their cramped little room. No? Ah well.
Back to Sam, then. It seems we've got a fleeting glimpse of that ghostly presence in the diary, "Auditor Wood", the threatening shadow in Sam's nightmares. John Wood, whose Encyclopedia profile runs to six words (https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…) already had Sam on his carpet for three hours a year ago to explain about Tangiers (see https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…) but more recently has been is the man who wasn't there when Sam called on December 7, and was only approached through his unnamed clerk on February 8 and on December 9 and 14.
A year ago it had taken him two weeks to review the Tangiers accounts; this time it seems it's more complex. The previous encounter had been in 1662, a dinner where young Sam had brought up the matter of his salary. Since then, there's been no socializing, no encounters at the theater. Perhaps "Auditor Wood" plays the flageolet too, but apparently not with his Subjects of Investigation.
What? But of course French is the universal language! It is spoken in the most refined salons from Muscovy to Lisbon, by Mr. Pepys, by king Charles (who, it must be said, also speaks Italian and likely a bunch of other things besides)! It is spoken in Paris and Versailles, which are the world. With luck, you may hear it spoken even by some common people as far as twenty leagues beyond Paris (though of course not well - 'tis another reason to avoid those common people). And king Louis, who is the Sun, labors to make it so all around the world, in la Nouvelle France, and in Luxembourg, and in Pundicherry, and, er, did I mention la Nouvelle France?
But for now, of course Latin is usefull to discourse with the learned. If you can understand anything they say. And, by numbers, likely the Chinish language, yes, though if they're like us they must hardly hear each other from one city to the next. By ports of call, 'tis to fear that Spanish or Dutch might serve better.
Should we point out, however, that you need not read too far into the book of Genesis, to find that "the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language (...) Go, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech", and he cast down ye tower of Babel. Should this make us pause on the matter of universal language? Latin also is the Pope's language, after all, heh heh heh.
Yet, it is just last year (April 1668) that Dr. Wilkins FRS has published his "Essay towards a Real Character and a Philosophical Language", a clever scheme to build a Universal Language, on a phonetic basis, and a pioneering work of comparative linguistics, amazingly oecumenical in even including in its comparisons the Pokomchi language of Guatemala and that of Madagascar. Our book-seller Mr Google has it at https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/…. We're not quite sure that "Hαι coba {ou}{ou} ιa ril dad, ha bαbι ιo s{ou}ƴmtα ha" will take rapidly as the opening of the Lord's Prayer, though it has a certain musickal charm (try it out at page 422). But we understand, from a Mr Borges who has spent much time on Dr. Wilkins' language, that his word for "Fire" is... "Deb".
Well hey, who knew, as we wrote the above Allin was in Algiers bay already. His long report to Williamson appears in the State Papers on February 2. It is too much to unpack here, but it's fascinating in its graphic detail of the admiral's bargaining with the corsairs; we felt the frayed carpets under our feet. Allin frees some ships and three captive women, kicks some bribes including a couple of slaves (ahem) at the corsairs, who say most touchingly that they only pester ships because they need the money. He moans at the state of his fleet in a way that makes us want to petition Mr. Pepys. Doesn't burn anything, but wouldn't be in any state to do that, and everyone is being most reasonable and businesslike anyway. Note that one of his vessels is sidetracked to load marble for "the King's building".
The King on this day has signed a warrant (if that's the proper term) to the Duke of York, "finding it an advantage to hire merchant vessels for convoys, rather than use ships of war, [to] authorize you to hire as many merchant vessels as will be required for the next summer" (State Papers, 1 Feb.; https://play.google.com/books/rea…).
Sam had expected as much after the impromptu meeting at Essex House on January 24 on the feasibility of a 40-ship navy this summer, which he left "doubt[ing, i.e. expecting] all will end in some little fleete this year, and those of hired merchant-men, which would indeed be cheaper to the King, and have many conveniences attending it" (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…).
And indeed, in our own debates on the hows and why, we did forget the protection of convoys, a necessary and often dangerous duty but perhaps not one that always justifies deploying actual warships, nimble but lightly-armed corsairs and pyrates being England's main worry at this time.
Then there's the steady flow of intelligence on the French fleet. The reports put it at a nicely rounded 100 ships (for instance at https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…), and it's growing but not extravagantly so either. Louis right now is busy inland, and England only has to worry about the routine problems in the colonies, and what with the insolent toll-taking of the king of Denmark, and supplying Tangiers, &c., but the reports have this way of getting at you. Such as: "I hear by a vessel from Bayonne that 8 frigates of 40 and 50 guns each have been launched, that 4 more are ready, and that they are building in all parts of France" (30 January, John Pocock to Hickes, State Papers). And how about this one, for teeth-grinding:
"The great ship St. Louis Royal is almost finished at Toulon, and seems to grace that port as well as the Louvre does Paris. She is 147 feet in length by 13 in breadth, and has 3 whole decks, all so high that the most proper man may stand upright under them, and yet not reach the top by a span. She carries 110 brass guns (...) and is to have 1,000 men. Her cabins are so glorious and shining that they seem rather made for diversion (...) Her stern is adorned with such gilt and carved work, and the King set there (...) with slaves in chains at his feet". Wow. Of course, "the faults which persons of judgment find are that she is much too high for her length (...) and that she will never sail well" (W. Allestree to Williamson, 23 January, State Papers).
It was one of several, too. Indeed they didn't sail well or last long, but they were meant to impress the little kings Charles of the world (check out that baby at https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy…). Apparently, it worked. Earlier in the month we had a glimpse of his Majestie, hunched over the latest imagery intelligence of those French missile bases: Capt. Anthony Deane, reporting to Williamson on the trouble he's had "to copy the drawing" of the fort of Brest, "which, I believe, is the best we have, as it [the water depths on its approaches, we surmise] was all sounded. I hope Lord Arlington will excuse its not being done like painting (...) I know his Majesty likes this way" (5 January, State Papers).
The king has naval matters on his plate on a constant basis, so what got under his bonnet to prompt those dead-of-night urgent summons?
40 ships, to put them in context, is not an extravagant objective. The merchant fleet is easily 10-15 times larger, and indeed nobody takes the sea without a few cannon. In recent times we've seen the Navy's strength reported as "not above 50 sail of ships fit for sea" (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…), "55 ships" deployed against the Dutch (in the great letter, at https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…), also a total victualling budget suggesting enough seamen for 90 ships (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…), and grand instructions to have 110 ships ready to sail this spring (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…).
The latter was second-hand but, if accurate, the feedback apparently wasn't great. It's not that the hulls don't exist: The records imply 55 ships built over 1667-68 (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…), and just now we've seen in the State Papers a letter from Thomas Fletcher to Sam (undated, in the end-of-January pile) asking for paperwork to "despatch the carved works of so many frigates as are now setting forth at Chatham". But there's the staffing, and all these little maintenance things, and the fleet got walloped by those winter storms.
Let us add that the lord Taffilet, a.k.a. Taffaletta but who for the record may prefer to be known as His Excellency Al-Rashid ibn Sharif, can play one tribe against another, and appears in any case to know exactly what he's doing. Sir Richard Bulstrode (his journall at https://archive.org/details/bulst…), who maintains his own correspondence with Tangiers, has a letter which reports that "Taffaletta is returned from the south with a very rich spoile and full of pride. He covetts soe much to see a splending ambassy from England and hath ordered them of Sally to agree to a peace by sea and not by land".
"Sally" being the Republic of Salé, an Ostend-style pyrate kingdom on the Moroccan coast, run in part by a cosmopolitan band of European renegades who, like the Ostenders, can apparently be turned on and off. Their Wikipedia entry at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sal… is worth perusing in its French version.
Comments
Second Reading
About Wednesday 3 March 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
On the Lord Mayor just "betaking himself" to a sulk, rather than being "forced to go": Venetian ambassador Piero Mocenigo begs to differ with our more benign assessment, and relates the incident in his weekly intelligence as a very big deal, big enough that the Doge and Senate should know:
==================================================
Serious trouble was narrowly averted here these last evenings owing to the readiness of the people to revolt. This was because when the lord mayor, who has the office and charge of governing the city, entered the college of the Templars who are all gentlemen students, these last claimed as a privilege of that place, that they should lower the sword carried before him by the justiciar. When he objected to do this, they took away the sword and detained the mayor ignominiously for some hours in the College as a prisoner. As the people were gathering their forces on his behalf the king found it necessary to send the guards to put down the tumult. By their efforts the young gentlemen were persuaded to let the lord mayor go, and peace was restored; and so with great ease a fire was extinguished that might very easily have renewed the fire of London with the worst consequences.
(Letter of 15 March 1669, https://www.british-history.ac.uk…)
About Saturday 13 March 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
Sam would have put a laugh-out-loud emoji in his diary next to this report of his captaincy, if he could. Indeed the Jersey is a bit of a comic-opera set right now. Its record at https://threedecks.org/index.php?… indicates it's fairly old (launched in 1654), and sadly does not mention Capt. Pepys as in-filling between Capts. Francis Digby (which ended in January) and William Poole (whose command will start on April 1 and fittingly enough take the ship to Tangiers).
At this time the Jersey is in dock at Woolwich to have its mainmast replaced (says a letter of 28 January), providing a stable enough deck for its interim captain to pace while brandishing his saber, but in late November it came to notice in the State Papers (https://play.google.com/books/rea…) for its botswain, its gunner, its purser and its cook all being AWOL.
About Wednesday 3 March 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
It seems there are different views on whether the Lord Mayor was, as Sam puts it, "forc[ed] to go" into that closett, and sequestered there by the proud students. John Bulstrode, in his diary (at https://archive.org/details/bulst…, page 102) says upon the mayor's entry with his sword, "the gentlemen of the house (...) begun soe great a disturbance that they would not suffer his Lordship to proceed, soe as betaking himselfe to a gentleman's chamber in the house where he was obliged to stay all the day". So the mayor "betook himselfe" and went to sulk, leaving at 7 "with his sword up, without any dinner". He wasn't necessarily frog-marched and thrown into that room.
And serjeant Beck with his watchmen, if they were trotting as we phant'sied, may have been headed to the Temple but not to grab Coventry, because Bulstrode also informs us that the latter won't be arrested until tomorrow morning, March 4. The warrants against Coventry, dated this day, must have been signed after a Council meeting held tonight, perhaps more or less at the same time as the mayor, his mood foul and his stomach rumbling, was slinking out of his hideaway. Why, we say, can't everyone just relax?
About Wednesday 3 March 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
On the Mall, Sam's coach encounters that of Sir William Coventry, in which servants are busy stuffing bags and travel-cases.
"I say, Sir William, good-morrow! What a happy surprise", Sam exclaims, still high from last night's revels.
Coventry, in his coach, starts almost to the ceiling and drops a booklet, "100 usefull French sentences for All Situations". "Why, yes, Mr. Pepys. I'm afraid..."
"Have you seen those papers the East India Company wants to introduce at the Treasurers' this day fortnight, my lord? I have a rebuttal with me already, if you have but a minute" - Coventry twitches, gestures to the servants to hurry it, scans the Mall in all directions - "it's only twelve pages. To begin with..."
"Yes, yes, very good Pepys. We'll discuss". Grabs Sam's proferred papers, stuffs them in Sir Duncomb's lap, who almost spills the bag of coins he was tying up. "Now if you will excuse us..."
"I was hoping, Sir William, that you would honor my humble house when leisure allows you. I have now but the most admirable collection... No? Some coffee or chocolate at yonder house at least".
"Mr. Pepys, I have an even grander idea. A masque! As in Venice".
"Why, Sir William, I never suspected... Shall we say, next week?"
"Nay, why delay our pleasure? Right now! Know you, I always fant'sied being a coachman". Coventry starts shrugging off his coat. "Your coachman's green livery is the talk of London, you know? Let me trade clothes with your man and drive your beautiful coach in his stead".
Sam is about to give his enthusiastic support to the project - this must be some new Italian fad at Court, a show of support for Candia! But Hewer cuts in, "Alas, my lord, we're late to the theater already. Mr. Pepys' wife is unstinting, as you may know! Farewell now, my lords" Knocks the ceiling, "Billy! Let's move!"
Billy cracks his whip smartly and bewildered Sam sees Coventry's coach recede in the distance. Why, is that searjant Beck, with a detachment of the Watch, whom they just passed trotting in the other direction?
About Wednesday 3 March 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
Aye, Sir William Coventry would be well advis'd to get busy:
--------------------------------
March 3. Warrant to James Beck, serjeant-at-arms, to apprehend Sir William Coventry, and convey him to the Tower for having sent a challenge to the Duke of Buckingham.
March 3. Warrant to Sir John Robinson, Lieutenant of the Tower, to receive Sir William Coventry.
--------------------------------
State Papers, https://play.google.com/books/rea…. C'mon, Sam, you told us on Monday that all of London knew about it, how can you not be connecting ye dots presently. How can Sir William himself be so blinde as not to be half-way to France already.
About Tuesday 23 February 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
So, between a routine morning at the office and the theater, Mr. Pepys "put a mouthfull of victuals in [his] mouth" - unusual language - then took the "upper part of [Queen Katherine's mummified] body in [his] hands". An interesting day indeed, though given the mummy's fragile condition images of Sam "manhandling" it and waltzing with it through the abbey seem unlikely. We phant'sy that Captain John Tinker of Portsmouth, who on Sunday last had asked Sam for leave to come up to London, mayhap brought from a ship come from Tangiers certain remarkable Herbs grown there, whose vapors when smok'd are renown'd to soothe the eyes, with minor side effects on the Minde.
This is not Sam's first encounter with the Leathery Ones. Last spring, on his way back from a merry party at Sir G. Whitmore’s, "by moonshine (...) I having there seen a mummy in a merchant’s warehouse there [sic], all the middle of the man or woman’s body, black and hard" (...) it pleased me much, though an ill sight", so much so that the merchant offered "a little bit, and a bone of an arme". This had been Sam's first - "I never saw any before" (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…). But not the last, then, and only the vanguard of the flood of mummies that are soon to come to London and end ground up in paintpots and medicine jars, walking about in Victorian phantasms and (with luck) stored away between clay pots in museums, a 200-year British love-story with mummies that will be reconsidered with the advent of synthetic pigments but also because the Egyptians tired of it and clamped down.
With less of a magickal pretext, we also note that this hadn't been the first time that Sam, who's always got to touch everything, makes contact with a cadaver out of curiosity, see https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…. And yes, many cultures do refuse to consider their dead as necessarily best served by being locked away and out of sight - why, we ourselves confess to have once been honor'd to share a bedchamber with our hosts' ancestral mummy, who was very decent and quiet company. But of course there are mummies, whose worship may well be idolatrous, and then there are Royal Mummies. Hundreds still come to King Charles to be touched for the King's Evil. In an antique, mummified Queen this virtue must have been distillated & concentrated by the dessication process!
Oh, and by the way, 'tis Carnaval season, halfway 'tween the winter solstice and spring, and a time when mummies are so potent, they almost glow in the dark.
About Sunday 24 January 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
John Bullstrode reports in his Diary for February 13 (at https://archive.org/details/bulst…) that the Spanish Ambassador, doing his job, has, with optimism or grim resignation we do not know, complain'd about all the piracy. "They say a meeting has been had with that ambassador by certain Lords thereto appointed, in order to give him all satisfaction on that point, which they say is like to end in making a more plaine and evident declaration of the peace in the West Indyes, &c." &c indeed. The story doesn't say if the meeting was held at the Spanish Embassy and was a chance to pocket some silverware.
About Wednesday 17 February 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
May we point out, in hope of perswadding this Assembly to suspend the customary One Hundred Lashes, that the weather last night was most inclement, and the Lady whose hand Mr. Pepys did hold, may have indeed welcomed this help from a local resident in navigating, in the dark, a construction area likely less familiar than her distant home in Charing Cross. Mr. Gadbury reports "Wind, rain, snow, hail" in London. From the Channel ports, the Letters (at https://play.google.com/books/rea…) contain nothing but Newes of Aeolian disasters and woe, viz. six shipwrecks with casualties and ships dragging their anchors for as much as 2 miles in Yarmouth, and three shipwrecks (one "to pieces") in Deal. We pray that the Lady herself was not broken to pieces in her long journey.
'nother thing. Mr. Bullstrode in his Journall (at https://archive.org/details/bulst…) notes already (though he seems to write with up to a week's delay, and so benefits from the gossip) that "his Majesty was much offended" by my Lord Rochester's conduct, so the King having "pardoned it to Rochester already" seems a hasty Interpolation. We surmise that Sam saw, from a distance, the King nod at the rake's embarrassed salute this morning. Perhaps at Versailles, the dismissal would have been harsher.
But on this matter, Terry's note "L&M note Lord Sandwich's Journal" led us to chase my Lord's journal, post the one ending in 1665 that is most readily found and oftentimes quoted. Las! The chase ends at https://discovery.nationalarchive…, with a catalog reference to a journal indeed ending in 1671, but "held privately (...) not available". We still rejoice that my Lord's not so deeply buried in the Audit of his Ambassadorial accounts (which aren't going so well for him, actually) as to miss Court dinners.
About Sunday 24 January 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
"Gov. Modyford lent Morgan's fleet a massive English Man-o-War named the HMS Oxford (...) The night that the raid was going to commence, there was a huge celebration aboard the ships. A few drunk soldiers during this accidentally destroyed the HMS Oxford". That's what we call a successful pyrate's party. Phant'sy they drank the captain's wine and stole his clothes, too.
About Friday 12 February 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
A reminder of the Unpredictability of Kings, or maybe of the Blindeness of Great Men: Wasn't my lord Ormond writing to his pal Ossory just four days ago, on the 9th instant, of being "confident that the King neither is, nor will be, prevailed to remove him from the government of Ireland..."? And this, after months of presence at Court precisely to find out. (Carte calendar, https://web.archive.org/web/20191…).
About Friday 12 February 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
In the Treasury Commission's minutes for this day (at www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-tre…) we find not a Word of this 50,000L. tussle with the Navy. We phant'sy that mayhap it took place before or after the official meeting, or the commission's Remembrancer had dropped his quill, or he got a Significant Look from my Lord Ashly, to go and water ye flowers for a minute.
The only Naval business pertains to the Commission's consideration on the 27th instant of my Lord Anglesey having "diverted" supply funds (we evok'd it at https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…): "The King to be moved in the 4,000L. paid by the Earl of Anglesey to other uses but which should have been for buying stores: that another fund may be appointed for it". This looks like a careful climb-down from accusations against one of the Big Men.
Incidentally we also find in today's State Papers (https://play.google.com/books/rea…) an annoyed request from White Hall, "referenc[ing] (...) the petition of John Chase, his Majesty's apothecary, to find a way for payment of his arrears of 7,000L. and provide for his future payment, the King being wishful to relieve his extremity. With a repetition of the recommendation thereof, the King being displeased that it has not been attended to". The-king-being-displeased, aye gentlemen, let's get moving now, for all we know this Chase may be withholding deliveries of quicksilver for the royal elaboratory next door...
Let the Treasurers chafe and wiggle. Our Sam is walking on water; eating the Duke's sauce right out of his Grace's spoon, and today, seeing them getting dressed down right after a matter-of-fact popping by the State Council. Oh, and the minutes for last Wednesday said "Process against Mr. Pepys to be stopped till sealing day".
About Tuesday 9 February 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
Sam is invited today into a sordid little affair that is likely to become the Navy's scandal du jour before long, the State Papers (https://play.google.com/books/rea…) indicate.
On 22 January Roger Baker, purser of the Dartmouth - a busy 5th class workabee frigate which often shows up in reports on convoy and supply missions - wrote to the Commissioners a long and pretty graphic complaint against his captain, Richard Trevanion. Following some unclear muddle (at least as summarized in the Papers) about beer bought on credit, wine issued to the crew for Christmas and an altercation between the two of them, Baker says Trevanion suddenly "gave me 200 blows with his cane, and took me by the hair of my head, intending to dash my brains out (...) he so mangled my face that I fear I shall lose an eye". The 200 blows alone (if we take them literally) must have taken a good 15 minutes at least, but it's not finished: "While I was under the doctor's hands he commanded the boatswain to clap me into the bilboes [leg shackles] atop of the forecastle [the upper deck] where I continued 10 hours, being nailed down with a staple to the davit [a crane often used to suspend the lifeboat]" - sounds dangerous, and wickedly inventive. It gets better: The boatswain gets trashed too for looking like he would help, Trevanion threatens other officers with a council of war or "to have them hanged". So, bad captain; a captain Bligh before the hour. Baker apparently has the letter smuggled out while the madman is on shore.
Letters on 31 January and 2 February then suggest that the Dartmouth, which was to sail to Cadiz and Tangiers on resupply duty, has not; it was wrongly sighted on its way home, and it's unclear where it's been, if anywhere. On 3 February it's in Holehaven, in Essex, so unless it has supernaturall engines we doubt if it went to Tangiers and back. On that day Baker reappears, still locked up in his cabin and reporting that Trevanion has gone rogue, "has not yet rated his men, and God knows when he will" - we're a bit unsure if this is a bureaucratic offense or something worse that could lead to a Bounty situation. The ship, https://threedecks.org informs us, has 110 men on board, who are likely not shrinking lilies themselves but must be more than a bit uneasy about the cap'n by now.
And finally today Baker is writing to Sam, god of the pursers. Apparently some action has been taken, and he offers to "justify on oath the business impeached against my commander", however he "durst[s; dares] not go near the commander, for fear of being murdered". You betcha.
Sam will want the Trevanion file. There's one at https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…, which shows him to be on his second command only, and to have lasted less than a year on the first, a 4th class ship called the Marmaduke that was quite a bit larger - so the Dartmouth could have been a demotion already. Hmm.
About Sunday 24 January 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
In a further indication of how badly the King wanted today's meeting to happen, we find in an aside in the weekly dispatch sent home by the Venetian ambassador, the excellently informed Piero Mocenigo, that "the exceptionally cold weather has so aggrevated the usual catarrh of the Lord Keeper (...) that since he has passed from chronic convalescence to a painful illness, the king has only once been able to go and hold a consultation at his house [since] last week". Now that must be some catarrh. From other minutiae in Piero's letter - dated February 8 in his calendar, so January 30 old style - that exceptional meeting, with all its bother, protocol and my Lord Keeper surely having to dress up, would seem to be the one which Sam attended today. Poor Lord Keeper.
It seems Piero had no wind of what the meeting was about, but his letter (found at www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-sta…) also passes on rumors, indeed also found with increasing insistence and detail in other papers, of French plans to tear up the Triple Alliance and return to Flanders both by land and by sea. England could perhaps stay neutral, but at the very least it would mess up the neighborhood and make a solid naval deployment a good idea for this Summer.
About Friday 5 February 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
Speaking of watchdogs. The Treasury commissioners, in their minutes today (at https://www.british-history.ac.uk…), record that "Auditor Wood [is] to certify on Monday what is the stop in stating Mr. Pepys' account for Tangier. Process [against Pepys] to stay till then".
Then they move on to the usual kaleidoscope of business, which overall gives the commission a rather judicial look, such being the amount of disciplinary stuff it has to get into. Delightfully, among the crowd of gentlemen called in, to give hat in hand their best explanations, is one Dacquet, who "remembers not that he had put the broad arrow on the bacon in May's house". The "broad arrow" is, we understand, a stamp applied for taxation purposes, but we hope the image brought some brief jocularity to the commission's stern meeting, in their cramped little room. No? Ah well.
Back to Sam, then. It seems we've got a fleeting glimpse of that ghostly presence in the diary, "Auditor Wood", the threatening shadow in Sam's nightmares. John Wood, whose Encyclopedia profile runs to six words (https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…) already had Sam on his carpet for three hours a year ago to explain about Tangiers (see https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…) but more recently has been is the man who wasn't there when Sam called on December 7, and was only approached through his unnamed clerk on February 8 and on December 9 and 14.
A year ago it had taken him two weeks to review the Tangiers accounts; this time it seems it's more complex. The previous encounter had been in 1662, a dinner where young Sam had brought up the matter of his salary. Since then, there's been no socializing, no encounters at the theater. Perhaps "Auditor Wood" plays the flageolet too, but apparently not with his Subjects of Investigation.
About Wednesday 3 February 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
What? But of course French is the universal language! It is spoken in the most refined salons from Muscovy to Lisbon, by Mr. Pepys, by king Charles (who, it must be said, also speaks Italian and likely a bunch of other things besides)! It is spoken in Paris and Versailles, which are the world. With luck, you may hear it spoken even by some common people as far as twenty leagues beyond Paris (though of course not well - 'tis another reason to avoid those common people). And king Louis, who is the Sun, labors to make it so all around the world, in la Nouvelle France, and in Luxembourg, and in Pundicherry, and, er, did I mention la Nouvelle France?
But for now, of course Latin is usefull to discourse with the learned. If you can understand anything they say. And, by numbers, likely the Chinish language, yes, though if they're like us they must hardly hear each other from one city to the next. By ports of call, 'tis to fear that Spanish or Dutch might serve better.
Should we point out, however, that you need not read too far into the book of Genesis, to find that "the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language (...) Go, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech", and he cast down ye tower of Babel. Should this make us pause on the matter of universal language? Latin also is the Pope's language, after all, heh heh heh.
Yet, it is just last year (April 1668) that Dr. Wilkins FRS has published his "Essay towards a Real Character and a Philosophical Language", a clever scheme to build a Universal Language, on a phonetic basis, and a pioneering work of comparative linguistics, amazingly oecumenical in even including in its comparisons the Pokomchi language of Guatemala and that of Madagascar. Our book-seller Mr Google has it at https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/…. We're not quite sure that "Hαι coba {ou}{ou} ιa ril dad, ha bαbι ιo s{ou}ƴmtα ha" will take rapidly as the opening of the Lord's Prayer, though it has a certain musickal charm (try it out at page 422). But we understand, from a Mr Borges who has spent much time on Dr. Wilkins' language, that his word for "Fire" is... "Deb".
About Tuesday 26 January 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
Well hey, who knew, as we wrote the above Allin was in Algiers bay already. His long report to Williamson appears in the State Papers on February 2. It is too much to unpack here, but it's fascinating in its graphic detail of the admiral's bargaining with the corsairs; we felt the frayed carpets under our feet. Allin frees some ships and three captive women, kicks some bribes including a couple of slaves (ahem) at the corsairs, who say most touchingly that they only pester ships because they need the money. He moans at the state of his fleet in a way that makes us want to petition Mr. Pepys. Doesn't burn anything, but wouldn't be in any state to do that, and everyone is being most reasonable and businesslike anyway. Note that one of his vessels is sidetracked to load marble for "the King's building".
About Monday 1 February 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
The King on this day has signed a warrant (if that's the proper term) to the Duke of York, "finding it an advantage to hire merchant vessels for convoys, rather than use ships of war, [to] authorize you to hire as many merchant vessels as will be required for the next summer" (State Papers, 1 Feb.; https://play.google.com/books/rea…).
Sam had expected as much after the impromptu meeting at Essex House on January 24 on the feasibility of a 40-ship navy this summer, which he left "doubt[ing, i.e. expecting] all will end in some little fleete this year, and those of hired merchant-men, which would indeed be cheaper to the King, and have many conveniences attending it" (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…).
And indeed, in our own debates on the hows and why, we did forget the protection of convoys, a necessary and often dangerous duty but perhaps not one that always justifies deploying actual warships, nimble but lightly-armed corsairs and pyrates being England's main worry at this time.
About Sunday 24 January 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
Then there's the steady flow of intelligence on the French fleet. The reports put it at a nicely rounded 100 ships (for instance at https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…), and it's growing but not extravagantly so either. Louis right now is busy inland, and England only has to worry about the routine problems in the colonies, and what with the insolent toll-taking of the king of Denmark, and supplying Tangiers, &c., but the reports have this way of getting at you. Such as: "I hear by a vessel from Bayonne that 8 frigates of 40 and 50 guns each have been launched, that 4 more are ready, and that they are building in all parts of France" (30 January, John Pocock to Hickes, State Papers). And how about this one, for teeth-grinding:
"The great ship St. Louis Royal is almost finished at Toulon, and seems to grace that port as well as the Louvre does Paris. She is 147 feet in length by 13 in breadth, and has 3 whole decks, all so high that the most proper man may stand upright under them, and yet not reach the top by a span. She carries 110 brass guns (...) and is to have 1,000 men. Her cabins are so glorious and shining that they seem rather made for diversion (...) Her stern is adorned with such gilt and carved work, and the King set there (...) with slaves in chains at his feet". Wow. Of course, "the faults which persons of judgment find are that she is much too high for her length (...) and that she will never sail well" (W. Allestree to Williamson, 23 January, State Papers).
It was one of several, too. Indeed they didn't sail well or last long, but they were meant to impress the little kings Charles of the world (check out that baby at https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy…). Apparently, it worked. Earlier in the month we had a glimpse of his Majestie, hunched over the latest imagery intelligence of those French missile bases: Capt. Anthony Deane, reporting to Williamson on the trouble he's had "to copy the drawing" of the fort of Brest, "which, I believe, is the best we have, as it [the water depths on its approaches, we surmise] was all sounded. I hope Lord Arlington will excuse its not being done like painting (...) I know his Majesty likes this way" (5 January, State Papers).
About Sunday 24 January 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
The king has naval matters on his plate on a constant basis, so what got under his bonnet to prompt those dead-of-night urgent summons?
40 ships, to put them in context, is not an extravagant objective. The merchant fleet is easily 10-15 times larger, and indeed nobody takes the sea without a few cannon. In recent times we've seen the Navy's strength reported as "not above 50 sail of ships fit for sea" (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…), "55 ships" deployed against the Dutch (in the great letter, at https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…), also a total victualling budget suggesting enough seamen for 90 ships (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…), and grand instructions to have 110 ships ready to sail this spring (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…).
The latter was second-hand but, if accurate, the feedback apparently wasn't great. It's not that the hulls don't exist: The records imply 55 ships built over 1667-68 (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…), and just now we've seen in the State Papers a letter from Thomas Fletcher to Sam (undated, in the end-of-January pile) asking for paperwork to "despatch the carved works of so many frigates as are now setting forth at Chatham". But there's the staffing, and all these little maintenance things, and the fleet got walloped by those winter storms.
About Tuesday 26 January 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
Let us add that the lord Taffilet, a.k.a. Taffaletta but who for the record may prefer to be known as His Excellency Al-Rashid ibn Sharif, can play one tribe against another, and appears in any case to know exactly what he's doing. Sir Richard Bulstrode (his journall at https://archive.org/details/bulst…), who maintains his own correspondence with Tangiers, has a letter which reports that "Taffaletta is returned from the south with a very rich spoile and full of pride. He covetts soe much to see a splending ambassy from England and hath ordered them of Sally to agree to a peace by sea and not by land".
"Sally" being the Republic of Salé, an Ostend-style pyrate kingdom on the Moroccan coast, run in part by a cosmopolitan band of European renegades who, like the Ostenders, can apparently be turned on and off. Their Wikipedia entry at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sal… is worth perusing in its French version.