We are advised from Plymouth this day (by https://play.google.com/books/rea…) that two French men-of-war departed from Looe and Fowey in Cornwall, having taken 160 soldiers, and then "dealt rudely" with some English vessels. Odd but... No. We disgress. Ships come and ships go, 'tis as ordinary as the French being insolent. Surely nothing larger will come from the incident. Pray forgive the interruption.
Routine memo on office trivia: On this day Sam is victualling Sir Thomas Allin. There's no fish left, so they get beef and peas (https://play.google.com/books/rea…). Yawn. One wonder where Allin is going, what his adventures will be? The expectation is the Streights and sunny Barbary - nice at this season, but you never know. How droll if he should come across his old nemesis, the gallant French admiral Gilles de La Roche Saint-André... an important man now, and what mustache! They could have a gentlemanly reunion and talk around coffee of Anglo-French friendship and reminiscences.
The Royal Society today at Arundel House – from its Secret Archyves:
mr Pepys: letter fovnd from an Anonymovs Gentleman on a book lately pvblished in Paris cavsing Rigidness of the Body and Expression of Hvmors. The Company ordered mr Oldenburg to obtain the Book with all expediency; the Cvrator to procure a dog for Experimenting the reported effects.
Nobody is terrorizing the south coast right now (for which God be praised), but that could change if England goes too far in its friendship with Spain, and providing help and shelter to their current privateers the Ostenders could qualify. What Louis thinks of the English Navy, we'll have to ask him, but it's still got a lot of ships and occasionally he gets walloped in the West Indies, so "toothless and defenceless" shouldn't be in it. But yeah, some of the ports are a bit lonely, and burning down one or two would be easy, and arguably the logical thing to do against piracy.
So, given the recent deals with Spain and the States and the fury in which Louis reportedly flew when he learned of the latter, 'tis the season to not be nasty to the Frogs. On this very day, another 12 horses are on their way as a personal gift from Charles (maybe with large tattoos that say "personal gift from Charles, your brother") to no less than the marquis de Turenne, who happens to command all French troops in Flanders (https://play.google.com/books/rea…). Whether a treaty is in the works, we're not sayin', but the all-knowing Venetian ambassador reported today that Temple had actually threatened De Witz to sign one with France if the Dutch didn't (No. 277 in https://www.british-history.ac.uk…). And remember that St. Albans was in Paris recently; and it surely wasn't to visit the Eiffel tower.
Speaking of mysteries however, here's another one: a rumor in France, which agent Anthony Thorold is picking up from arriving vessels and preparing to report (it will appear at https://play.google.com/books/rea…) that Louis expects to capture all of Flanders by summertime, "except Ostend". Except Ostend? Is it that well defended? Or would Louis consider that missile launchpad better potentially too useful to burn to the ground? And useful against who, then?
Apart from that, in the next few days Sam will be Very Busy with a letter sent him this day by a Captain John Poyntz, who "would undertake to make a lighthouse, and build a castle on the Goodwin Sands (...) and if I did not complete them this summer, would be bound to lose my life". Poyntz then says it would be cheap, too, and asks Sam to get "the King and Council" to provide him, among other supplies, "2 open vessels of 30 tons each (...) with 100 carpenters, seamen, and labourers to be in the King's pay". (State Papers, No. 111, https://play.google.com/books/rea…). It's tempting to imagine that letter being passed around the Office as the day's crank piece ("he bets his life on building a castle on sand? How' bout just his honor, if he don't deliver we could do him like it says in that book of yours, Mr. Sam"), but next week Sam will draft no less than four letters to the Commissioners, so it may have been taken seriously.
Captain Poyntz isn't unknown, in 1664 he was Clerk Comptroller of the office of the Master of the Revels, which licensed lotteries and entertainment of all sorts (https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…). So of course now he could be building a lighthouse; why, you Office boys could then visit for, you know, Revels. A lighthouse on the Goodwin Sands would indeed have been a good idea, as the treacherous sandbank will cause shipwrecks by the thousands, but it won't be acted upon before around 200 years (https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/…). We wish Poyntz had kept a Journall too.
The proclamation which the State Papers calendars as of February 8 is actually slightly more lenient in the version, dated February 7 (of which our spy brought us the galley proofs yesterday), to appear in the next Gazette. We now wonder at which may be the version of record, however the Gazette version is more detailed, printed by Authority, and is what the Publick at large will have seen. Significantly, it doesn't prohibit all sales of prize goods, only those from "Privateers with foreign Commission" (pfew, big sigh of relief there). It also doesn't quite shut the door on foreign adventures, except "without leave from His Majesty", or HRH or the High Admiral. For the record it also doesn't ask port officers to restrain mutual enemies for two tides, which may be a long time to delay a foreign warship intent on action, but to keep them from sailing on the same tide - within the reach of "just one more signature" or "we can't find the key" delaying tactics. (Or maybe, "we're trying to get through to a Mr Pepys in London but at this time he's often in the theater, so sorry captain").
Neutrality (for now) indeed seems a good idea as the Most Christian seems so intent on dragging half of Europe into war, and England (for now, in the person of Sandwich) being the peacemaker between Spain and Portugal, but the decree would also serve a Noble Purpose in fixing some of the chaos in the Channel and North Sea. The Gazette version's preamble references "the Insolencies of private Men of War", a clear allusion to the Ostenders' unrestrained plundering of French ships (a favorite tactic is to strip the crew, we wonder how thoroughly), then often dragging them for sale into English ports (imagine the complications if they got resold there). They tend to leave English vessels alone, but not always, and recall that they recently plucked a Portuguese right from an English dock. English privateers are also going by the hundreds to the Continent and, apart from their getting into contact with the French, have turned up en masse in Dutch crews, boasting it pays better than the Navy. Ultimately this all seems favorable to the French; Charles wouldn't be laying the groundwork for an alliance with them, now?
In the background to today's discourse on securing the Medway there continues to be quite a bit of administrative housecleaning and overhaul. Predictably, Peter Pett's commission has just been revoked (terse notice in the State Papers, https://play.google.com/books/rea…), and he will now disappear from the Pepys radar, supposedly to be replaced by a "John Taylor" though that seems to be a typo for John Tippets.
Also today, Mr. Williamson was handed one hell of a royal decree to insert in the Gazette, at which he must have grumbled because it will take nearly half of the space in No. 233, covering February 6-10. Dated "Whitehall, Feb. 7", in a nutshell it enjoins everyone to be nice to each other while their ships are in an English port - a certain recent incident involving a Portuguese ship comes to mind - but it also prohibits his Majesties Subjects from entering "the Martial service of any Foreign Prince or State (...) or go in any Merchant, or Fishing voyage, in any Ship or Vessel, than such as belong to His Majesties own Subjects, without leave"; anyone in such foreign employ, even to fish herring, being commanded to appear and register "upon pain of being reputed and punished as Pirats". Not really in Sam's department but we expect it will be fodder for tavern talk at the Swan, and you may want to tell your friends who went on mercenary adventures in Flanders or who took employment with French fishermen and who don't keep up with the Gazette.
Well, surely this day was as fit for a diary as any. But is Sam a True Englishman? We ask, because on this day some self-styled "True Englishmen" sent Parliament their "complaints", a 16-page tract (in verse!) called "Vox & Lacrimae Anglorum". The authorship isn't clear and it's hardly an opinion poll, but since we won't get any for at least a couple of centuries it's interesting to check which boxes Sam, often pessimistic on the Kingdom's state and prospects, would tick in the fairly broad range of what the Anglorum consider the issues of the day. The summary is in the State Papers, No. 85, https://play.google.com/books/rea…
Tick eagerly: "want of pay for the seamen; (...) the money spent on the Queen mother and on the King's mistresses; (...) praying for (...) the relief of debtors" [Sam having to relieve debtors himself often enough].
Maybe tick: "partiality in the administration of justice; (...) praying for (...) the restoration of faithful ministers".
Not ticking, or no stated opinion: "heavy taxation [well, Sam's on the side that spends the taxes anyway], decrease of trade; (...) predominance of Popery, and persecution of nonconformists [at least, not for now]; of want of justice against those who set London on fire [Sam's not a conspirationist]; (...) of religion being made a stalking horse to idolatry. Praying for (...) the putting down of monopolies [what monopolies?], (...) encouragement of husbandry [ha ha, maybe he would dodge that one], and justice against 'perfidious Clarendon'". The latter may or may not reflect public sentiment; we suspect it's prudent to put "down with Clarendon" on every document including the baker's bill these days.
Not mentioned in the "Vox & Lacrimae", but big issues on planet Sam: insecurity in the Ruines; insipid plays with bad actors; cost of coach rides; intrusive committees.
While Sam wanders from tavern to tavern, worrying that maybe Cocke this and maybe the plate that, and before he vents all this tension at poor Hewer and ultimately in today's slightly long, long and slightly rambling Journall entry, our spy at the Savoy brought us a dispatch, dated this day from Whitehall, which will appear in the next issue (No. 222) of the Gazette, dated February 3-6.
It says His Majesty told the Council board last week (on January 31) that four standing committees would henceforth manage the biggest chunks of its daily business. There is to be one for Foreign Affairs, one for Trade, one for "Complaints and Grievances" (good luck with that one) and a "Committee for such matters as concern the Admiralty and Navy, as also all Military affairs, Fortifications, &c.", chaired by HRH.
So, it looks like someone has invented the Ministry of Defence. Sam, who hates shambolic meetings where incompetents toss problems around with no agenda or results, should be all for it and could thrive in this new world of efficiency and planning. Except it's one more committee on top of him, and possibly a new layer between him and the Top, isn't it.
We tend to agree that it's hard to see what a solemn letter to His Grace can change exactly. Everybody knows England is broke and the Duke sees the Commissioners all the time. But this letter we only learn of now cannot be just the morning's idea and it may be meant to circulate more broadly. If examples are needed to illustrate the situation, Sam won't have to dig very deep in the mailbag, which provides an endless stream of whimperings about money and in which, on this day in Portsmouth, John Tinker is throwing the following to Sam's attention:
-- Capt. John Tinker to Sam Pepys: (...) The oar-makers are content to make 20s. and to comply with their contract, but doubt the goodness of the pay, alleging that they sold goods to the purveyor for ready money, and are yet unpaid; their faith is weak. If I make it my own debt, they will be contented. (...) [State Papers, No. 43, https://play.google.com/books/rea…].
And so on and so forth, from the oar-makers, the sail-makers, the rope-makers, the timbermen, the caulkers and all the rest. On January 29 Chris Pett wrote of trying to recover eight caulkers "employed in the river", apparently in private business, who told him "they will rather be hanged than come, unless they can be better paid"; and so he asked for a press warrant. Enough expedients are found for some business to continue, notably big salvage projects to rebuild the Royal Oak and a first-rate newbuild, the Charles. It's actually not so bad; according to threedecks.org over 1667-68 the Navy will acquire 55 ships of all sizes, while the Dutch State Navy and its five admiralties will add 33, and the warmongering French 35. But the incessant battering of grouchy and grubby tradesmen is surely enough to make a honest clerk want to go paste labels in his library.
On this day William Acworth, a man Sam (he will later say) rather likes, and who holds the dangerous job of storekeeper at the Woolwich dockyard, writes to Sam for a copy of a petition filed against him by a Mr. Clayton (not readily traceable). Sam hasn't written of Acworth since 1665, but this year he will spend quite a bit of time on the Acworth saga, which centers on accusations of stealing (what else) cordage. So stay tuned. For now the letter is in the State Papers, at https://play.google.com/books/rea…. Its summary is not especially fascinating except where it also mentions the stores receiving 140 tons of hemp. 140 tons. Imagine how far we could go if just 0.01% of that should happen to fall off the cart.
If Sam read the Most Christian's pamphlet in the Gazette, as L&M says and seems most probable, then what he had in hand was Gazette No. 29, dated January 23-27 and containing items dated through the 25th. Indeed the "Circulatory Letter" from Versailles is datelined "Whitehall, Jan. 25". This is indeed the latest issue, the ink still smudgy on Sam's fingers, a useful calibration point on how fast he gets the paper. The Carte collection retains a 3-page copy of the letter in French (Carte 46, dated Jan. 27), so it also circulated in pamphlet form and it's possible Sam got hold of one.
In typical style Louis presents himself as the greatest Friend to Peace there ever was, and says "he has no Design by this Expedition to put any Obstacle to the Peace". But of course. By all reports the French conquest of Brussels, Lille and the surrounding country has been increasingly brutal. It's also been no picnic for the French forces so, seen from London, a second front in Franche Comte can look like a welcome diversion from the northern theater.
Interestingly, the Louis letter is printed in the Gazette in a font about twice as large as the rest of the news. It could be deference to the majestic author. Or - though Gazette 229 covers more or less the usual time interval, of 3-4 days - it could be that the news was indeed considered so hot as to warrant rushing publication and spreading it in all the space that remained available on page 2. Williamson may have been scooping out someone, or ordered by "Whitehall, Jan. 25" to print it a.s.a.p.
The pilferers *were* publicly punished in the stocks? But Sam wanted to go! Why are they telling him after the fact? He had saved a whole crate of rotten vegetables for the Tormenting & Pelting! Why does he always get all the work and none of the fun?
And soon, you'll see, they'll be in his lap, whining until they "obtain it from the Navy Commissioners".
Sigh. Ah well. Let's look at the bright side. The letter doesn't say they got their ears cut off, so maybe Sam didn't miss so much after all. Of course. Setting the example is fine but we need the ropemakers; can't antagonize those who possess the Art. And at least they don't know who Sam is.
Perhaps they could get transported to Tangiers? Once there they'd be rescued by the graceful Lord Pepys, and put to good use in new Tangiers Ropeyards. In five years it would be an empire, our ropes would sell all the way to Tartary.
Nah. Get real. Sam is no Houblon. Let's not be hubristic on Lord's day.
What to do with the veggies now? Take them to the theater maybe. Or feed them to the Boy.
1668. England is at peace. Peace, and its horrors: No more money for the fleet, the troops all demobbed and scattering. The Clerk of the Acts often despairs of getting enough to pay suppliers and keep the King's great Navy afloat.
Oh boo-hoo-hoo? Maybe there is hope - from who else than Henry Jermyn, earl of St. Albans, currently on one of his many missions to Paris (he's travelling light - we saw a pass into France for his suite of just 35 horses and 2 mules on January 14, at https://play.google.com/books/rea…). This one is certainly timely, what with the easily mis-interpreted deal with the Dutch, but on this day St. Albans is with another outsize character, the Venetian ambassador to France, Marc Antonio Giustinian, a.k.a. "Golden Guts" (according to his Wikipedia notice - don't ask), a future doge and a terrific cable writer. Venice is, at this time, still in a bloody fight with the Turk, and has called Christiandom for help. Golden Guts memorializes the meeting for the doge and senate, and you can almost see the glasses of prosecco twinkle as St. Albans does a bit of trade diplomacy:
-- "The earl of St. Albans, who is going to London next week, called on me at this house. (...) He promised to do his best for the levy, but warned me of the difficulties in the way, owing to the reduction of the population by reason of the plague and the war which afflicted that country only a few months ago. In a subdued tone he spoke of their trade in the Levant and that he did not know how the Turks would take it. It seemed to me, however, that this was not the obstacle which he had in mind, but that he introduced the point in order to bring your Excellencies to something more profitable for the royal House of England. Thus he went further and said that if the republic should happen to want to hire ships, it would be easy to fill these with men and cause them to proceed to the Levant, while giving out that the Venetians had purchased them in England. In this way the traders would be protected from suffering harm while the republic would get what it wanted. He stopped at this point and from what I understand Prince Rupert has a squadron of thirteen ships which he would like to turn to advantage either by selling or by hiring. I told the earl that I had no commissions about ships but that to raise the question in London could not fail to do good. Paris, the 24th January, 1667 [old style; 1668]"
Mr. Pepys, new plan: We'll sell or lease out the Navy. Please draft a price list. (What's this about Rupert having a squadron for sale?)
The dispatch is in the Calendar of State Papers Relating to English Affairs in the Archives of Venice, vol. 35, No. 272 (https://www.british-history.ac.uk…).
On this day another senior bureaucrat, well known to Sam, writes a chilling official letter.
Sir Ellis Leighton last came across the radar in March. Sam met him when he worked in the prize office and thinks him a wit (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…) and "one of the best companions at a meale in the world" (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…). He is now the Secretary of the Company of Royal Adventurers Trading into Africa, and had to answer a petition which representatives from Barbadoes had sent him in September, on how they cannot afford to buy slaves at the company's price, and should be allowed to source them directly from Guiny. In November Sam had already picked up a company response (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…) but, whether this still came short or another group had petitioned, Sir Ellis is now picking up his quill again.
He writes, of the Barbadoes planters, that "hitherto [it] has been their practice" to "never pay for the negroes they have". And notes the pernicious effects that making slaves too cheap is having on the company: "And as it was testified they had so great a glut of negroes that they would hardly give them their victuals for their labour, and multitudes died upon the Company's hands". Which was a great bother to manage. The letter is in the State Papers' colonial series (America and West Indies), vol. XXII, No. 1680 [https://www.british-history.ac.uk…].
Our Sam, this generally gentle soul, was supposedly an investor in the CRATA, "from 1663" according to the notice this earns him in a National Portrait Gallery catalog of accomplices to the slave trade (https://www.npg.org.uk/learning/d…). One wonders at the evidence, and that statement, and others like it, are not backed by much sourcing or detail. Anyway, after November 1667 the diary ceases to mention Sir Ellis, the witty conversationalist whose company Sam had enjoyed so much; nor can we find any letter to a Mr. Leighton or (as Sam spelled it) Layton, investment or not. Maybe it's just that they now move in different circles. Perhaps reading the company's brief to parliament on how to fairly price negroes had brought into focus what may have been a bit remote and abstract, and caused a malaise, different-values-at-the-time or not. Or perhaps a coffee-house chat, unreported in the Journall. "Ah, Pepys, you think you have problems at the Navy Office. Let me tell you, I would trade them for the headaches this current glut of negroes is causing me".
Scube: Thank you. In large part. The State Papers also include more stately collections on foreign relations, but the Domestic Series is where the amazingly thorough 19th century archivists who summarized these tens of thousands of obscure manuscripts, put the Naval Office documents. They also contain a wealth of petitions about unpaid bills and unjust arrests, country-life gazette items and miscellaneous red tape and inter-office correspondence that give a street-level view on the little people (usually, on their gripes and problems) which complement the Journal quite nicely. Many bear Sam's fingerprints but he must have dismissed that stuff as too boring for the Journal, and anyway who wants to go back all over the workday when updating their diary?
The Google scans I reference, as well as a University of London version (available from https://www.british-history.ac.uk…) which is just as good but (urgh) all in a modern UTF font, both have search indexes, and putting the purser's, the captain's or their ship's name in there leads to a few mentions here and there. The actual records tend to be in the National Archives at Kew but, alas, have not been digitized. Just Googling the ships' names brings up minutely detailed descriptions in a fantastic database of age-of-sail warships, threedecks.org, and further mentions of The Loyal Merchant in documents from well into the next century, and in Company archives. Whether Capt. White was really bound to a chair is neither documented, nor contradicted by the historical record.
On this day, perhaps while Sam was out of the office, someone else wrote a report on a sordid affair in which the purser of the Loyal Merchant, lately one of the Navy's major hired ships, accuses its captain Isaac White of the ageless trick of over-reporting the crew's size, and of having had him thrown into jail when he wouldn't play along. Sam would know the case well, as the report includes his notes from the captain's interrogation. Interestingly, the notes are recorded as "in Pepys' shorthand" [State Papers No. 20-II, https://shorturl.at/ayAB6 page 181], confirming that he was there in the action, and that his duties extend to enforcement and fraud investigations. We can imagine him, scratching away while the captain, bound to a chair and with a large lantern in his face, deals with one of the more muscular clerks.
But why him? Sam's no mere note-taker. Financial crime, financial cop. And then, he's good with captains. And then... much, much to Sam's puzzlement, the office asks him, in such cases, to sing "Beauty Retire" to the subject, again and again. It's a hard nut indeed that doesn't crack after a couple of hours of that, or a reading of Boyle's "Hydrostatics".
The case apparently goes nowhere. In a month [State Papers, page 241], the purser gets a honorable discharge as Sam writes again to get him paid back the security which kept him in his job (relations can't have improved with the captain after today). Captain White soon resurfaces, still a captain and on another ship - though a smaller one, the Wren, so perhaps he didn't really shine in Sam's transcript. The Loyal Merchant goes on to a decades-long career, at one point passing to the East India Company.
Once again Mr. Pepys was at absolutely the right dinner party, to hear of a deal with the Dutch that (we all use the Gregorian calendar, right?) will not even be signed before the 23rd. This would seem to be a leak, maybe authorized. Or was there some public announcement out of the Hague? He seems fainly surprised. Clearly the triple alliance is above his pay grade, but he could have been told in advance at the Office to pump up the victualling a bit.
In any case the news must be getting around, as today Mr. Thomas Holden ("a merchant", as per https://www.britishmuseum.org/col…) writes "to Hickes" that "It is reported that the King intends to put out 110 men-of-war this spring, and the Dutch 100 more, against the French" (State Papers, https://shorturl.at/ayAB6, p. 176). "Against" as in "to defend against", in the very unfortunate event we have to, and we're pretty sure Charles will do no such thing, but still; that would a be lot of ships to mobilize. It may call for more biscuits.
As for the horses, well, why not being nice to Louis, someone we can't really fight and might just be signing another treaty with in the not too distant future. And the French also just seem to love English horses. Since early November, it's a total of 292 horses that various dispatches reported crossing the channel, gifts (or trade) to various French grandees, including the 17 nice ones for the Most Christian, and a whole herd of 140 conveyed by the highly francophile Sir George Hamilton just yesterday (State Papers, p. 178, No. 195). That's great, because what other luxury goods does England have on offer, exactly?
Susan, we concede that your interpretation is so much more consistent with the Weymouth dispatch as to be, in fact, correct. Our minde had just recoiled at the possibility of so brazen a deed as seizing a ship in dock, but we also now do find that Mr. Muddiman was suffered to report the embarrassing incident in his Gazette (No. 216 of Jan. 13-16, page 2, col. 2), and clarifies that (a) the ship was part of a caravan that had sought shelter from a storm, (b) it was indeed "seised on by an Ostender and carryed off", and (c) the captain was not "let go" (hey, captains are good to ransom), but happened to be on shore; only the English customs-men did the Ostender have "the kindness" (how touching), and the great wisdom, to leave alone.
"Ostender" in 1668 is a loaded term. Ostend is indeed part of the United Provinces, but must have been a thorn in their side as the main base for the infamous Dunkirkers, privateers with a decades-long record of working for Spain. Their concise history at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dun… is a bit blank on the 1660s, but clearly they're still available and Spain is still technically at war with Portugal until February, so no problem there.
One could still, if of a sinful disposition, build an alternative history in which the Portuguese captain had only pretended to be driven to the coast, was really on a mission, &c. A mission for who? The court in Lisbon did have bigger fish to fry than the fate of Bombay, had traded it off for help in Europe against Spain. But that didn't mean a lack of interest in India, where Portugal had plenty of other bases and controlled land well beyond Bombay (see the map at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Por…). Brazil is fine, but why should it be enough, and aren't we all agreed that the real riches are in the Orient?
On the ground, anyway, the Portuguese viceroy and governor have been doing all they could to stop, delay or contain the transfers to England. As of 1668 they have lost bits and pieces and Bombay has a hands-on governor, a Capt. Gary, who is doing a bit more than his predecessors to fortify the island - but it's nothing like what the Company, already a formidable entity, could (and will) deploy. If Sam had worked for the EIC (and who knows if he didn't get the pitch?) he likely wouldn't have complained as much of not getting resources (why, Mr. Pepys, in the private sector of course you would have that coach already!) But, anyway, life went on. Many of the Portuguese just got rebadged as Company men. Portugal retreated to Goa and will cling to it until 1974.
At this time the shortened link works on all our devices, of both the Windows and the Android persuasions. It does lead us to a large blackish (actually dark green) rectangle but, on close inspection, this proves to be the embossed cover of the book, and at the bottom of the page we find a sliding cursor to navigate inside the volume. The full link, https://play.google.com/books/rea…, is a mouthful and its termination is specific to each page, but if it is more serviceable we shall now favour it.
Comments
Second Reading
About Wednesday 12 February 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
We are advised from Plymouth this day (by https://play.google.com/books/rea…) that two French men-of-war departed from Looe and Fowey in Cornwall, having taken 160 soldiers, and then "dealt rudely" with some English vessels. Odd but... No. We disgress. Ships come and ships go, 'tis as ordinary as the French being insolent. Surely nothing larger will come from the incident. Pray forgive the interruption.
About Monday 10 February 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
Routine memo on office trivia: On this day Sam is victualling Sir Thomas Allin. There's no fish left, so they get beef and peas (https://play.google.com/books/rea…). Yawn. One wonder where Allin is going, what his adventures will be? The expectation is the Streights and sunny Barbary - nice at this season, but you never know. How droll if he should come across his old nemesis, the gallant French admiral Gilles de La Roche Saint-André... an important man now, and what mustache! They could have a gentlemanly reunion and talk around coffee of Anglo-French friendship and reminiscences.
About Sunday 9 February 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
The Royal Society today at Arundel House – from its Secret Archyves:
mr Pepys: letter fovnd from an Anonymovs Gentleman on a book lately pvblished in Paris cavsing Rigidness of the Body and Expression of Hvmors. The Company ordered mr Oldenburg to obtain the Book with all expediency; the Cvrator to procure a dog for Experimenting the reported effects.
About Saturday 8 February 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
Nobody is terrorizing the south coast right now (for which God be praised), but that could change if England goes too far in its friendship with Spain, and providing help and shelter to their current privateers the Ostenders could qualify. What Louis thinks of the English Navy, we'll have to ask him, but it's still got a lot of ships and occasionally he gets walloped in the West Indies, so "toothless and defenceless" shouldn't be in it. But yeah, some of the ports are a bit lonely, and burning down one or two would be easy, and arguably the logical thing to do against piracy.
So, given the recent deals with Spain and the States and the fury in which Louis reportedly flew when he learned of the latter, 'tis the season to not be nasty to the Frogs. On this very day, another 12 horses are on their way as a personal gift from Charles (maybe with large tattoos that say "personal gift from Charles, your brother") to no less than the marquis de Turenne, who happens to command all French troops in Flanders (https://play.google.com/books/rea…). Whether a treaty is in the works, we're not sayin', but the all-knowing Venetian ambassador reported today that Temple had actually threatened De Witz to sign one with France if the Dutch didn't (No. 277 in https://www.british-history.ac.uk…). And remember that St. Albans was in Paris recently; and it surely wasn't to visit the Eiffel tower.
Speaking of mysteries however, here's another one: a rumor in France, which agent Anthony Thorold is picking up from arriving vessels and preparing to report (it will appear at https://play.google.com/books/rea…) that Louis expects to capture all of Flanders by summertime, "except Ostend". Except Ostend? Is it that well defended? Or would Louis consider that missile launchpad better potentially too useful to burn to the ground? And useful against who, then?
About Saturday 8 February 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
Apart from that, in the next few days Sam will be Very Busy with a letter sent him this day by a Captain John Poyntz, who "would undertake to make a lighthouse, and build a castle on the Goodwin Sands (...) and if I did not complete them this summer, would be bound to lose my life". Poyntz then says it would be cheap, too, and asks Sam to get "the King and Council" to provide him, among other supplies, "2 open vessels of 30 tons each (...) with 100 carpenters, seamen, and labourers to be in the King's pay". (State Papers, No. 111, https://play.google.com/books/rea…). It's tempting to imagine that letter being passed around the Office as the day's crank piece ("he bets his life on building a castle on sand? How' bout just his honor, if he don't deliver we could do him like it says in that book of yours, Mr. Sam"), but next week Sam will draft no less than four letters to the Commissioners, so it may have been taken seriously.
Captain Poyntz isn't unknown, in 1664 he was Clerk Comptroller of the office of the Master of the Revels, which licensed lotteries and entertainment of all sorts (https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…). So of course now he could be building a lighthouse; why, you Office boys could then visit for, you know, Revels. A lighthouse on the Goodwin Sands would indeed have been a good idea, as the treacherous sandbank will cause shipwrecks by the thousands, but it won't be acted upon before around 200 years (https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/…). We wish Poyntz had kept a Journall too.
About Saturday 8 February 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
The proclamation which the State Papers calendars as of February 8 is actually slightly more lenient in the version, dated February 7 (of which our spy brought us the galley proofs yesterday), to appear in the next Gazette. We now wonder at which may be the version of record, however the Gazette version is more detailed, printed by Authority, and is what the Publick at large will have seen. Significantly, it doesn't prohibit all sales of prize goods, only those from "Privateers with foreign Commission" (pfew, big sigh of relief there). It also doesn't quite shut the door on foreign adventures, except "without leave from His Majesty", or HRH or the High Admiral. For the record it also doesn't ask port officers to restrain mutual enemies for two tides, which may be a long time to delay a foreign warship intent on action, but to keep them from sailing on the same tide - within the reach of "just one more signature" or "we can't find the key" delaying tactics. (Or maybe, "we're trying to get through to a Mr Pepys in London but at this time he's often in the theater, so sorry captain").
Neutrality (for now) indeed seems a good idea as the Most Christian seems so intent on dragging half of Europe into war, and England (for now, in the person of Sandwich) being the peacemaker between Spain and Portugal, but the decree would also serve a Noble Purpose in fixing some of the chaos in the Channel and North Sea. The Gazette version's preamble references "the Insolencies of private Men of War", a clear allusion to the Ostenders' unrestrained plundering of French ships (a favorite tactic is to strip the crew, we wonder how thoroughly), then often dragging them for sale into English ports (imagine the complications if they got resold there). They tend to leave English vessels alone, but not always, and recall that they recently plucked a Portuguese right from an English dock. English privateers are also going by the hundreds to the Continent and, apart from their getting into contact with the French, have turned up en masse in Dutch crews, boasting it pays better than the Navy. Ultimately this all seems favorable to the French; Charles wouldn't be laying the groundwork for an alliance with them, now?
About Friday 7 February 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
In the background to today's discourse on securing the Medway there continues to be quite a bit of administrative housecleaning and overhaul. Predictably, Peter Pett's commission has just been revoked (terse notice in the State Papers, https://play.google.com/books/rea…), and he will now disappear from the Pepys radar, supposedly to be replaced by a "John Taylor" though that seems to be a typo for John Tippets.
Also today, Mr. Williamson was handed one hell of a royal decree to insert in the Gazette, at which he must have grumbled because it will take nearly half of the space in No. 233, covering February 6-10. Dated "Whitehall, Feb. 7", in a nutshell it enjoins everyone to be nice to each other while their ships are in an English port - a certain recent incident involving a Portuguese ship comes to mind - but it also prohibits his Majesties Subjects from entering "the Martial service of any Foreign Prince or State (...) or go in any Merchant, or Fishing voyage, in any Ship or Vessel, than such as belong to His Majesties own Subjects, without leave"; anyone in such foreign employ, even to fish herring, being commanded to appear and register "upon pain of being reputed and punished as Pirats". Not really in Sam's department but we expect it will be fodder for tavern talk at the Swan, and you may want to tell your friends who went on mercenary adventures in Flanders or who took employment with French fishermen and who don't keep up with the Gazette.
About Thursday 6 February 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
Well, surely this day was as fit for a diary as any. But is Sam a True Englishman? We ask, because on this day some self-styled "True Englishmen" sent Parliament their "complaints", a 16-page tract (in verse!) called "Vox & Lacrimae Anglorum". The authorship isn't clear and it's hardly an opinion poll, but since we won't get any for at least a couple of centuries it's interesting to check which boxes Sam, often pessimistic on the Kingdom's state and prospects, would tick in the fairly broad range of what the Anglorum consider the issues of the day. The summary is in the State Papers, No. 85, https://play.google.com/books/rea…
Tick eagerly: "want of pay for the seamen; (...) the money spent on the Queen mother and on the King's mistresses; (...) praying for (...) the relief of debtors" [Sam having to relieve debtors himself often enough].
Maybe tick: "partiality in the administration of justice; (...) praying for (...) the restoration of faithful ministers".
Not ticking, or no stated opinion: "heavy taxation [well, Sam's on the side that spends the taxes anyway], decrease of trade; (...) predominance of Popery, and persecution of nonconformists [at least, not for now]; of want of justice against those who set London on fire [Sam's not a conspirationist]; (...) of religion being made a stalking horse to idolatry. Praying for (...) the putting down of monopolies [what monopolies?], (...) encouragement of husbandry [ha ha, maybe he would dodge that one], and justice against 'perfidious Clarendon'". The latter may or may not reflect public sentiment; we suspect it's prudent to put "down with Clarendon" on every document including the baker's bill these days.
Not mentioned in the "Vox & Lacrimae", but big issues on planet Sam: insecurity in the Ruines; insipid plays with bad actors; cost of coach rides; intrusive committees.
About Wednesday 5 February 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
While Sam wanders from tavern to tavern, worrying that maybe Cocke this and maybe the plate that, and before he vents all this tension at poor Hewer and ultimately in today's slightly long, long and slightly rambling Journall entry, our spy at the Savoy brought us a dispatch, dated this day from Whitehall, which will appear in the next issue (No. 222) of the Gazette, dated February 3-6.
It says His Majesty told the Council board last week (on January 31) that four standing committees would henceforth manage the biggest chunks of its daily business. There is to be one for Foreign Affairs, one for Trade, one for "Complaints and Grievances" (good luck with that one) and a "Committee for such matters as concern the Admiralty and Navy, as also all Military affairs, Fortifications, &c.", chaired by HRH.
So, it looks like someone has invented the Ministry of Defence. Sam, who hates shambolic meetings where incompetents toss problems around with no agenda or results, should be all for it and could thrive in this new world of efficiency and planning. Except it's one more committee on top of him, and possibly a new layer between him and the Top, isn't it.
About Tuesday 4 February 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
We tend to agree that it's hard to see what a solemn letter to His Grace can change exactly. Everybody knows England is broke and the Duke sees the Commissioners all the time. But this letter we only learn of now cannot be just the morning's idea and it may be meant to circulate more broadly. If examples are needed to illustrate the situation, Sam won't have to dig very deep in the mailbag, which provides an endless stream of whimperings about money and in which, on this day in Portsmouth, John Tinker is throwing the following to Sam's attention:
-- Capt. John Tinker to Sam Pepys: (...) The oar-makers are content to make 20s. and to comply with their contract, but doubt the goodness of the pay, alleging that they sold goods to the purveyor for ready money, and are yet unpaid; their faith is weak. If I make it my own debt, they will be contented. (...) [State Papers, No. 43, https://play.google.com/books/rea…].
And so on and so forth, from the oar-makers, the sail-makers, the rope-makers, the timbermen, the caulkers and all the rest. On January 29 Chris Pett wrote of trying to recover eight caulkers "employed in the river", apparently in private business, who told him "they will rather be hanged than come, unless they can be better paid"; and so he asked for a press warrant. Enough expedients are found for some business to continue, notably big salvage projects to rebuild the Royal Oak and a first-rate newbuild, the Charles. It's actually not so bad; according to threedecks.org over 1667-68 the Navy will acquire 55 ships of all sizes, while the Dutch State Navy and its five admiralties will add 33, and the warmongering French 35. But the incessant battering of grouchy and grubby tradesmen is surely enough to make a honest clerk want to go paste labels in his library.
About Thursday 30 January 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
On this day William Acworth, a man Sam (he will later say) rather likes, and who holds the dangerous job of storekeeper at the Woolwich dockyard, writes to Sam for a copy of a petition filed against him by a Mr. Clayton (not readily traceable). Sam hasn't written of Acworth since 1665, but this year he will spend quite a bit of time on the Acworth saga, which centers on accusations of stealing (what else) cordage. So stay tuned. For now the letter is in the State Papers, at https://play.google.com/books/rea…. Its summary is not especially fascinating except where it also mentions the stores receiving 140 tons of hemp. 140 tons. Imagine how far we could go if just 0.01% of that should happen to fall off the cart.
About Monday 27 January 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
If Sam read the Most Christian's pamphlet in the Gazette, as L&M says and seems most probable, then what he had in hand was Gazette No. 29, dated January 23-27 and containing items dated through the 25th. Indeed the "Circulatory Letter" from Versailles is datelined "Whitehall, Jan. 25". This is indeed the latest issue, the ink still smudgy on Sam's fingers, a useful calibration point on how fast he gets the paper. The Carte collection retains a 3-page copy of the letter in French (Carte 46, dated Jan. 27), so it also circulated in pamphlet form and it's possible Sam got hold of one.
In typical style Louis presents himself as the greatest Friend to Peace there ever was, and says "he has no Design by this Expedition to put any Obstacle to the Peace". But of course. By all reports the French conquest of Brussels, Lille and the surrounding country has been increasingly brutal. It's also been no picnic for the French forces so, seen from London, a second front in Franche Comte can look like a welcome diversion from the northern theater.
Interestingly, the Louis letter is printed in the Gazette in a font about twice as large as the rest of the news. It could be deference to the majestic author. Or - though Gazette 229 covers more or less the usual time interval, of 3-4 days - it could be that the news was indeed considered so hot as to warrant rushing publication and spreading it in all the space that remained available on page 2. Williamson may have been scooping out someone, or ordered by "Whitehall, Jan. 25" to print it a.s.a.p.
About Sunday 26 January 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
The pilferers *were* publicly punished in the stocks? But Sam wanted to go! Why are they telling him after the fact? He had saved a whole crate of rotten vegetables for the Tormenting & Pelting! Why does he always get all the work and none of the fun?
And soon, you'll see, they'll be in his lap, whining until they "obtain it from the Navy Commissioners".
Sigh. Ah well. Let's look at the bright side. The letter doesn't say they got their ears cut off, so maybe Sam didn't miss so much after all. Of course. Setting the example is fine but we need the ropemakers; can't antagonize those who possess the Art. And at least they don't know who Sam is.
Perhaps they could get transported to Tangiers? Once there they'd be rescued by the graceful Lord Pepys, and put to good use in new Tangiers Ropeyards. In five years it would be an empire, our ropes would sell all the way to Tartary.
Nah. Get real. Sam is no Houblon. Let's not be hubristic on Lord's day.
What to do with the veggies now? Take them to the theater maybe. Or feed them to the Boy.
About Friday 24 January 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
1668. England is at peace. Peace, and its horrors: No more money for the fleet, the troops all demobbed and scattering. The Clerk of the Acts often despairs of getting enough to pay suppliers and keep the King's great Navy afloat.
Oh boo-hoo-hoo? Maybe there is hope - from who else than Henry Jermyn, earl of St. Albans, currently on one of his many missions to Paris (he's travelling light - we saw a pass into France for his suite of just 35 horses and 2 mules on January 14, at https://play.google.com/books/rea…). This one is certainly timely, what with the easily mis-interpreted deal with the Dutch, but on this day St. Albans is with another outsize character, the Venetian ambassador to France, Marc Antonio Giustinian, a.k.a. "Golden Guts" (according to his Wikipedia notice - don't ask), a future doge and a terrific cable writer. Venice is, at this time, still in a bloody fight with the Turk, and has called Christiandom for help. Golden Guts memorializes the meeting for the doge and senate, and you can almost see the glasses of prosecco twinkle as St. Albans does a bit of trade diplomacy:
-- "The earl of St. Albans, who is going to London next week, called on me at this house. (...) He promised to do his best for the levy, but warned me of the difficulties in the way, owing to the reduction of the population by reason of the plague and the war which afflicted that country only a few months ago. In a subdued tone he spoke of their trade in the Levant and that he did not know how the Turks would take it. It seemed to me, however, that this was not the obstacle which he had in mind, but that he introduced the point in order to bring your Excellencies to something more profitable for the royal House of England. Thus he went further and said that if the republic should happen to want to hire ships, it would be easy to fill these with men and cause them to proceed to the Levant, while giving out that the Venetians had purchased them in England. In this way the traders would be protected from suffering harm while the republic would get what it wanted. He stopped at this point and from what I understand Prince Rupert has a squadron of thirteen ships which he would like to turn to advantage either by selling or by hiring. I told the earl that I had no commissions about ships but that to raise the question in London could not fail to do good. Paris, the 24th January, 1667 [old style; 1668]"
Mr. Pepys, new plan: We'll sell or lease out the Navy. Please draft a price list. (What's this about Rupert having a squadron for sale?)
The dispatch is in the Calendar of State Papers Relating to English Affairs in the Archives of Venice, vol. 35, No. 272 (https://www.british-history.ac.uk…).
About Thursday 23 January 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
On this day another senior bureaucrat, well known to Sam, writes a chilling official letter.
Sir Ellis Leighton last came across the radar in March. Sam met him when he worked in the prize office and thinks him a wit (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…) and "one of the best companions at a meale in the world" (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…). He is now the Secretary of the Company of Royal Adventurers Trading into Africa, and had to answer a petition which representatives from Barbadoes had sent him in September, on how they cannot afford to buy slaves at the company's price, and should be allowed to source them directly from Guiny. In November Sam had already picked up a company response (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…) but, whether this still came short or another group had petitioned, Sir Ellis is now picking up his quill again.
He writes, of the Barbadoes planters, that "hitherto [it] has been their practice" to "never pay for the negroes they have". And notes the pernicious effects that making slaves too cheap is having on the company: "And as it was testified they had so great a glut of negroes that they would hardly give them their victuals for their labour, and multitudes died upon the Company's hands". Which was a great bother to manage. The letter is in the State Papers' colonial series (America and West Indies), vol. XXII, No. 1680 [https://www.british-history.ac.uk…].
Our Sam, this generally gentle soul, was supposedly an investor in the CRATA, "from 1663" according to the notice this earns him in a National Portrait Gallery catalog of accomplices to the slave trade (https://www.npg.org.uk/learning/d…). One wonders at the evidence, and that statement, and others like it, are not backed by much sourcing or detail. Anyway, after November 1667 the diary ceases to mention Sir Ellis, the witty conversationalist whose company Sam had enjoyed so much; nor can we find any letter to a Mr. Leighton or (as Sam spelled it) Layton, investment or not. Maybe it's just that they now move in different circles. Perhaps reading the company's brief to parliament on how to fairly price negroes had brought into focus what may have been a bit remote and abstract, and caused a malaise, different-values-at-the-time or not. Or perhaps a coffee-house chat, unreported in the Journall. "Ah, Pepys, you think you have problems at the Navy Office. Let me tell you, I would trade them for the headaches this current glut of negroes is causing me".
About Tuesday 21 January 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
Scube: Thank you. In large part. The State Papers also include more stately collections on foreign relations, but the Domestic Series is where the amazingly thorough 19th century archivists who summarized these tens of thousands of obscure manuscripts, put the Naval Office documents. They also contain a wealth of petitions about unpaid bills and unjust arrests, country-life gazette items and miscellaneous red tape and inter-office correspondence that give a street-level view on the little people (usually, on their gripes and problems) which complement the Journal quite nicely. Many bear Sam's fingerprints but he must have dismissed that stuff as too boring for the Journal, and anyway who wants to go back all over the workday when updating their diary?
The Google scans I reference, as well as a University of London version (available from https://www.british-history.ac.uk…) which is just as good but (urgh) all in a modern UTF font, both have search indexes, and putting the purser's, the captain's or their ship's name in there leads to a few mentions here and there. The actual records tend to be in the National Archives at Kew but, alas, have not been digitized. Just Googling the ships' names brings up minutely detailed descriptions in a fantastic database of age-of-sail warships, threedecks.org, and further mentions of The Loyal Merchant in documents from well into the next century, and in Company archives. Whether Capt. White was really bound to a chair is neither documented, nor contradicted by the historical record.
About Tuesday 21 January 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
On this day, perhaps while Sam was out of the office, someone else wrote a report on a sordid affair in which the purser of the Loyal Merchant, lately one of the Navy's major hired ships, accuses its captain Isaac White of the ageless trick of over-reporting the crew's size, and of having had him thrown into jail when he wouldn't play along. Sam would know the case well, as the report includes his notes from the captain's interrogation. Interestingly, the notes are recorded as "in Pepys' shorthand" [State Papers No. 20-II, https://shorturl.at/ayAB6 page 181], confirming that he was there in the action, and that his duties extend to enforcement and fraud investigations. We can imagine him, scratching away while the captain, bound to a chair and with a large lantern in his face, deals with one of the more muscular clerks.
But why him? Sam's no mere note-taker. Financial crime, financial cop. And then, he's good with captains. And then... much, much to Sam's puzzlement, the office asks him, in such cases, to sing "Beauty Retire" to the subject, again and again. It's a hard nut indeed that doesn't crack after a couple of hours of that, or a reading of Boyle's "Hydrostatics".
The case apparently goes nowhere. In a month [State Papers, page 241], the purser gets a honorable discharge as Sam writes again to get him paid back the security which kept him in his job (relations can't have improved with the captain after today). Captain White soon resurfaces, still a captain and on another ship - though a smaller one, the Wren, so perhaps he didn't really shine in Sam's transcript. The Loyal Merchant goes on to a decades-long career, at one point passing to the East India Company.
About Monday 20 January 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
Once again Mr. Pepys was at absolutely the right dinner party, to hear of a deal with the Dutch that (we all use the Gregorian calendar, right?) will not even be signed before the 23rd. This would seem to be a leak, maybe authorized. Or was there some public announcement out of the Hague? He seems fainly surprised. Clearly the triple alliance is above his pay grade, but he could have been told in advance at the Office to pump up the victualling a bit.
In any case the news must be getting around, as today Mr. Thomas Holden ("a merchant", as per https://www.britishmuseum.org/col…) writes "to Hickes" that "It is reported that the King intends to put out 110 men-of-war this spring, and the Dutch 100 more, against the French" (State Papers, https://shorturl.at/ayAB6, p. 176). "Against" as in "to defend against", in the very unfortunate event we have to, and we're pretty sure Charles will do no such thing, but still; that would a be lot of ships to mobilize. It may call for more biscuits.
As for the horses, well, why not being nice to Louis, someone we can't really fight and might just be signing another treaty with in the not too distant future. And the French also just seem to love English horses. Since early November, it's a total of 292 horses that various dispatches reported crossing the channel, gifts (or trade) to various French grandees, including the 17 nice ones for the Most Christian, and a whole herd of 140 conveyed by the highly francophile Sir George Hamilton just yesterday (State Papers, p. 178, No. 195). That's great, because what other luxury goods does England have on offer, exactly?
About Tuesday 14 January 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
Susan, we concede that your interpretation is so much more consistent with the Weymouth dispatch as to be, in fact, correct. Our minde had just recoiled at the possibility of so brazen a deed as seizing a ship in dock, but we also now do find that Mr. Muddiman was suffered to report the embarrassing incident in his Gazette (No. 216 of Jan. 13-16, page 2, col. 2), and clarifies that (a) the ship was part of a caravan that had sought shelter from a storm, (b) it was indeed "seised on by an Ostender and carryed off", and (c) the captain was not "let go" (hey, captains are good to ransom), but happened to be on shore; only the English customs-men did the Ostender have "the kindness" (how touching), and the great wisdom, to leave alone.
"Ostender" in 1668 is a loaded term. Ostend is indeed part of the United Provinces, but must have been a thorn in their side as the main base for the infamous Dunkirkers, privateers with a decades-long record of working for Spain. Their concise history at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dun… is a bit blank on the 1660s, but clearly they're still available and Spain is still technically at war with Portugal until February, so no problem there.
One could still, if of a sinful disposition, build an alternative history in which the Portuguese captain had only pretended to be driven to the coast, was really on a mission, &c. A mission for who? The court in Lisbon did have bigger fish to fry than the fate of Bombay, had traded it off for help in Europe against Spain. But that didn't mean a lack of interest in India, where Portugal had plenty of other bases and controlled land well beyond Bombay (see the map at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Por…). Brazil is fine, but why should it be enough, and aren't we all agreed that the real riches are in the Orient?
On the ground, anyway, the Portuguese viceroy and governor have been doing all they could to stop, delay or contain the transfers to England. As of 1668 they have lost bits and pieces and Bombay has a hands-on governor, a Capt. Gary, who is doing a bit more than his predecessors to fortify the island - but it's nothing like what the Company, already a formidable entity, could (and will) deploy. If Sam had worked for the EIC (and who knows if he didn't get the pitch?) he likely wouldn't have complained as much of not getting resources (why, Mr. Pepys, in the private sector of course you would have that coach already!) But, anyway, life went on. Many of the Portuguese just got rebadged as Company men. Portugal retreated to Goa and will cling to it until 1974.
About Monday 13 January 1667/68
Stephane Chenard • Link
At this time the shortened link works on all our devices, of both the Windows and the Android persuasions. It does lead us to a large blackish (actually dark green) rectangle but, on close inspection, this proves to be the embossed cover of the book, and at the bottom of the page we find a sliding cursor to navigate inside the volume. The full link, https://play.google.com/books/rea…, is a mouthful and its termination is specific to each page, but if it is more serviceable we shall now favour it.