Annotations and comments

Tonyel has posted 280 annotations/comments since 11 March 2013.

Comments

Second Reading

About Wednesday 5 September 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

"In the evening my wife being a little impatient"
I'll bet that Sam has been unable to resist boasting about his new-found wealth until Bess has suggested he might spread some of it around.

About Saturday 1 September 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

Some years ago I pumped out the flooded cellar of an 18c farmhouse and found a channel in the stone floor which allowed spring water to trickle across. (This had got blocked - hence the flood). Judging by the hooks in the ceiling beams, this was the recognised way of preserving large amounts of food - and it was certainly damned cold, even in summer.

About Tuesday 14 August 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

Fifty six pounds of butter in mid-summer would go off quite quickly unless they had a very cold cellar. Perhaps Elisabeth and "the girl" would have to be busy making cakes, etc to preserve it.

About Sunday 12 August 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

When I was a lad (some considerable time ago) I often heard the expression " All my eye and Betty Martin" used to describe a fanciful, unlikely story. I would love to think that it was already three hundred years old.

About Sunday 22 July 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

There is a memorial in a church in Devizes, Wiltshire to five young people who drowned while rowing on a pond in 1751. While regretting this, it also makes clear that it was their fault for going rowing on a Sunday.

About Thursday 5 July 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

" he had a project for all us Secretaries to join together, and get money by bringing all business into our hands."
Middle management wasting no time in organising some mutual nest-feathering. 'Twas ever thus - and still is, of course.

About Wednesday 4 July 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

" where I received 500l. for my Lord, by appointment of the Treasurer, and went afterwards down with Mr. Luddyard and drank my morning draft with him and other officers. "
This does seem to confirm that Sam has no fears about carrying a large amount of gold into the pub - although, when he collects the plate, he takes the precaution of hiring a coach.

About Sunday 1 July 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

It's worth reading the Wikipedia entry on Sir Samuel Morland - a fascinating character, credited amonst many other things with inventing the first internal combustion engine. I wonder if Sam's slightly dismissive "prating" was due to his not being included in the conversation.

About Saturday 23 June 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

There is also a Cardinal's Cap Alley and a parallel Rose Alley across the river in Southwark. The story I was told was that the cardinal's parishioners caught him visiting Rose ("no better than she ought to be") and chased him up the next alley where he lost his cap.

About Wednesday 20 June 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

" to send the barge that brought the King on shore, to Hinchingbroke by Lynne."
Presumably Montagu wanted this as a souvenir to show off to his friends.

About Thursday 14 June 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

"to the Treasurer of the Navy for 500l. After that to a tavern......."

Would this have been in gold? A huge amount to risk in a pub!

About Friday 8 June 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

A good handsome wench I kissed, the first that I have seen a great while.

According to a recent BBCTV programme on manners in Elizabethan times, if a caller at a strange house was met at the door by a young woman he should kiss her firmly on the lips.
Sam seems to have taken full advantage of this custom. Somehow the chorus of Rich Hall's love song comes to mind: 'Some people call it stalking.'

About Tuesday 15 May 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

Way off topic, but is there any significance in that some names in the annotations appear in blue and some in black? I plan to be following the site again for however many years it takes and, at my age, I don't have the time to puzzle about this each morning!

About Saturday 12 May 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

"gave me many orders to make for direction for the ships that are left in the Downs, giving them the greatest charge in the world to bring no passengers with them, when they come after us to Scheveling Bay, excepting Mr. Edward Montagu, Mr. Thomas Crew, and Sir H. Wright."

Is this Sandwich making sure that only the "right" people accompany him to the King, or merely that Charles' entourage will require a lot of empty cabins?

About Tuesday 1 May 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

Slightly shorter than Herrick,

On May morning my mother always declaimed, in a squeaky Yorkshire accent:
"Wake me early moother, for I'm to be queen of t' may!"

Not so elegant, but it has the same sense of excitement.

About Sunday 29 April 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

" But he shook his shoulders when he told me how Monk had betrayed them,"

Strange, I associate this expression with laughter. Could it be that Montagu was amused by Monk's roguery?

About Saturday 7 April 1660

Tonyel  •  Link

For UK readers only, there is a new series starting next Wednesday, 10th, on BBC4 at 9 p.m. called "The Century That Wrote Itself" about the explosion of literacy in the 17th century which will focus on "five remarkable writers". Can't imagine that Sam won't be in there somewhere.

About Thursday 22 March 1659/60

Tonyel  •  Link

Strange to post a reply ten years late but, surely Bess kept the dining room keys and Sam had the keys to the house until the last moment.
I like his dawning realisation of how many ways his elevation may benefit him in the future - and his insurance of asking God not to let him get carried away by it.

About Saturday 10 March 1659/60

Tonyel  •  Link

"Then by coach home, where I took occasion to tell my wife of my going to sea, who was much troubled at it, and was with some dispute"
Poor Bess - husband disappearing to sea, she having to move lodgings and (as usual, one suspects) she's the last to know.