Saturday 14 September 1661
At the office all the morning, at noon to the Change, and then home again. To dinner, where my uncle Fenner by appointment came and dined with me, thinking to go together to my aunt Kite’s that is dead; but before we had dined comes Sir R. Slingsby and his lady, and a great deal of company, to take my wife and I out by barge to shew them the King’s and Duke’s yachts. So I was forced to leave my uncle and brother Tom at dinner and go forth with them, and we had great pleasure, seeing all four yachts, viz., these two and the two Dutch ones. And so home again, and after writing letters by post, to bed.
Oh sorry, Uncle, but I just can't refuse a request by Sir Slingsby, now could I? Wasn't it a pre-arranged appointment this time, Sam? I am afraid I must agree that our boy is shirking his responsibility here.
"..thinking to go together to my aunt Kite’s that is dead; but before we had dined comes Sir R. Slingsby and his lady, and a great deal of company, to take my wife and I out by barge to shew them the King’s and Duke’s yachts..." Let the dead bury the dead. P is off with the living to have a jolly good time with his wife.
comes Sir R. Slingsby You can not refuse the Comptroller of the Navy invitation if you do not want to risk your job! Aunt is dead already and she will stay like that for eternity, so she will be honored another day...
Sam's being shown the king's and the duke's yachts should also help his future promotional opportunities.There are times when he has to see after himself by putting his self interests before a deceased aunt,who was herself left financially secure in life through marriage to a successful butcher.
The letter I assume is to his Father in Brampton, I think he has to have them in by midnight, and it will cost him 2d, unless of course they go by express, would Sam have used a local shop to dispatch them?, I just wondered what time the local shops would have shut?
For a description and discussion of the Postal Service in London and parts beyond in the C 17th. see:- http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~awoodley/Letter2.html
John Evelyn's diary today: "I presented my "Fumifugium" dedicated to his Majestie who was pleased I should publish it by his special Command; being much pleasd with it:"
Thanks, Michael - fascinating site!
'Fumifugum': John Evelyn's book about the problem of air pollution in London, with suggested causes and remedies. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fumifugium
"we had great pleasure, seeing all four yachts, viz., these two and the two Dutch ones." L&M: The Catherine was the King's yacht; the Anne the Duke's. The Dutch yachts (given to the King by the Dutch) were the Mary and the Bezan.
John Evelyn’s fascinating little book "Fumifugium" was published in 1661, and describes the effect of the growing use of sea coal on London’s micro-climate. Evelyn refers to ‘that Hellish and dismall Cloud of Sea Coal’ which caused Londoners ‘to breathe nothing but an impure and thick mist accompanied with a fulginous and filthy vapor’ and which caused the inhabitants to suffer from, ‘Catharrs, Phthisicks, Coughs and Consumptions’. He blamed all the ‘Brewers, Diers, Lime Burners, Salt and Sope Boylers’ who belched forth a ‘cloud of sulphure’ from their ‘sooty jaws’. Evelyn was a founding father of the environmental movement. His suggested solution was to move all the polluting industries to an area east of Greenwich -- downwind from the main centers of habitation. He was also keen on the idea of planting a ring of sweet-smelling trees and shrubs right around the periphery of London, a sort of early green belt. Fumifugium was dedicated to Charles II, who received Evelyn’s ideas with enthusiasm, but did nothing about them. https://londonhistorians.wordpress.com/2018/03/04/london-weather-in-the-late-seventeenth-century/