Friday 23 September 1664

My cold and pain in my head increasing, and the palate of my mouth falling, I was in great pain all night. My wife also was not well, so that a mayd was fain to sit up by her all night.

Lay long in the morning, at last up, and amongst others comes Mr. Fuller, that was the wit of Cambridge, and Praevaricator1 in my time, and staid all the morning with me discoursing, and his business to get a man discharged, which I did do for him.

Dined with little heart at noon, in the afternoon against my will to the office, where Sir G. Carteret and we met about an order of the Council for the hiring him a house, giving him 1000l. fine, and 70l. per annum for it. Here Sir J. Minnes took occasion, in the most childish and most unbeseeming manner, to reproach us all, but most himself, that he was not valued as Comptroller among us, nor did anything but only set his hand to paper, which is but too true; and every body had a palace, and he no house to lie in, and wished he had but as much to build him a house with, as we have laid out in carved worke. It was to no end to oppose, but all bore it, and after laughed at him for it.

So home, and late reading “The Siege of Rhodes” to my wife, and then to bed, my head being in great pain and my palate still down.

27 Annotations

First Reading

Australian Susan  •  Link

"...the palate of my mouth falling..."
Anyone any idea what this means? Your hard palate cannot fall, but does he mean the soft palate was swollen?

Terry F  •  Link

"his business to get a man discharged"

i.e., a waterman discharged from impressment (L&M explain).

Cum grano salis  •  Link

uvule
1589 J. BANISTER Antidotary (1633) 87 A Gargarisme for them that be roofe-fallen, commonly called the Vvule.
uvula
c1645 HOWELL Lett. II. i. (1650) 1 The same defluxion..fell..into my throat in Oxford, and distilling upon the uvula impeached my utterance a little.

1. Anat. The conical fleshy prolongation hanging from the middle of the pendent margin of the soft palate in man and some other primates.
c1400 Lanfranc's Cirurg. 261 Aboue {th}is instrument is vuula {th}at is {th}e palet of {th}e mou{th} & helpi{th} for to make soun. Ibid., Sumtyme vuula wexi{th} to long.

cape henry  •  Link

Really rather a sad scene for a man (Minnes)to express himself so bitterly to his colleagues over what are essentially his own failings.

Ozstu  •  Link

"...the palate of my mouth falling..."Anyone any idea what this means?
I just assumed that he had no appetite, hence "Dined with little heart.."

Mary  •  Link

Pepys' palate.

I know just what he means: that very uncomfortable symptom of the early stages of a cold where the soft palate and the area behind it becomes very sore and swollen. The act of swallowing both solids and liquids is painful as the back of the tongue rises against the soft palate.

Robert Gertz  •  Link

Nice side of Sam the dutiful husband ignoring his discomfort to sit up with an ill Bess and the next day, still ill, reading that action-packed blockbuster "Siege of Rhodes" to entertain her. Always fascinating that a spouse like Sam can at once be so affectionate and caring yet can't resist risking the blowing the whole relationship over meaningless dalliances with somebody like Betty Martin, nee Lane. But I suppose for him the rush and thrill of the risk has become a big part of the pleasure.

Robert Gertz  •  Link

"Pirrhus: 'Fall on! The English stoop when they give fire! They seem to furl their colors and...retire!'

Sultan Suleyman: "Advance! I onely would the honor to conquer two, whom I by force would save.' Exeunt."

"Whoa...You're not stopping there?"

"Bess...It's late"

"Sorry. Just so exciting, you did the cannons and soldiers so well. Suleyman must have been quite a man..."

Hmmn... "Bess, he's the Turk."

"I mean to get Roxanna and all...He had to have something. Maybe he took evenings off from conquest to sit up with her when she wasn't feeling well."

"You feeling any better?"

"Little...You?"

"Head's throbbing and my palate's still down. Feels like I have a stone in there."

"Then it's bed for you, sir. Uh...Sam'l?"

"It's fine...I wasn't counting on it, sweet."

"Thanks. I'm so sorry."

"God's will be done, girl."

"Thank ye, Sam'l. Sam?"

"Hmmn?"

"What about Balty? Have you heard anything?"

"Oh, him. I think there was a note or something from Turkey, demanding ransom, threatening hideous torture. I wrote back, 'No, please don't do it...I'll send everything I have. Please. Don't send him back.'"

"Sam'l!"

"Dear, I seriously doubt he ever got further than Dover."

Stuart  •  Link

Aye, Mary has it, that part back-top of the mouth which swells uncomfortably beginning a nasty cold.

Todd Bernhardt  •  Link

"little heart"!

What a beautiful and unexpected glimpse into their lives ... I believe (though I may be wrong) that this is the first term of endearment that we see between Sam and Elizabeth.

And, in the midst of fighting a bad sinus infection myself, I think Mary's definition of a falling palate is right on.

Todd Bernhardt  •  Link

What does "fine" mean as it's used above? Thanks.

Judith  •  Link

'it's fine'

Something of a matter of coition?

Mary  •  Link

£1000 fine and £70 per annum

"fine' in this case is a legal term. It is a sum of money paid by a tenant at the beginning of his tenancy in order that his rent may be small or minimal. Carteret has been voted a housing allowance of £1000 down and rent of £70 p.a. Not bad.

language hat  •  Link

"little heart"

Todd, I hate to burst your picture of domestic bliss, but I'm afraid "dined with little heart" simply means "without much pleasure."

language hat  •  Link

pr(a)evaricator

OED: 3. Cambridge Univ. An orator who makes a humorous or satirical speech at the degree ceremony; = VARIER n. 1. Now hist.
1615 J. CHAMBERLAIN Let. 15 Mar. I. ccxxv. 587 The bishop of Ely sent the moderator, the auswerer, the varier or prævaricator, and one of the repliers, that were all of his house twenty angells a-peece. 1636 Doc. Sept. in C. H. Cooper Annals Cambridge III. 280 St. Mary's Church [Cambridge] at every Great Commencement is made a theatre and the prævaricator's stage, wherein he acts and sets forth his profane and scurrilous jests. 1706 Phillips's New World of Words (ed. 6), Prevaricator.., also a Master of Arts in the University of Cambridge, chosen.. to make an ingenious Satyrical Speech reflecting on the Misdemeanours of the principal Members. 1851 Coll. Life t. Jas. I 84 The Praevaricator's gibes were launched forth at all present. [...]

Clement  •  Link

Problem with Fuller reference.

The current link to Thomas Fuller (1608-1661) cannot be correct. Besides the small fact that he's been dead for three years by this point, and he wouldn't have been at Cambridge during the years Sam was there.

Any ideas who this should really be?

Robert Gertz  •  Link

Too bad about "little heart" it would be sweet. Maybe a "my" as in "my little heart" will turn up in the transcript one day. However Sam does use "poor wretch" as a term of endearment. In the audio version of the Diary, Kenneth Brannaugh uses the same inflections he used for the scene in the filmed "Henry V" where the three traitors get theirs ("Get you...Poor miserable wretches...To your deaths.") but I think Sam's would have been a little more affectionate.

Using the excuse, I wonder why "Henry V" hasn't showed up among Sam's viewing...Or has it? I'd think it would be just the sort of patroitic blockbuster play Charlie and Jamie would want running now to stir up a little fire. Perhaps it hadn't been rediscovered? (Though I would think some older theater folks would remember it well) or maybe it was considered old-fashioned? Or maybe they found it just a bit too subversive with Will dropping all those hints that the career of Harry, Star of England, wasn't to be examined too carefully lest uncomfortable questions be asked? I always thought the actual end of the scene I mentioned with the three traitors groveling over each other to thank God they've been caught and will justly die for threatening this god-blessed grace of kings was so over the top ('Ode to Stalin' groveling level) that Will must have been pulling our legs.

Terry F  •  Link

Methinks this Thomas Fuller is another, who is now Rector of Navenby, Lincs. (L&M provide him no death date in their Index). (Clement, keen read of Roger Miller's annote, which seems to be attached to the other of the name.)

Pedro  •  Link

And in the Med...

De Ruyter again met Lawson near Malaga. He inquired of Lawson's health, whereupon both Admirals had pledged each other from their decks with a glass of wine, and had exchanged salvos.

(Life of Admiral De Ruyter by Blok)

Clement  •  Link

Disambiguation of the Thomas Fullers.

Thank you for the lead, Terry F.

This Thomas Fuller is footnoted for this day's entry in "The Diary of Samuel Pepys: 1664" (University of California Press, 1995, Robert Latham, William Matthews)
"Thomas Fuller, Fellow of Christ's, 1649-61, was now Rector of Navenby, Lincs. As praevaricator he was a licensed jester at the disputation in philosophy, making learned but nonsensical play with the question under dispute. A sample of his wit (verses on {"An anima hominsis sit tabula rasa") is in W. T. Costello, "Scholastic curriculum at early 17th-cent." Cambridge, pp. 27-9. He was now interceding to protect a waterman from the press-gang..."

pepf  •  Link

"I wonder why “Henry V” hasn’t showed up among Sam’s viewing…Or has it?"

It has indeed, RG, but not the Bard's.
[(... to the new play, at the Duke’s house, of “Henry the Fifth;” a most noble play, writ by my Lord Orrery ) http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1… ]

Theatrical Shakespare was restored to England along with the Monarchy, as plays from the pre-Civil War theatre were adapted to the new theatrical and social climate. Henry V was not, however, one of the earliest rehabilitations. When Samuel Pepys records attending two performances of Henry V in 1664
and again in 1668 with Thomas Betterton in the central role, it seems likely that this was not Shakespeare's play, but the rhymed verse drama by Robert Boyle, Earl of Orrery. Boyle's play seems only to confirm the contemporary insignificance of Shakespeare's, in that it shows no discernable trace of the earlier dramatic account of Henry's reign.

(William Shakespeare, King Henry V, ed. Emma Smith, p.10)

Second Reading

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"an order of the Council for the hiring him [ Sir G. Carteret ] a house, giving him 1000l. fine, and 70l. per annum for it."

The house (for the use of the Navy) was in Broad St and replaced the old building in Leadenhall St. (L&N footnote) We're not talking about a palace, Mennes!

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"It was to no end to oppose, but all bore it, and after laughed at him [ Sir J. Mennes ]for it. "

In 1661 Mennes had succeeded John Davis (an office clerk) in one of the official houses of the Navy Office building: http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1… His complaint was perhaps that it did not belong ex officio to the Controller and was not grand enough. (L&N footnote)

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

"... Sir G. Carteret and we met about an order of the Council for the hiring him a house, giving him 1000l. fine, and 70l. per annum for it. Here Sir J. Minnes took occasion, in the most childish and most unbeseeming manner, to reproach us all, but most himself, that he was not valued as Comptroller among us, nor did anything but only set his hand to paper, which is but too true; and every body had a palace, and he no house to lie in, and wished he had but as much to build him a house with, as we have laid out in carved worke. It was to no end to oppose, but all bore it, and after laughed at him for it."

I read this as Carteret wanting a house. Then Mennes takes to grumbling that no one gives him anything to do except sign off on their work, and he doesn't like his house either. Which makes no sense because:

From Claire Tomalin's "Samuel Pepys: The Unequalled Self" pp 49-50 http://www.pepysdiary.com/encyclo… "Sir George Carteret, an impeccable royalist whose service at sea had begun under King Charles and who had held Jersey for him, was appointed Treasurer. He had official lodgings at Whitehall, a house in Pall Mall, another at Deptford and a country mansion near Windsor, and he was the highest paid, with L2,000 a year and the right to three pence in every pound he handled -- this was a remnant of the old way of doing things."

So it must be Carteret proposing that Mennes gets a better house, even if that's not what Pepys says.

StanB  •  Link

Interesting character Sir William Davenant who once cited himself as Shakespeare's son and there are grounds for it , "Know this, which does honor to my mother,--I am the son of Shakespeare;" thus allying himself to Shakespeare
More here http://www.theatrehistory.com/bri…

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