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Samuel Pepys Signature
Published April 2006
280pp, 23.4x15.6cm
1 84383 197 X
£25.00/US$47.95
Hardback |
These are selected from letters not previously published.
The book contains the full texts.
1. CONGRATULATIONS ON PEPYS’S APPOINTMENT AS CLERK OF THE ACTS – THE JOB
HE HELD THROUGHOUT MOST OF THE DIARY PERIOD
18. CAPTAIN ROBERT CLAY TO SAMUEL PEPYS
Sapphire in Plymouth Sound
20 August 1660
I have not had opportunity since I was at Lisbon to tender you with my
service. At this time (encouraged by your freedom then) have presumed to
do it; and to congratulate your entrance into the business you have
better been to, in the office.
Give me leave to acquaint you (who I may have some occasion to trouble;
yet should be as glad to serve) that one frigate is very foul, beyond
others of this squadron, which I am much ashamed of, and there is no
supply to be had for nought.
2. PEPYS COMMENTS ON HIS INTOLERANCE OF DRUNKEN BEHAVIOUR BY NAVAL
OFFICERS
165. SAMUEL PEPYS TO CAPTAIN JOHN TYRRELL
1 November 1684
SIR
… I remember you did also instance to me something touching the idle and
drunken behaviour of Lieutenant Davey but have given me nothing in
writing about it, so as I have not ground enough to make the complaint
which I otherwise should in duty do concerning him to the King, who I’m
sure will encourage no such libertines in his service, and least of all
be at the charge of bearing such a man extra that has not virtue enough
to entitle him to be borne in his ordinary service. Nor does it stand
with your duty to pass by with silence, his Majesty being so injured,
especially where at the beginning of the voyage you have reason to
foresee that you shall not be able to give him that certificate of his
good behaviour which you know he must come to you for, at the end of it
… For as long as I have the honour of serving the King, I’ll never (by
the grace of God) hear of any debauchery stirring in the Navy (let who
will be guilty of it) without doing my part towards its correction.
3. TO SAMUEL NEWTON of Christ’s Hospital concerning a complaint by Mr
Newton that boys were being taken from the school to go to sea before
they were ready.
228. SAMUEL PEPYS TO SAMUEL NEWTON
8 August 1695
MR NEWTON
All then which I think to be now needful to return to you upon your
present complaint, is, the giving you my opinion, what may be fit in
your place to do upon it, with respect to Sir Matthew Andrews; who not
only is your superior, and so not decently to be contended with by you,
but the person whom you find in a special manner depended upon by the
House in the business of disposing of the children, and moreover has the
honour of being Master at this time of the Trinity House, where the King
by his Letters Patents has placed the last judgment of the children’s
proficiencies and fitness to be sent abroad; and so there seems no room
left in either respect for you doubting their being informed in the
design or moment of the foundation. Besides, as it now happens, the
Treasurer your immediate superior, is out of the way, nor any court or
committee within your reach to appeal to, in case you found yourself so
to do. |
