SOURCE: “A Look at Pepys,” in American Book Collector, Vol. 7, No. 10, October 1986, pp. 17-24.

[In the following essay, Rostenberg studies Pepys's large collection of books, musical texts, and manuscripts as a reflection of both his own interests and those of his contemporaries.]

On the evidence of his detailed, chatty, and often delightful diary (kept from March 1659/60 to 1669), Samuel Pepys was a man of many parts: an able public servant, a music lover endowed with personal talent, and a participant in the scientific experimentation of the age. He was the friend of many, the admirer of numerous ladies with whom he relished a kiss and a warm embrace, the stalker of literary bargains, and the extremely proud owner of an enviable collection of books and manuscripts.

It is evident that the sober John Evelyn exercised considerable influence upon the extroverted Pepys. The respect of the younger man for the master of Sayes Court is generous and glowing. He alludes to “a most excellent discourse with Mr. Eveling [sic] touching all manner of learning wherein I find him a very fine gentleman.” Having invited Evelyn to dinner, Pepys declared that “he was most desirous of keeping [his] friendship … a most excellent humoured man I still find him and mighty knowing.”¹

As dedicated collectors, both men were familiar with the Restoration book world. Although Evelyn, in his diary, remains personally aloof from the book trade, Pepys in his journal indicates the names of bookseller, print dealer, binder, gilder, and joiner. These detailed volumes remain an indispensable backdrop for the mid-seventeenth century London book scene whose precincts extended from St. Paul's to the neatly laid paths of Moorfields, from the New Exchange to the grubby stalls of Duck Lane. Riding abroad in his coach (his wife at his side) or alone on foot, Pepys paused to examine a new publication, survey a print, to give instructions for binding of his growing collection which today remains (at Magdalene College, Cambridge) in its original presses (bookcases) so carefully assembled over three centuries past in his study in Crutched Friars.

Like the majority of collectors, Pepys specialized in those books reflecting his professionalism and predilection. His holdings included a variety of works relating to maritime history and related subjects. His love of music and his playing of the viol and flageolet stimulated his acquisition of books on musical theory, collections of songs and catches, and technical treatises. Although Pepys lacked the deep appreciation of art cultivated by Evelyn, he displayed much interest in paintings and engravings.

Excluding his manuscript holdings, the Catalogue of the Pepys Library at Magdalene College, Cambridge lists at least sixty texts on various aspects of naval literature: Orders in Admiralty, instructions concerning the provisions and maintenance of ships, history of maritime exploration and travel, sea charts, construction and appointment of vessels, treatises on longitude and latitude, narratives of English victories at sea, a copy of Le Neptune François with twenty-nine engraved maps, the notable Mare Clausum of John Selden, and so forth.²

As a topflight naval man, Pepys was attracted to the assorted specialties sold at the Atlas, the shop of the noted typographer Joseph Moxon. Here, in September, 1663 he acquired “a payre of globes” for £3, 10s “with which I am very well pleased.” His library included several books by Master Moxon: A tutor to astronomy & geography; A brief discourse of a passage of the North-Pole to Japan, China; Moxon's celebrated Mechanick Exercises, the most significant English study on printing craft and technique; and a copy of the dealer's Catalogue of globes … maps, instruments and books.³

Pepys did not confine his maritime purchases to the Atlas. At a Dutch shop in St. Catherine's Street he selected maps, finding elsewhere “two or three draughts of the port of Brest.” A map of Paris adorned his “green room,” while during a visit to the Change he ordered some maps which were to hang in “my new Roome which will be very pretty.” Not long after its completion Pepys acquired a copy of the handsome map of Tangiers executed by Moller which the diarist considered “very pleasant.” In addition he owned a copy of Moller's Quartermaster Map, actually a folding map of England and Wales.⁴

The Pepys diary indicates the writer's enormous pleasure in music. He lavished much attention on the purchase and adornment of his new viol. “To Wapping to my carvers about my Viall and thence to my Viall makers in Bishopsgate Street, his name is Wise who is a pretty fellow at it.” Having paid the carver of his instrument 10s, Pepys stated that “he tells me that I may, without flattery say, I have as good a Theerbo viall and viallin as in England.”⁵

On occasion Pepys refers to music practice “betimes before my people rise” and playing his flageolet at the Green Dragon on Lambeth Hill. For practice there is indication that he consulted a copy of Musics Recreation on the Lyra Viol, containing 100 Ayres, Corants and Sarabends for the Lone Lyra Viol and Instructions for Beginners. His copy was bound with “blank paper for the lessons.”⁶

The majority of the musical texts owned by Pepys had been published by the London firm of Playford, which issued such popular works as Breefe Introduction to the skill of musicke; the Cantica Sacra of Richard Deering; and the popular collection of songs issued under a variety of titles, Catch that can by John Hilton, a work which Pepys declared had “a great many new fooleries in it.” More serious texts in music theory included Descartes's “little treatise in musique,” the Treatise of natural grounds & principles of harmony by William Holder and Matthew Locke, and Observations upon … an Essay on the Advancement of Music.

During a visit to Duck Lane, the resort of booksellers “down on their luck,” the Clerk of the Acts found several significant foreign texts in music theory. On 22 February 1667/68 Pepys “there did by Kircher's Musurgia, cost me 35s, a book I am might glad of expecting to find great satisfaction in it.” There he also located a copy of Descartes's “Little treatise in musique,” hoping also to detect a copy of “Marsanne a French man that has wrote well of musique but this is not to be had, but I have given order for its being sent over.” Although the average Duck Lane dealer conducted a limited business, Pepys's music dealer was obviously a man of enterprise. In late May, 1668 the diarist happily noted that “my bookseller brings me home Marcennus's book of musicke which cost me £3.3s but it is a very fine boke.” Happy with his copy of Harmonie Universalle of Marin Mersenne, he expressed his approval of Thomas Morley, A plaine & easie Introduction to practical musicke, which he read in his chamber “with a good fire,” finding it “very good but an unmethodical book.”⁷

Perhaps inspired by Evelyn's familiarity with the visual arts, Pepys became acquainted with several well-established London artists and dealers. His journal refers to visits to “Hiseman” [Huysmans], “a picture drawer who is said to exceed Lilly [Lely].” In September of that year the Dutchman Huysmans executed a portrait of Mrs. Pepys. The diarist enjoyed a fairly close relationship with the engraver and print dealer, Evelyn's friend, William Faithorne the Elder, at the sign of the Drake outside Temple Bar. Here Pepys, fascinated by Faithorne's studies in chiaroscuro, purchased a variety of prints, some to be used as models for his wife's artistic dilletantism. He considered the engraver's portrait of Lady Castlemaine, executed in red chalk as “the finest thing I ever saw in my life.” He became so enamored of the plate that he purchased three copies. His print enthusiasms extended to Paris, where he commissioned his friend William Batelier to purchase prints of Louis XIV and Colbert by Nantueil, describing them as “most excellent to my great content.”⁸

Pepys cannot be described as a compulsive collector. His book-buying reflects some hesitation and ambivalence. He does not appear to have suffered from actual financial pressure, but rather from doubt regarding the significance and necessity of a specific item. During a rendezvous of 27 March 1665 “at the Foreign Booksellers in St. Paul's Churchyard” he spent considerable time in assessing an assortment of Spanish books and “with much ado kept from laying out money there.” His indecision is further discerned during a visit to his bookseller Joshua Kirton where he had deliberated for “two to three hours” regarding a considerable purchase. He put aside twenty books “to lay his money out upon,” but found himself “at a great losse where to choose. I could not tell whether to lay out money for books of pleasure, as plays, which my nature was most earnest in; but at least after seeing Chaucer, Dugdale's History of Paul's, Stow's London … besides Shakespeare, Jenson and Beaumont's plays, I at last chose Dr. Fuller's Worthys, the Cabbala or Collections of Letters of State; and … Hudibras, both parts, the book now in greatest fashion for drollery, though I cannot, I confess, see enough where the wit lies.” At a later date he resolved to spend no more than £10 on books and “shall do no more for a great while, I hope.”⁹

Despite his occasional hesitation and financial restraint, Pepys regarded his great collection with affection, lavishing upon it much care and devotion. Like Evelyn, Pepys recognized the significance of bibliographical tools for its arrangement and development. His reaction to Evelyn's gift of his translation of Naudé, Instructions for Erecting a Library, is rather amazing: “the book is above my reach.” This reaction did not prevent his purchase of identical bibliographical texts owned by Evelyn, the works of Bale and Hyde. In addition, Pepys owned the bibliographies of Draud, Beughem, Cave, and Dupin as well as specialized treatises such as A Catalogue of the Philosophical books and tracts written by the Hon. Robert Boyle and Thomas Bassett's A Catalogue of the Common and Statute Law Books of the Realm (1682). His collection boasted the library catalogues of Sir John Elyot and Edward Bernard, the astronomer. In order to acquaint himself with current publications he purchased a copy of A Catalogue of Books Printed in England since … the fire of London 1666 to the end of the Michelmas 1695, compiled by the bookseller Robert Clavell.

After the ravages of the Fire of London, Pepys undertook the reorganization of his library. Having experienced much difficulty in recovering a bale of books dispatched for safekeeping, he realized the necessity of compiling an alphabetical record of his ever-increasing holdings. On several occasions his diary cites his endeavors at cataloguing. On Christmas Day, 1666 he wrote that “back home and there with my brother reducing the names of all my books to an alphabet what kept us til 7 or 8 at night.” With the help of his wife and the housemaid, Pepys “titled books for the present year … setting them in order which is now done to my good satisfaction.”¹⁰

Like Evelyn, Pepys relished well-bound books. As early as May, 1660, during his visit to The Hague with Lord Sandwich, Pepys declared that he had purchased three books “for the love of the binding.” Pepys either suffered from a maniacal neatness or the conviction that a collection was displayed to better advantage if all the volumes were perfectly aligned. Hence he had pedestals made for his smaller books to enable them to stand shoulder to shoulder with a folio or quarto.

The Pepys diary offers insight into Restoration bibliopogy. It is evident that several book-dealers provided customers with binding services, either sending books to binderies or maintaining a bindery at their establishment. Pepys directed the stationer John Cade to attend to the binding of “Holland's book.” His bookseller Kirton was instructed that a bundle of books left with him for binding was to be bound “to suit [those] in my study.” As fussy about the details and elegance of his bindings as about the exact positioning of his books, Pepys took the bound copy of his 1602 Chaucer to “the claspmaker to have it clasped and bossed.” The majority of the collector's books were bound in brown calf, gilt spines with raised bands, the panels of the spine outlined in a triple gilt filet. Pepys alluded to the common binding in contrast to “the other which is more gaudy.” The collector's many references to the necessity of uniformity in binding are somewhat depressing. Is it possible that the future Secretary of the Admiralty would have thus dismissed a Grolier or Maioli octavo? But then each would have occupied its own pedestal.¹¹

In August, 1666 Pepys “treat[ed] with a bookbinder to come and gilt the backs of [his] books to make them handsome, to stand in my new presses when they come.” The binder was the highly esteemed Edmond Richardson who for many years had been Dunton's neighbor in Scalding Alley and had bound for him many of his “Calves Leather Books.” According to Dunton, Richardson was an excellent binder, “very just and punctual in his dealings. A man of great virtue Mr. Richardson spoke as neat as he could to his capacities, and not to the humours of men … one in whom nature seemed entirely sanctified.” Responding to Pepys's request, Richardson gilded the backs of his books achieving the golden uniformity so desired by the collector.

Pepys's holdings were housed in new presses set up in the collector's study at Crutched Friars. Preserved today in Magdalene College Library, they remain handsome evidence of the excitement and pleasure they brought Samuel Pepys during the summer of 1666. Pepys had consulted with the master joiner Thomas Sympson who worked at the Deptford and Woolwich Docks about the construction of new book presses. During a visit to the Pepys residence in July, 1666, “together with great pains [they] contrived presses to put my books in.” In August the completed presses were delivered to Pepys who assisted with assembling them: “I kept him [Sympson] with me all day and he dined with me and hanging things that is maps and picture[s] and Draughts—and setting up my books and as much as we could do—to my most extraordinary satisfaction so that I think it will be as noble a closet as any man hath.”¹²

The superb collection of Samuel Pepys housed in the presses “contrived” by Sympson was enriched by a group of twenty-seven incunabula, with seven Caxtons (including The Game of Chesse by Jacobus de Cessolis, ca. 1478 and Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, ca. 1484, Christine de Pisan's The book of the feat of arms and chivalry, 1489, and Reynard the Fox). Other incunables standing erect on the shelves at Crutched Friars were two editions of Dame Juliana Berners's The Book of Hawking, hunting & fishing (the St. Albans's 1486 edition and the Wynkyn de Worde edition of 1496). In fact, the collection had a total of nine de Worde imprints, among them Higden's Polychromicom (1494), Bartolomaeus Anglicus's De proprietatibus rerum (1495), and Donatus's Accidence (1499), while seven editions of Pynson completed Pepys's incunabula holdings.¹³

In addition to the bibliophile's specialized material in maritime concerns and music, the library comprised significant works in belles-lettres, popular literature, classics, science, art, history, theology, and news-books: works by Milton, Donne, Cervantes, Erasmus, More, Boccaccio, the plays of Beaumont, Corneille, Marlowe, Killigrew, Moliere, and the fourth folio of Shakespeare. Pepys delighted in the acquisition of popular tales and chapbooks: The Merry tales of Gotam; A Merry dialogue between Andrew and his sweet heart Joan; Cupid's Court of Salutations, Love à la mode, and many others. William Fletcher believes that “among the most interesting Pepys collections is one of eighteen hundred ballads in five folio volumes; and another of four duodecimo volumes of garlands and other popular publications.”

The fine presses housed in addition to standard theological folios significant domestic and foreign scientific writings, including forty works by Boyle. These were supplemented by the investigations of Graunt, Wilkins, Willis, Charleton, Leeuwenhook, Gassendi, Swammerdam, and others. In the field of art Pepys owned works by Bosse, Evelyn's translations of the writings of Roland Freart Sieur de Chambray, the theoretical texts of Monier, Du Fresnoy, and others. The Secretary to the Admiralty displayed a strong historical bent, having acquired copies of narratives by Camden, Buchanan, Eadmor, Mennipennie, and well as numerous ephemera relating to current events: tracts on the Popish Plot, the Speeches, Debates, and Acts of Charles II and James II, the Observator in Dialogue by L’Estrange, etc.

Just as the word “perlogi” inscribed in a volume owned by Evelyn indicates that he had read it, so Pepys diary affords ample evidence that its author had familiarized himself with numerous texts. In his journal he assumes the role of literary critic. An inveterate theatregoer, Pepys applauds and castigates much of the London theatre fare. The Rump by John Tatham was considered “very silly,” while he regarded Chapman's Bussy d’Ambois “a good play.” Love à la mode by Thomas Southerland received the critic's dismissal: “a silly play writ by a Person of Honour (which is I find, as much to say a coxcomb).” Pepys appraised Ben Jonson's Cateline his Conspiracy “a very excellent piece,” exuding ecstacy about Every Man in his Humour, a play “with the greatest propriety of speech that I ever read in my life.” Webster's The Duchess of Malfy “seemed a good play,” while “the opener” [the prelude] of Massinger's The Bondman had “great appeal.” Pompey the Great, read en route to Deptford, was castigated as “a mean play [its] words and sense not very extraordinary.” Suckling's Aglauara fell into the same category, a “mean play nothing of design to it.”

Pepys admired the English translation of Francisco Quevedo's The Visions, saying it was “the best I ever saw—it being almost impossible to conceive that it should be a translation.” He trounced the recently published Life of William Cavendishe, Duke of Newcastle, by his wife Margaret. The book proved her “a mad conceited ridiculous woman, and he an arse to suffer her to write what she writes to him and of him.” In October, 1662 he completed his reading of Thomas Gentleman's The best way to make England the richest. “Whereas I expected great matters from it, I find it a very impertinent [book] and though some things are good, yet so full of tautologys that we are weary of it.” He deemed Truth Exalted by William Penn (the Quaker) “so full of nothing—a book of ridiculous nonsense that I am ashamed to read in it.”

On 13 January 1668 Pepys visited the shop of John Martyn, where he saw a French book which “I did think to have for my wife to translate, called L’Escholle de Filles.” The reaction of the amorous Pepys to this romance is slightly amusing: “when I came to look into it, it is the most bawdy, lewd book that ever I saw, rather worse than puttana errante [by Aretino], so that I was ashamed of reading in it.”

The volumes read and appraised by Samuel Pepys had been acquired for the most part from members of the London book trade. Their activity, their stock, their relationship with the collector are reanimated in the diary. Several of his holdings in naval literature were purchased from William Fisher at the Posterne Gate near the Tower and from members of the Hurlock family, specialists in books of the sea. With neither firm does Pepys appear to have enjoyed a personal relationship. In contrast, he maintained a lively association with John and Henry Playford, father and son, the outstanding music dealers of the day.¹⁴

The premises of John Playford, Sr. near Temple Church attracted all the musical virtuosi of London, Pepys among them. Here with his sons Henry the composer, and John, Jr. Playford sold some theology and Stuart encomia, but his specialty was old and new musical compositions. As early as 13 February 1659/60 Pepys gleefully wrote that he had purchased from Playford his “great book of songs which he sells for 14s.” At the Playford shop the collector “looked over a book or two” and there acquired a copy of Deering's Cantica Sacra. Here he read the publisher's Introduction to Musique, “wherein are some things very pretty.” Hoping to acquire a revised edition of John Hilton's Ketches, Pepys was informed by Playford's man that the Fire had “hindr’d publication.” A new edition was planned by the enterprising publisher with “many new things being add to it.” A copy of this new edition “with a great many new fooleries,” was purchased by Pepys in April, 1667.¹⁵

There can be little doubt that the year 1666 bore “the marks of the beast,” since in September the disastrous Fire hit the city, devastating its homes and shops, its great buildings and communications. Pepys's diary remains one of the prime sources for the origin and spread of the fire. On 2 September he climbed a parapet near the Tower from which “I did see the houses at the end of the bridge all on fire and an infinite great fire on this and the other side.” A few days later he noted that he saw “all the towne burned and a miserable sight of St. Paul's church with all the roofs fallen and the body of the quire fallen into St. Fayth's … which being filled with the magazines of books belonging to ye stationers, and carried thither for safety, the were all consumed, burning for a week following. I do believe there is above £150,000 books burned. All the great booksellers and all there where being burned. A great want thereof there will be of books, especially Latin and foreign books.”¹⁶

In early October Pepys was informed by a kinsman of Kirton that the bookseller was “utterly undone, and made £2 or £3000 worse than nothing, from being worth £7 or £8000.” On 11 November 1667 Pepys briefly wrote that “this day I hear of Kirton my bookseller, poor man is dead; I believe, of grief for losses by the fire.”¹⁷

Pepys was a frequent patron of John Cade of Cornhill, a stationer, picture dealer, and occasional bookseller. He appears to have had a fairly large stock of prints, maps, and painting since the collector writes of inspecting his warehouse where he looked “for a map or two … there finding a great Plenty of good pictures.” After some consideration he purchased a small painting for his wife's “closett” and later, after some negotiation, he invested approximately £12 in paintings.

As a publisher and bookseller, Cade furnished Pepys with copies of the drawing book of Richard Gething, offered him a copy of Ogilby's Bible in quires which the collector believed “to be so big” that he decided not “to use it.” Forfeiting the Bible, Pepys purchased from Cade a silver drudger, or spice box, and several prints. Cade also acted as one of Pepys's binding agents. The collector may have rejected some of the offers made by the master of the Globe, but he readily heeded his gossip that the Queen Mother had “near finished a peace with France which as a Presbyterian he [Cade] do not like but seems to fear it will be a means to introduce Popery.”¹⁸

Pepys entertained genuine affection for the family of the news vendor Mrs. Michell, established at Westminster Hall. Although this lady specialized in the sale of news books (or current events), she attempted for a short period some publishing, issuing in 1653 with Henry Hills A brief narration of the tryall of Captain Clement Nedham and, at the close of the century and in association with several publishers, the writings of a Frenchman, Marsin.

Pepys alludes to his visits to Westminster Hall where he idled over a popular narrative, settled accounts, and discussed timely topics. During the height of the Plague, in July, 1665, he brought Mr. and Mrs. Michell a bottle of wine prior to their departure from the city. An entry from 1 December 1666 mentions his reading of a pamphlet at her stall, one “lately printed but suppressed and much called after The Catholiques Apology.” The tract had been attributed to Roger Palmer, Earl of Castlemaine; its author berates Parliament for its severity towards Papists. The following January Pepys brought home from Mrs. Michell “the proceedings of the Parliament in the 3rd and 4th year of the late king, a very good book for speeches and arguments of the law.”¹⁹

Amazingly, the Pepys diary does not mention the collector's association with one of the foremost London publishers and booksellers, Robert Scott of the Princes Arms. Scott was hailed by his contemporaries as “the greatest librarian in Europe, an expert bookseller … the only person of his time for his extraordinary knowledge in books.” Despite the omission of Scott's name from the diary, there is ample evidence that Pepys purchased books from him. Indeed, it was Scott who wrote to Pepys: “without flattery I love to find a rare book for yu.” In June, 1688 he reported to Pepys the purchase of the “History of Ireland by Campion (wch I think yu formerly desired) I here sent it yu with a very scarce book viz. Pricaei defensio His. Britt. 4to. and an old Harding's Chronicle, also ye ship of fooles in old verse by Alex. Berkley priest, wch last, though not scarce, yett so very fayre and perfect yt seldome comes such another, ye Pricaeus yu will find deare, yett I never sold it under 10s. I hope shortly to procure for yu a perfect Hall's Chronicle.”²⁰

Notes

1. Pepys diary VI, 94f., 243; II, 49.

2. Pepys catalogue: sampling of collector's maritime tastes: James, Duke of York, Instructions for better ordering his Majesties fleet in savling, no. 2081; Instructions to be observed by all masters, pilots, ketches, … attending the fleet, no. 1677; William Barlow, The navigators supply, no. 1267; Henry Bond, The art of apparelling & fitting of any ship, no. 1399; B. A., Gloria Britannica: or the boast of the British Sea, no. 91; Borough, The Soveraignty of the British Sea, no. 71; Dassie, L’Architecture Navale, no. 1842; Brouscon, Tide-tables, no. 1; Bond, The Longitude found, no. 399; Rawlins, An account of the great Victory … at sea against the French, no. 1431; A large discourse wherein is set foorth in what manner all the sixt great gallies sent out of Spayne … are destroyed, no. 1431; Le Neptune François, no. 2999.

3. Pepys diary IV, 302.

4. Pepys diary IV, 320, 350; V, 98; VIII, 111; IX, 437.

5. Pepys diary IV, 232.

6. Pepys diary IV, 296.

7. Pepys diary IX, 85, 148; 216; IX, 427.

8. Pepys diary Huysmans: V, 276; VI, 231; Faithorne: III, 2, 173; VII, 359, 393; Nanteuil: IX, 427.

9. Pepys diary IV, 87, 410.

10. Pepys diary VII, 421; IX, 72.

11. Pepys diary II, 243, 303, 307.

12. Pepys diary VII, 214, 242, 252.

13. J. C. T. Oates, “Catalogue of Incunabula,” in Catalogue of the Pepys Library 195, 198.

14. Plomer, Dictionary of Booksellers … 1641 to 1667, 75, 104.

15. Plomer, 148; Pepys Diary Wheatley I, 53; Pepys diary II, 106; VIII, 124; for Playford see Wing P2456.

16. Pepys diary VII, 268, 277.

17. Pepys diary VII, 309; VIII, 526.

18. Plomer, 41; Pepys diary IV, 1434; VIII, 337; VII, 134, 420.

19. Plomer, 130; Narration, Wing N74; Marsin, Wing M812A, 813, M813A, 813E; Pepys diary VI, 162; VII, 393; Castlemaine, Wing G1240.

20. Plomer, 162; for Scott see Rostenberg, Literary, Political … Publishing … in England 1551-1700, II, 290f. Original ms. Rawlinson A179, Bodleian Library.