Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 281, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 November 1915 — PEPYS COULD NOT SEE IT [ARTICLE]

PEPYS COULD NOT SEE IT

Famous Diarist by No Means in Accord With University’s Expressed Opinion About Book. Sir William Cavendish, known in English history as the first duke of Newcastle, was commander of King Charles the First’s royal army tn his contest with Cromwell. Sir William’s second wife, the Duchess Margaret, wrote a life of her husband, in which she depicted him as a “Most Illustrious Prince” and in every respect the pink of perfection. The work was supposed to be entirely authentic and truthful, for Sir William himself assisted in its preparation. It was published early in 1667, and many complimentary copies were sent out, including one to the officials of St John's college, Cambridge university. In acknowledging its receipt they wrote: “Your excellency’s book will not only survive our university, but hold date even with time itself; and incontinently this age, by reading your book, will lose its barbarity and rudeness, being made tame by the elegance of your style and manner.” But old Samuel Pepys was not quite so favorably impressed. In his celebrated "Diary,” under date of March 18, 1667, he made this entry: “Staid at home reading the ridiculous history of my Lord Newcastle, wrote by his wife; which shows her to be a mad, conceited, ridiculous woman, and he an ass to suffer her to write what she writes to him and of him.”