Morning at the Office. Busy as usual in my avocations and had very little time to pursue my examination of the maxims of the wise men which I resumed after a lapse of some time. In truth during the intensely cold weather we have had, it is a severe thing to sit down and write at all. I have a good deal of that to do always in addition to which this comes hard. I find also that a good deal of my time is wasted in the reading of Newspapers. My morning evaporates in spite of myself.

After dinner I finished the first Oration against Verres, and began the second, all the early part of which is only a repetition of what he has already said. But he then enters into the heart of the subject. It is a pity that you are obliged to imagine this to have been delivered as the Delinquent fled the Contest, and made the whole series unnecessary.

In the Evening I attended the annual Meeting of the Proprietors of Boylston Market to see an Account of their expenditure and receipt. Upon the election of Directors, I was very much surprised to find myself put upon the list. It was not my wish to undertake this which is very certainly a more troublesome situation than that in the Middlesex Canal, but I did not feel at liberty to decline it. Upon the election of Clerk, I was again put in nomination and chosen, which I disliked exceedingly. Though of the two, I should have preferred having that alone to the other. Returned home at nine o’clock and read the Latin Grammar and the Tatler.