Clear morning, but the wind so very high as to be unpleasant. I went to the Office and was occupied in taking off the Quarterly Account. This with a stroll which I took with Mr. Peabody to look at the improvements going on at the North end of the town consumed much of my time, and I did not omit my regular walk. Dinner as usual. Afternoon, Mr. Joli whose work does not interest me at all. Is it not time lost to work upon it. Evening, Les Parvenus, and Schiller’s Thirty years War.

My time is pretty regularly filled up, but not very beneficially, and 59as I grow older, I begin to feel a greater doubt of my power of ever being able to apply my capacity to any serviceable end. Yet it is not quite fitting that I should despair. I am almost too young. Perhaps with the same powers, I cease to feel the same degree of confidence that I did. A young man can very often do more with assurance than an old one with substantial talent.