Diary of Charles Francis Adams, volume 5
1833-12-06
Morning a little cloudy but it afterwards cleared away and became very pleasant. I went to the Office. Time passed in looking over Accounts which from my negligence have gone considerably wrong. I went to the Athenaeum for an hour to read the President’s Message and other documents.1 This is a flimsy performance.
The City is in commotion about a local election for Mayor—A miserable affair in which there is not a sixpence choice between the three candidates. I shall vote for the weakest to defeat the others.2
Afternoon quietly at home. Read Lord Bacon de Augmentis Scientiarum. Virgil. In the evening Byron’s Corsair to my Wife,3 and after it, Smith’s Moral Sentiments a book valuable for it’s acute observation if not for it’s moral system.
The President’s annual Message to Congress, delivered on 3 Dec., was printed in the Boston newspapers on the 6th.
The leading candidates were William Sullivan and Theodore Lyman, both political enemies of JQA. The third and antimasonic candidate was George Odiorne.
On CFA’s periodic returns to the reading of Byron and on copies of his Works in MQA, see vol. 3:41, 185.