The third cold morning. I went to the Office quite late and found every thing so cold and cheerless that I left in disgust without making a fire or sitting down to work. I went to the Athenaeum and amused myself in conversation with Mr. Walsh upon the present distress in the money department. Our majority seems to have gone mad, and they have the power. A democracy has it’s evils. In the mean time, I sup-252pose I should feel myself as less exposed to absolute suffering from all these events, than any body, or at least than the great number.

Afternoon, Lord Bacon. I want some definite occupation and yet if I had it, I do not know how I could manage to pursue it. Evening quietly at home. Patronage, which is not so interesting. The idea of a perfect female character it is very well to define, but it’s improbability destroys the illusion of a tale of real life and brings us down at once to a moral treatise. Adam Smith.