Diary of Charles Francis Adams, volume 5
1834-06-11
Fine day. I accompanied Mr. Brooks to town and passed my time very quietly at the Office making up my Accounts which have fallen backward somewhat and writing my Diary. After which I read Jefferson, finishing the second volume of his Correspondence which embraces the period he passed in France. He perhaps enjoyed himself as much during that time as he ever did, and was probably engaged in as few bad movements. His religion seems to have been in a process of corruption at this time, and the evidence of it now and then peeps forth, but it was left for times afterwards to show it forth in all its ugliness.
Medford to dinner. Mr. and Mrs Frothingham with two children, Mr. G. M. Dexter, at dinner, and afterwards, Mr. C. A. Davis of New York, Mr. A. Belknap, a Mr. Cunard from Halifax, descended from a Philadelphia refugee, and P. C. Brooks Jr., Mrs. W. R. Gray and her daughter. These were more than enough. I dislike this influx of company. They are uninteresting people and I am in just such a position as to be “de trop” in all the companies.1 Quiet evening. Maritime Discovery.
Mr. Brooks in naming his guests offers little more by way of identification than does CFA. He does say that Mr. Dexter is “of Railroad” and gives Mr. Belknap’s name as “Andrew” (Brooks, “Farm Journal”). Charles A. Davis was the business associate of Sidney Brooks (see vol. 4:147); and Mrs. W. R. Gray was the sister-in-law of Mrs. Samuel Gray, sister of Mr. Brooks. CFA’s uncomfortableness in the social gatherings in Medford may have been due in part to his being essentially a stranger in a company made up otherwise of old friends and relatives, in part to political animosities generated by JQA, and in part to the absence of any persons of bookish tastes.