Morning fine. My wife accompanied me to Boston where she met her sister Mrs. Frothingham. I was engaged in various vocations, but very few of them of a useful nature. Received a letter from my brother stating his reasons for not coming this way.1 There is much foundation for them. The alarm in relation to the progress of this disease is increasing, I think, and the consequent difficulty of transportation from New York here. Little or nothing else is talked of, and the public as usual in cases of panic does a great deal to accelerate it’s fate.

Returned to Quincy just in time to save a violent thunder gust, though after all it passed principally to the south of us. The absence of thunder and lightning this season is I think one of the most remarkable signs of this remarkable year. I read some of Seneca upon Clemency and found much that was wise in it, although I could not subscribe to the slavish doctrines it professes. Quiet evening at home.