This was the regular day appointed for Fast according to the custom of this people.1 I remained at home in the morning and read Constant until the time for Divine Service when I attended and heard Mr. Frothingham from 12 Luke 19–20. “And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much good laid up for many years, take thine ease, eat, drink and be merry. But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided.” A very good Sermon upon the appropriateness of the occasion to the Season when man casts his seed upon the land with all the hopes and fears which necessarily belong to the support of his existence.

The day was fine. There was no service in the afternoon, owing to Mr. Frothingham’s cold. I read Benjamin Constant. Walk. I was a good deal surprised to find how much changed the spirit of this Institution had become. The Streets bore far more of the appearance of a holiday and festival than on any other day in the year. The Common was crowded and the Streets filled with Coaches. There appeared to me far more of what I should consider a pleasant recreation among the people than I ever see on our Jubilee days, when there is drinking and riot but no pleasure, or cheerful appearance.

Read Cicero, finishing the third Tusculan Disputation. And to divert my mind with a little light reading, I took up the Mille et une Nuits2—One of the most amusing of all works. The mixture of Eastern manners with their peculiar mythology, the marvelous combining with the beautiful, the power of invention, of description and of narration make this work infinitely charming. My Wife went out to Medford with 289her sisters. This evening Mr. Brooks was understood to have renewed his invitation for the intervening period to the close of the Session. Read Miss Edgeworth. Mr. Degrand came in for an hour.

Fine morning. I went to the Office but not until after I had occupied myself in reading some time.

My memory is so treacherous that I forget to put things in their right places. It was not today but on Wednesday that a gentleman called upon me and spent two hours about a scheme to purchase Monticello for Mrs. Randolph.1 He said his name was Hart from New York. He gave no account of himself but talked with the utmost freedom of all the principal persons in the Country–My friend this and my friend that. He was shrewd though exceedingly discursive in his remarks. His Account of his success and the various modes in which he had been received was laughable enough. He did not ask me to subscribe probably gathering my opinion from my conversation.

Time at the Office in Accounts. Walk. Afternoon, Benjamin Constant and Cicero. Evening for a wonder, quiet at home. German.

Fine day. Office. Mr. William Spear called upon me to let me know that William Field one of the Tenants had run away from Quincy after having embezzled and forged to no inconsiderable amount. Loss to my father of half a year’s Rent and House vacant. At the same time here the Tenant has gone from the House in Court Street without paying his last month’s due. These are losses resulting from the state of the times. I gave Spear a general power to collect the remaining rents for fear of loss.1

Accounts. Walk. Afternoon reading Constant and Cicero. Mr. Brooks came in by request to see my Wife and they settled it between them that we are to go out on the tenth of May to Medford. In the mean time there seems to be a probability of the adjournment of Congress. I never was more in doubt in my life.2 Evening quietly at home, reading Miss Edgeworth’s Manoeuvring and German.