A beautiful day. I went to town accompanied by Mr. Brooks. Office where I was engaged with business and Accounts my whole time. Mr. Walsh came in about the case of the title for the trustees of Boylston, and we discussed it pretty full. It goes on so slowly I hardly think I made a mistake in giving it away. I am now pretty much of a useless drone. I have for many years nourished the idea that I might do something to add to my reputation, but I have failed and being above the necessity of labouring for a living, I have only to be idle, my powers which I know to be somewhat respectable notwithstanding. With respect to these however I feel that it will be advisable to think rather more humbly of them than I have done. The world wants great powers, and when I reflect that I have none to turn to account in any line which I can point out above what many others possess, I think I may as well retire within my shell of modesty. My grandfathers papers are my only resort and to that I must fix myself. Home. Afternoon, German and Ovid. Evening out. A visit at Mr. Jonathan Brooks’ and one to Miss Mary B. Hall.

Morning cloudy with a Southerly wind which brought a storm of rain before night. I went to town with Mr. Brooks and was busy at my office much of the day. My father sent me a long letter, the answer to Col. Pickman to copy. I think with the exception of one or two passages, it is very well. The subject is a painful one to all parties and should be treated with the gentlest language.1 T. B. Adams came in just before I left town, and I was obliged to hurry in order to complete my business with him. He wants an advance as usual with him when he comes to this Quarter.

Home. Afternoon quiet at home. Read German. The Life and Adventures of Quinctius Heymerau von Flaming. A work by La Fontaine, but more comical than his others. Read in the evening, two hundred lines of Ovid’s first book of the Metamorphoses and was much charmed with them—Incomparably superior to all the rest of his works, by the nobility of it’s thought. The versification is as easy as usual. A little of Mrs. Austin’s Characteristics of Goethe.2 Very German. I have a notion, I shall not like him. The boy was quite unwell with his new teeth today.