Mrs. Parks the Aunt of my Wife by her Mother’s side is dead after a lingering illness. The members of the family thought it fit to attend the Funeral which took place today at her house at Cambridge.

The dinner hour was fixed at one o’clock so that my morning was rendered of very little service to me. I did however succeed in making up a few of the longer days of my Diary. The variety of a Journey had become exceedingly necessary to infuse interest in these ordinarily monotonous pages. I have ceased to believe in the utility of a Journal and would break off mine if it had not become a habit which I do not like to destroy. The Communion with my own mind, the expression of feelings which escape nowhere else have become necessary to me and will often do much to soothing down the moments of depression which will occasionally come upon me.

The afternoon was passed partly at the Athenaeum, partly at the shops where I am ordering my various things. I hope on Monday to 26get myself into train for the winter. I continued Sir James Mackintosh and finished Mr. Sedgwick.

Most of my time spent at the Office. I wrote much in my Diary. On the whole my Journey was an agreeable one. Little or no incident, but nothing disagreeable and the idea of relief from responsibility, the escape from the cheerlessness of Quincy. At Washington to be sure my remembrances are not pleasant but at least I made them few.

Having been very much alone since my return, I thought I would call and see my friend Davis for an hour. He had little or nothing new to relate and I was interrupted by the coming in of several persons in the course of my visit. I perceive myself gradually shut out from the world by my constant seclusion by mourning and I suppose by my own distant and reserved manners. This is not agreeable. My only resource must be to open my house a little more, to be understood to entertain. But is not this mortifying, that one’s consequence should so much depend upon one’s wealth. I do not like the society of Boston.

Walk and home. Afternoon quiet. I am now upon the history of Mackintosh, a fragment which breathes all of his philosophical spirit and yet takes views more new and more decided of the momentous events of the four years of James. Yet what a thing is fame. Sir James is pursued by his biographer like the hawk by the small fry of birds. But he cannot now turn round to defend himself.

Pleasant day though rather cool. I have since the arrival of the Quincy books resumed my German and made progress in Werther—One of the most popular of all the writings of Goethe. But I find that the occupation of my mind upon other things has in a degree weakened my recollection of this difficult language.

Attended divine service and heard Mr. Lunt. I am not yet so settled as to remember the Texts. He was sensible as he usually is but rather dry and as my nights have been rendered rather uneasy by the crying of the boy I felt too sleepy to listen with improvement.

The Afternoon service was deferred until three o’clock on account of an eclipse of the sun which took place at the usual time of Meeting. It was very nearly total and remarkable for being the last visible here for a generation or thirty five years. I watched it for some time obscured 27as it was at times by heavy banks of cloud. The darkness was not so great as I anticipated. It was much that of sunset, and showed how powerful even the small portion of the sun’s beams are. The light was as great as that of the full moon. Singular, the occurrence. Vastness gives sublimity to all the movements of the solar system. A shadow falling through immensity is nothing to the mind of a mere mortal, but when it accidentally touches the earth in its natural progress through space he then wonders for a minute and looks through a bit of smoked glass to see what the matter is. Mr. Frothingham took up the subject in his afternoon discourse, Joel 2.