Another cloudy disagreeable day. It is a week now that we have not seen the sun. I went to the Office. Read a little and wrote Diary. My time at the Office passes very fast. And yet I perhaps do not spend it in the most useful manner.

Today I spent half an hour in writing to my Mother.1 To her I can incidentally say things which if addressed to my father would seem hard. Yet they may so place the truth before his eyes as to enable him to act more effectively. He is a singular instance of a man to whom prudence never was natural—Who as he grew older lost the inducements which formerly existed to exercise it, and therefore constantly exposed himself on all sides to the attacks of enemies. To day there arrived his own explanation of his warlike speech which reduces it down to little or nothing. But the explanation was unnecessary because the conviction was growing in the Community. And it subjected him to a colourable charge of interest in making it. I think I shall write to my Mother upon this point.2

Walk. Ovid, finishing the fifth book of the Fasti. Afternoon. Papers and de Grimm. Evening, continued Article—Bacon in the Biographia. Wallenstein.

Finished the first part of Wallenstein. A curiously wild mixture representing a licentious army of mercenaries. Schiller however combines natural elements. The men speak as soldiers would. He does not fly into ideality at all. Coleridge who translated the rest of the Drama did not attempt this.1 Office, thence to the House to return some books. Mr. Walsh took all my time, and I did nothing. Walk.

The Senate after four attempts this day elected by one vote John Davis so that he is the Senator. I will not cultivate revengeful feeling but it is hard in this case to restrain it. My father owes his defeat to himself alone and it is most probably fortunate for him that he is not introduced into a spot where collision with Mr. Webster and three others would be almost inevitable. But the selfishness of Davis is so manifested throughout the business that for him I have no feeling but contempt. For the rest I declare now as I have thought all along that for us it has turned out for the best. My father will be less exposed in the House to minute observation in his intercourse with Mr. Webster and will be entirely at liberty to take what course he may deem proper.

Read Ovid. Afternoon. Papers and Grimm. Mrs. Hall dined here, Mrs. W. G. Brooks and brother in the evening.

Pleasant day. I read Wallenstein and then to the Office. My time taken up partly in Accounts, partly in attending a sale of Stocks, and partly in writing upon my piece of work. The last French Packets give accounts of the recall of the French minister and of the dismission of Mr. Livingston. The inference here seems to be war and I attended the sale for the purpose of observing the effect of the panic. It was considerable but did not affect the prices generally. I tried to do something but without success.

Continued my Essay upon Education. Walk. Then home where I read Ovid. Afternoon, the papers and de Grimm. My Wife went with her father to Medford. I read until my eyes troubled me. This is the first winter I ever experienced an inconvenience of this description.

Conversation with Mr. Brooks about French affairs. He like all men of property feels alarmed. I believe the only way to maintain the dignity of this country is not to allow itself to be trifled with. France has acted in a manner shamefully wrong and the sense of it ought to be expressed by this Country. General Jackson can do it. But if my father had done it, what a hue and cry there would have been. Wallenstein.