Diary of Charles Francis Adams, volume 6
1835-03-05
Fine day although still cold for the month. I felt a little better but not free from sore throat and general cold. Indeed I do not know when I have felt more disagreeably. Office where I employed my time pretty usefully. I wrote for an hour upon my work. Short walk. Read the debates in Congress upon the various questions relative to a war. The members have become crowded up in the last minute and talk fast but not with much method. Read Ovid whose lines pleased me much today. The Consolatio has many touching passages which are quite equal to the Author, and identify him.
Afternoon, Attended a funeral of Mrs. Dalton, a relation of my Wife’s Mother. She was an aged woman being nearly 79 years. There were a considerable number of relations and friends and the children appeared much affected. But there was nothing to a mere stranger like myself for I had never seen the person, which reminded me of 90more than the lapse of the longest term of human life when death is no evil.
Home, Feeling not quite well. Luxuriated with Baron Grimm. Evening at Mr. Frothingham’s. Nobody there but Wife and Mr. B. who dined out. Pleasant little Supper and home.
1835-03-06
The weather is pleasant and grows slowly more mild. My father has explained his course so as at least to show the absurdity of the charges made against him.1 I went to the Office though not feeling yet thoroughly well. My throat is still sore and my face feels the feverish heat of a cold. I was somewhat diverted from my regular occupation by a tedious interruption from Mr. Walsh. Yet I managed to make progress.
Walk and home where I finished the Consolatio ad Liviam which though not free from despicable servility has much of the spirit of poetry in it. Read a part of a mere Fragment upon Fish called Halieuticon. After dinner Grimm, Cuvier whose translator has not done remarkably well. I then read a little of Mons. Guizot whose work I do not think I shall go through with. There are so many things of more worth. Indeed when one thinks of time and of study one is reminded of the complaint of the Student in Faust and perhaps of it’s merited answer in the sneer of Mephistopheles. Evening, home. Mr. Brooks was out so that I read to my Wife from Barrow’s Travels in Norway.2 A slight book. Afterwards Musaeus.
On 26 Feb. Congress received from the President another message with supporting documents on the crisis with France. To the resolutions offered by the chairman of the Committee of Foreign Affairs (Cambreleng), JQA proposed amendments that the rights of American citizens to receive indemnity as stipulated in the Treaty of 1831 ought “in no event to be sacrificed, abandoned, or impaired” by any consent of the government; that if in the opinion of the President it be compatible with “the honor and interest of the United States, during the interval until the next session of Congress” to resume negotiations, he be requested to do so; that no legislative measure “of a hostile character ... is necessary or expedient at this time.” During the course of his speech in support of his amendments on 28 Feb. (printed “You will perceive by the Newspapers that Mr. Adams is in extenso on 2 March), JQA offered a full explanation of his position earlier on the President’s actions (National Intelligencer, 27 Feb., p. 3, col. 3; 28 Feb., p. 3, col. 2; 2 March, p. 4, cols. 1–3). His further remarks during the debate on 2 March were not printed in the Intelligencer until 17 March (p. 2, cols. 1–4). Meanwhile, LCA’s interpretation of the events in Congress would have been received:
only and has ever been for war only as a last extremity but it did not suit either party in Congress so to understand him and therefore use was made of his Speech for the purposes of both.... But you know that years ago in Congress it was declared that if 91Mr. Adams’s conduct and motives ‘were as pure as the Angels of heaven’ it would only be an additional motive of attack to those who ‘Had rather reign in Hell, than serve in Heaven’” (LCA to ABA, 2 March, Adams Papers).
John Barrow Jr., Excursions in the North of Europe, London, 1834, borrowed from the Athenaeum.