Abby does not stand travelling well. She was quite unwell today from continued head ach and sore throat. The weather was sultry in the morning which brought on a heavy thunder shower. I went out 10with the young ladies to take a walk along the shore and about the place, which heated me so much as to prevent my going to Meeting as I had proposed. Many of the family went.

There is a good deal of improvement over at Newburgh since I was here, which adds very much to the beauty of the prospect from this side of the River. A judicious clearing of vistas about the place would heighten greatly the effect of the very pretty scenery along here. As it is there is a little too much of foliage.

We received today a letter from home written the day after our departure.1 All well.

At dinner we had Mr. and Mrs. Pell of New York. She was formerly of Boston, an heiress, but has suffered much since her marriage from ill health and loss of children. He seems a good natured man somewhat subdued in his spirits. The table was necessarily large, so large that it weighed upon my conscience to be burdening his hospitality at this time. Mr. DeWint is a good natured man well disposed to all about him, but neither in his family nor in life possessed of that energy which makes regularity, and success. His Wife has many of the Adams characteristics of which the love of money is by no means one. I see no trace of the disposition in any of the family excepting perhaps in my father and myself, and with us it is subsidiary to other views. But a truce to reflection.

I passed the Afternoon lounging and chatting with John Smith on the portico, watching the clouds and the view of Newburgh as it varied under their passage. Evening, we all went to see Mrs. DeWint the mother, who lives in a small house close by. She is a fine old lady with energy sufficient for herself and her son too. She is a sort of Lady Bountiful and has with her a niece, Miss Smaltz who provides all the rose water and little charity fair works for the village. Upon returning home we found it raining and the girls had to make a scamper of it home which was not a little amusing.

The thunder showers of yesterday and the day before instead of dispersing the clouds and cooling the air, appeared merely as precursors of the storm which came today. It rained hard and therefore in my Wife’s condition detained us here today. There was so large a number here however that we were by no means dull. I spent part of my time in writing a letter to my Mother to give her some Account of my situa-11tion,1 part in reading “Sartor Resartus” of which I know less what to think the more I get on in it. I sometimes doubt whether a man who studies to envelope his ideas in a style of mystery and conundrum has in fact a clear notion of his own meaning, and whether it is not a resource for half fledged undertakings. The idea of Sartor Resartus in itself good does not appear to me distinctly carried out—Much episodical writing which obscures rather than explains. Evening, we had a round game at cards but girls always get in a frolic and disturb the play so that we finished soon.