Diary of Charles Francis Adams, volume 7
1837-05-19
Cloudy with mist and occasional rain. I went to the Office. Time not passed as usefully as it should be. It has been impossible for me to fix my mind firmly upon any thing for several days past. The various rumours afloat, the exciting character of the information and besides my approaching change of residence unsettle me. The story of the proclamation is confirmed, the suspension of the bonds is also confirmed, so that things are now at rest for the moment, but the news from England is more and more indicative of a commercial crisis in that quarter.1
Home, writing upon the currency but I do not get on, and I do not know that I shall not have to give it up. Not that I have not in my head the elements of a whole system, but I am so situated as to be ill able to give it currency.
Evening, to the Theatre. Three pieces—The forced Marriage, the Loan of a Lover and Twice Killed. The performers, Mr. and Mrs. Keeley—the first a sort of Comedie Larmoyante turning upon the honesty of a Lawyer, the others farces.2 Their style of acting is the low Comic and is very good of it’s kind. We returned home late very much amused.
The presidential proclamation called upon the Congress to convene in special session on the first Monday in September. Secretary of the Treasury Levi Woodbury issued notice that Custom House bonds falling due and not paid in specie would be extended until a reasonable time after the convening of the Congress. There was further disturbing news from London (Daily Advertiser, 19 May, p. 2., col. 3; 20 May, p. 2, col. 5).
Mr. and Mrs. Robert Keeley of the London theater had made their first American appearance to great applause in New York in Sept. 1836. They had introduced J. B. Buckstone’s Julie, or the Forced Marriage, a sentimental domestic comedy, to the New York stage as recently as the first of May. The Loan of a Lover by Planché and the farce Twice Killed had been in the Keeleys’ repertoire since Dec. 1836 (Odell, Annals N.Y. Stage
, 4:18, 114, 119–120, 127).
1837-05-20
A fine day. I went to the Office but was not very active. Conversation with Mr. Everett and Mr. Walsh. The public questions appear now to be rather more easy. But Mr. Van Buren’s position looks more and more difficult. The attempt to sustain the Bank of the Metropolis has failed1 and Kendall’s Post Office rules are likely to share the same fate. Mr. Biddle has published a third letter to my father explaining his course in the late crisis.2 On the whole the letter is a sensible one, 247although it is not quite candid as to the effect of his own mistakes in his former letters. He slides over matters adroitly.
Went home early for the purpose of taking my Wife to Quincy. This being the day upon which we had fixed for going out. The children and women going in a Carriage beforehand. After dinner I went to the House, giving directions and superintending. They have been very much kept back by the rain. However there is manifest progress from time to time, and now that I am here I can direct. A. H. Everett came to see my father and talked until after tea. Nothing new however. Evening at home. Conversation.
The Bank of the Metropolis in Washington suspended payments (Daily Advertiser, 20 May, p. 2, col. 4).
Nicholas Biddle’s letter to JQA of 13 May was reprinted from the National Gazette in the Daily Advertiser, 18 May, p. 2, cols. 1–2.