Cool. Left by the Stage. Morning out. Dine and evening at Mr. Davis’.

I arose early this morning and put every thing in order to start by 364the Stage which had agreed to call for me as I thought, but after waiting two hours in vain I walked to the Office and found it had left me. This was vexatious as it threatened to make me a delay of Sunday. I tried to persuade the Agent to change me into the Mail but he would not. Throughout the whole business it is impossible to describe the extent to which the unaccommodating spirit is carried on that road. I left in disgust extracting nothing more than a promise that if a passenger in the Mail could be found voluntarily to exchange with me he would let me know by half past three o’clock.

On my return home I found Mr. C. A. Davis who called and asked me to accompany him to his counting room where he kept me some time in conversation upon currency and politics. After this I went down to inquire if the boat would go to New Haven tomorrow, which being answered in the affirmative gave me satisfaction enough to reconcile me to the delay. The remainder of the morning passed rapidly in executing little commissions and in reading at the Reading Room in Clinton Hall. A very pleasant place to resort to.

Mr. Davis called at dinner time to take me to dine with him which I was glad to do having given up my Stage Agent. Nobody at table but Mrs. Howell, Mr. Dekay, Mrs. Davis’s brother, and Miss Julia her daughter who is a pretty girl enough. The dinner was tres mince, but plenty of wine and good conversation so that I remained until late in the evening and thereby failed to make the visit I had intended to the Coldens.

Much talk with Mr. D. about Biddle respecting whose course of policy I expected he would entertain opinions very different from mine, but I found he rather confirmed by positive facts within his experience the truth of the inferences which I had drawn from more general reasoning. Home and to bed but for some reason or other I could not sleep for some hours although perfectly tranquil.

Cold and clear. Steamer New Haven to New Haven.

I was up betimes and marched down to the Slip where the Steamer was and went on board. Found plenty of passengers and an abundance of freight. We started at seven and with a hearty goodwill I bid good bye to the City of New York, a place where I find very little disposition to remain for any length of time. But upon this visit, it has seemed to 365me more repulsive than ever for its motley and ragged population and it’s money seeking spirit.

The boat made very good headway for an hour and a half when it got into the ice. The prospect for ten miles a head was all dreary and in the midst of it we got aground. This was not a very good incident and I began to think we were likely to be frozen in. But the tide was coming in and after two hours and a half the boat again moved. The prospect was then better and the boat went bravely to work grinding up the packed ice for many miles until it became very clear that we should get through.

This was the only cheerful intelligence of the day, for as we were going the same track with the unfortunate Lexington, with all the details before us of that disaster and conscious that their bodies were somewhere under our path, I could not resist the feeling of gloom which these ideas created. And when we passed the very spot and I looked round to see what our chance would be under similar circumstances with cotton and spirits on board as full as we could hold and a hundred and fifty passengers with but a single boat, I could not wonder that the mortality turned out so great. The incidents as they are told are too affecting. They harrow the soul.

We reached New Haven safely at eight o’clock and it being too late to send out a train tonight to Hartford we lodged at The Pavilion. Much too crowded for comfort, but thankful to have got so far.