A very hot, windy morning. I felt so much fatigued as to be very unwilling to undertake any long walk in the sun, so that I decided upon remaining in the house. This detention is in this place quite disagreeable as all the places of resort are at a distance from each other, and thus make motion to them laborious and fatiguing. I begin to be very impatient and wish to return. My own occupations on the whole cannot be long supplied by any dissipation.

Wrote Diary, and a letter to Boston,1 also reading the Bank Reports of the State of Alabama. Made a call upon Mrs. Smith and sat an hour conversing in a very easy way. She would have been well calculated for a much higher situation in society.

Evening, accompanied the ladies to a party at Miss Tayloe’s given to the bride, Mrs. Kane. The party was small and composed entirely of strangers. Washington is certainly much changed from what it was.49 There is an absence of the haut ton which it used to have, and a prevalence of half genteel which makes the difference. This is no doubt owing to the bachelor style of the late President and the absence of any presiding female character in the higher departments of Office. We returned at twelve. A thunder shower and rain following.

Very heavy rain with occasional gusts of wind throughout the day, which prevented my going out until evening. But as I thought it scarcely advisable to waste so much time, I finished the Bank Report, and then read the whole of the original debate upon the first charter of the United States Bank. This is a very interesting exposition of the views originally entertained of this much vexed question, and I am not aware that much more could have been said. The argument of Mr. Madison against the Bank is very able and would be convincing if experience had not shown even to his own satisfaction that it was fallacious. A national mode of some kind of regulating the currency is indispensable to every country. Mr. Ames is not so strong upon the general position as I should have expected, and the argument drawn from the particular clauses weakens itself by its multiplication.1

After dinner, in the evening, my Wife and I went to see the President. Introduced into his sitting room formerly called the green room, where were numbers of persons, of whom I found out the names only of Mr. Wright of N.Y., Mr. Hubbard of N.H., Senators and a Mr. Kelly from Peru, Illinois. They all left and then Govr. Dickerson came in.2 On the whole, the visit was very well, but I was much struck with the air ennueyé of the President and distrait too. He certainly manifests the cares of Office very much.

During our stay Mr. Hubbard mentioned his having received the intelligence of Mr. Woodbury’s nomination to be Chief Justice in New Hampshire, which seemed to spread a momentary gleam of satisfaction over his features. Yet the rumor is that Kendall is to succeed. A man in his way likely to be even more troublesome. Returned home reflecting upon the moral of ambition in ordinary men—and extraordinary ones too where the difference is only in the gloss which ability throws over the picture.