"Oh that I could have a home! But this felicity has never been permitted
me. Rolling, rolling, rolling, till I am very near rolling into the
bosom of mother earth."
Thus wrote the venerable John Adams to his wife, in the sixty-fifth year
of his age, and the last of his Presidency. A few years previous he had
uttered the same sigh, nor is it infrequent in his letters. "I am weary,
worn, and disgusted to death. I had rather chop wood, dig ditches, and
make fence upon my poor little farm. Alas, poor farm! and poorer family!
what have you lost that your country might be free! and that others
might catch fish and hunt deer and bears at their ease!"
This was written in the days when there was such a thing as genuine
patriotism; when, as in the noble Greek and Roman years, there lived
among us also noble men, who freely surrendered all that life offered
them of sweet and splendid, to work for their fellows, and to exalt
their country's state, content that old age should find them poor in
fortune and broken in health, so only that integrity remained, and a
serene conscience led them undisturbed to the end of life.
Among these former glories of our Republic, the name of John Adams
stands in the clearest sunlight of fame. No purer patriot ever lived.
The names which dazzle us in history become no fables when read by his
light; Plutarch tells no nobler story, records no greater claims; Athens
and Sparta smile upon him from their starry places, and Rome holds out
her great hand of fellowship to him--for there is no virtue which has
lived that may not live again, and our own day shows that there has
never been a political corruption so base as to despair of being
emulated.
Concerning the civil life of such a man, much might with ease be
written. The head and front of every great political movement of his
country, from his thirtieth year to the day of his death he lived no
obscure life, and was missed from no contest. "The great pillar of
support to the Declaration of Independence," as Jefferson called him,
its fearless and eloquent defender, the right hand of his country's
diplomacy, and the strength of her treaties, he is a portion of her
history and his acts are her annals. But this devotion to the great
political struggles of his time was not consistent with home delights.
These he was to scorn and to live laborious days. Early immersed in the
stirring events of his day, he surrendered to the duty of serving, all
private claims; he gave up his profession, he separated himself from his
wife and children to go wherever he could be useful; he abandoned a mode
of life most dear to him; and leaving his little Sabine farm and his
friendly books, with no hopes of personal aggrandizement, and small,
unjoyous prospect of success in the venture he was aiding, went out to
fight. His first act of importance, a worthy beginning to such career,
was his defence of Preston, in the famous trial for the murder of
certain citizens of Boston by British soldiers, in 1770. Preston was the
captain of the British troops stationed in Boston, and under government
orders. As may easily be imagined, in the uneasy state of public
feeling, exasperated by real injuries and petty tyrannies, suspicious,
discontented and spurred on by men who circulated a thousand injurious
reports, the people and the foreign soldiery were ready at any moment to
break out into open quarrel. Finally, this did indeed happen. The
soldiery, provoked beyond endurance, resisted the assaults of the
people, and fired upon them. Captain Preston was arrested and
imprisoned; five citizens had been killed and many wounded, and it was
with difficulty that the people were restrained from rising into furious
rebellion. Preston was taken to prison to await his trial, but it was
for a time impossible to obtain counsel, so great was the hatred of the
people to the soldiery, and so strong the feeling that no man would be
safe from violence who would attempt to defend these foreigners for the
murder of his own fellow-citizens. John Adams--then a rising lawyer in
Boston, and a man who had already given hints of coming greatness--was
sent for by the unfortunate captain, who begged him to undertake his
cause. "I had no hesitation in answering," says Adams in his
autobiography, "that counsel ought to be the very last thing that an
accused person should want in a free country; that the bar ought, in my
opinion, to be independent and impartial at all times, and in every
circumstance, and that persons whose lives were at stake ought to have
the counsel they preferred. But he must be sensible this would be as
important a cause as was ever tried in any court or country in the
world; and that every lawyer must hold himself responsible, not only to
his country, but to the highest and most infallible of all tribunals,
for the part he should act. He must therefore expect from me no art or
address, no sophistry or prevarication in such a cause, nor anything
more than fact, evidence, and law would justify." And a little after he
tells us what it cost him to act up to his own standard of duty. "At
this time I had more business at the bar than any man in the province.
My health was feeble. I was throwing away as bright prospects as any man
ever had before him, and I had devoted myself to endless labor and
anxiety, if not to infamy and to death, and that for nothing, except
what was and ought to be all in all, a sense of duty. In the evening, I
expressed to Mrs. Adams all my apprehensions. That excellent lady, who
has always encouraged me, burst into a flood of tears, but said she was
very sensible of all the danger to her and to our children, as well as
to me, but she thought I had done as I ought; she was very willing to
share in all that was to come, and to place her trust in Providence."
Such were the politicians of that day; and though we do not doubt that
private virtue as much abounds with us as with them, and that as great
private sacrifices as this was public can be instanced in these later
times, yet no one will be so hardy as to say that any politician of this
day would brave such hazards or so daringly face peril. Politics are
become a trade with us. The curse of popular governments is this, that
they make office desirable in proportion to the ease with which it is
attained, and that seeking place becomes in time as legitimate a
profession as seeking oysters. No one will so mock at common sense, or
hold the judgments of his fellow spectators in such light esteem, as to
aver that any one of our public men serves his country for his country's
sake, or for any better reason than because it is conducive to bread and
butter. Hence it is with us a jeer and a by-word to talk about
patriotism. The fact seems to be, that our material prosperity is so
great, our resources so boundless, our outlook so glorious, our liberty
so well assured--or at least the liberty of those among us who are
white--that there is no call for sacrifice and patriotic service. The
country is rich and can well afford, if she will be served, to pay the
servant; but we speak of devotion to principle, which we believe is
clean gone out from us, and can be predicated of no public man.
John Adams, son of John Adams and Susannah Boylston Adams, was born at
Quincy, Massachusetts, on the 19th day of October, 1735. He received the
best education that the times afforded, graduated at Harvard College,
and afterward commenced the study of divinity with a view to the
ministry; at the same time he was occupied in teaching school, that
universal stepping-stone in New England to professional life. Indeed,
there was then hardly more than there is now any such thing as a
schoolmaster by profession; and without doubt a sufficing reason for the
fact that our young men are so inefficiently educated, is, that the
teachers are in nine cases out of ten only one lesson in advance of
their scholars. In those days, however, the schoolmaster was apt to be a
person of some consequence. He held a position very often next in
importance to that of the parson, and ruled an autocrat over his little
flock of beardless citizens. Nowhere has he been better described than
in "Margaret," in the character of Master Elliman, whose mingled
pompousness, verbiage, and pedantry, admirably represent the class to
which he belonged. But the character gradually lost its individuality as
society advanced, until at length the great bulk of teachers, except in
the colleges, were merely young men preparing for the learned
professions.
The injurious effect of this state of things, which has made a very
decided mark upon our national character, we will not discuss here, but
it is well to note the differences between the manners of the colonial
times, and those of our present day--and of these differences none is so
striking as the great decrease of respect in which professional men are
held with us compared with that which was yielded to them by our
forefathers. With them the schoolmaster, the parson, the physician, the
lawyer, were considered and treated as a sort of sacred nobility, apart
from the vulgar, and wholly refusing admixture with them; they were
placed in the seats of honor, and counted among counsellors; their
company was sought by the wealthy and the educated, their acts were
chronicled, and their words were echoed from mouth to mouth. In the
streets, when the schoolmaster or minister appeared, the children at
play drew up into a hurried line, took off their caps, made deferential
bows and listened with humility to the greeting or word of advice.
Nowadays, the Pope himself would be hustled in an omnibus, and if Master
Elliman were to appear in the streets and offer advice to the children,
ten to one but that they would throw dirt at him. It was in the twilight
which followed the departing day of these venerable times and preceded
the coming on of these degenerate darker hours, that John Adams became a
pedagogue. He was hardly at that age fit to be a teacher. He was
thoughtful, ambitious and lofty in his aims, but he was also somewhat
indolent and wanted persistency. It is true that his mind was hardly
made up as to what he should do for a living. We have said that he began
with studying for the ministry, but he tells us that he at one time read
much in medical books, and inclined to the study of physic.[2]
Yet I imagine that his inclination to either of these professions was
never very strong. His education at Cambridge, then the high seat of
orthodoxy, and perhaps the advice of his parents, his father holding an
office in the church government of his town of some importance at that
day, may have led his mind in the direction of the ministry, and his
studies in that line were very regular and persistent for some time.
Surgery and medicine had probably merely the fleeting fascination for
him which they have for multitudes of eager young men, striving to pry
into all the subtile secrets of nature, and to find out all the
mysteries which environ us. But as he says of himself, "the law drew me
more and more," and in his Diary under the date of Sunday, 22d of
August, 1756, we have the following entry:--
"Yesterday I completed a contract with Mr. Putnam to study the law,
under his inspection, for two years. I ought to begin with a resolution
to oblige and please him and his lady in a particular manner; I ought to
endeavor to please every body, but them in particular. Necessity drove
me to this determination, but my inclination, I think, was to preach;
however, that would not do. But I set out with firm resolutions, I
think, never to commit any meanness or injustice in the practice of law.
The study and practice of law, I am sure, does not dissolve the
obligations of morality or of religion; and, although the reason of my
quitting divinity was my opinion concerning some disputed points, I hope
I shall not give reason of offence, to any in that profession, by
imprudent warmth."
He now gave up his school, and somewhat changed his manner of life.
Before we leave him let us hear his quaint description of the schoolboys
of his day--not very different from the youngsters of 1853.
"15. Monday (1756).--I sometimes in my sprightly moments consider myself
in my great chair at school, as some dictator at the head of a
commonwealth. In this little state I can discover all the great
geniuses, all the surprising actions and revolutions of the great world,
in miniature. I have several renowned generals not three feet high, and
several deep projecting politicians in petticoats. I have others
catching and dissecting flies, accumulating remarkable pebbles,
cockle-shells, &c., with as ardent curiosity as any virtuoso in the
Royal Society. Some rattle and thunder out A, B, C, with as much fire
and impetuosity as Alexander fought, and very often sit down and cry as
heartily upon being outspelt as Caesar did, when at Alexander's sepulchre
he recollected that the Macedonian hero had conquered the world before
his age. At one table sits Mr. Insipid, foppling and fluttering,
spinning his whirligig, or playing with his fingers, as gayly and
wittily as any Frenchified coxcomb brandishes his cane or rattles his
snuff-box. At another, sits the polemical divine, plodding and wrangling
in his mind about "Adam's fall, in which we sinned all," as his Primer
has it. In short, my little school, like the great world, is made up of
kings, politicians, divines, L.L.D.'s, fops, buffoons, fiddlers,
sycophants, fools, coxcombs, chimney-sweepers, and every other character
drawn in history, or seen in the world. Is it not, then, the highest
pleasure, my friend, to preside in this little world, to bestow the
proper applause upon virtuous and generous actions, to blame and punish
every vicious and contracted trick, to wear out of the tender mind every
thing that is mean and little, and fire the new-born soul with a noble
ardor and emulation? The world affords us no greater pleasure. Let
others waste their bloom of life at the card or billiard-table among
rakes or fools, and when their minds are sufficiently fretted with
losses, and inflamed by wine, ramble through the streets, assaulting
innocent people, breaking windows, or debauching young girls. I envy not
their exalted happiness. I had rather sit in school and consider which
of my pupils will turn out in his future life a hero, and which a rake,
which a philosopher, and which a parasite, than change breasts with
them; though possessed of twenty laced waistcoats and a thousand pounds
a year.[3]"
One of the most interesting features of the early part of the "Diary"
from which these extracts have been taken, is the perfect simplicity and
truthfulness with which the writer details his efforts to attain
steadfastness of purpose and diligence in study. He feels in moments of
reflection the value of his time and the sacredness of duty; he makes
the best resolutions, and concocts the wisest plans for improvement and
the most liberal schemes of study; but his animal spirits, which flowed
on in cheerfulness, even to his latest day of life, his social nature,
and his admiration for women, all played sad pranks with his resolves,
and drew out from him many a repentant sigh over lost and wasted time.
Yet this trouble ceases almost as soon as he begins to study law and
gives up his uncertain dallyings with schoolkeeping, divinity, and
medicine. Having once put his shoulder to the wheel, he worked with
vigor, and began to show what greatness of character there was in him.
Let it not be understood from what we have said, that John Adams was
ever a seeker after low or vulgar pleasures. More than once in his
"Diary" he ridicules the foolish, extravagant, licentious amusements of
the young men of his time. Card-playing, drinking, backgammon, smoking,
and swearing, he says are the fashionable means of getting rid of time,
which excited in his mind only contempt. "I know not," he says, "how any
young fellow can study in this town. What pleasure can a young gentleman
who is capable of thinking, take in playing cards? It gratifies none of
the senses, neither sight, hearing, taste, smelling, nor feeling; it can
entertain the mind only by hushing its clamors. Cards, backgammon, &c.,
are the great antidotes to reflection, to thinking, that cruel tyrant
within us! What learning or sense are we to expect from young gentlemen
in whom a fondness for cards, &c., outgrows and chokes the desire of
knowledge?"
Up to the time of his commencing the study of law with Mr. Putnam, John
Adams had resided in Braintree, sharing in the social intercourses of
the place, its tea-parties, clubs of young men, visiting and receiving
visitors, and all the common civilities of country life. On one
occasion, we find him taking tea and spending the evening at Mr.
Putnam's, in conversation about Christianity. This was at the time when
Adams was studying divinity, and it is evident that he discussed
religion and theological subjects with a good deal of interest, since we
find that the talk at almost all these meetings turns in that direction.
There seems to have been a decided leaning towards speculation and doubt
in the minds of many men, on the subject of Christianity, at that day,
and we frequently find their opinion very frankly expressed in the
"Diary," and left almost without comment by the recorder. He was very
fond of chatting with his neighbors over a social cup of tea, sometimes
after a day spent in hard study, at other times resting from the
fatigues of attending to little affairs about the farm, loading and
unloading carts, splitting wood, and doing other chores. He is apt to be
a little impatient with himself. He finds it easier to say before going
to bed that he will rise at six than to get up when the hour arrives.
Several days in the "Diary" bear for sole record--"Dreamed away this
day," and once when several had slipped by without any seeming good
result, he writes--"Thursday, Friday. I know not what became of these
days;" and again--"Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday. All spent in
absolute idleness, or which is worse, gallanting the girls." The next
day--"Tuesday. _Sat down and recollected my self_, and read a little in
Van Muyden, a little in Naval Trade and Commerce."
And so the good seems always leading him on, always eluding him, and
playing sad momentary havoc with his peace of mind. But he consents to
no doubtful terms with the enemy. He determined to conquer the foes of
sloth, inattention, social indulgence, and do his whole duty. With the
responsibilities of time came the cure for youthful follies, and his
marriage in the thirtieth year of his age, dealt the last fatal blow to
all his enemies. In 1764 he thus writes:--
"Here it may be proper to recollect something which makes an article of
great importance in the life of every man. I was of an amorous
disposition, and, very early, from ten or eleven years of age, was very
fond of the society of females. I had my favorites among the young
women, and spent many of my evenings in their company; and this
disposition, although controlled for seven years after my entrance into
college, returned, and engaged me too much till I was married.
"I shall draw no characters, nor give any enumeration of my youthful
flames. It would be considered as no compliment to the dead or the
living. This I will say:--they were all modest and virtuous girls, and
always maintained their character through life. No virgin or matron ever
had cause to blush at the sight of me, or to regret her acquaintance
with me. No father, brother, son, or friend, ever had cause of grief or
resentment for any intercourse between me and any daughter, sister,
mother, or any relation of the female sex. These reflections, to me
consolatory beyond all expression, I am able to make with truth and
sincerity; and I presume I am indebted for this blessing to my
education.
* * * * *
"I passed the summer of 1764 in attending courts and pursuing my
studies, with some amusement on my little farm, to which I was
frequently making additions, until the fall, when, on the 25th of
October, I was married to Miss Smith, second daughter of the Rev.
William Smith, minister of Weymouth, granddaughter of the Hon. John
Quincy, of Braintree, a connection which has been the source of all my
felicity, although a sense of duty, which forced me away from her and my
children for so many years, produced all the griefs of my heart and all
that I esteem real afflictions in life."[4]
In 1758, his term of study with Mr. Putnam being expired, John Adams
left Worcester, having determined for several reasons not to settle
there, but to establish himself, if possible, in Braintree, where his
father and mother resided. They had invited him to live with them, and
he says that as there had never been a lawyer in any country part of the
county of Suffolk, he was determined to try his fortune there. His
acquaintances told him that "the town of Boston was full of lawyers,
many of them of established characters for long experience, great
abilities, and extensive fame, who might be jealous of _such a novelty
as a lawyer_ in the country part of their county, and might be induced
to obstruct me. I returned, that I was not wholly unknown to some of the
most celebrated of those gentlemen; that I believed they had too much
candor and generosity to injure a young man; and, at all events, I could
try the experiment, and if I should find no hope of success, I should
then think of some other place or some other course." The result was
that he established himself in Braintree, living at his father's house,
and continuing his studies patiently and perseveringly until clients
began to appear. He gives an amusing account of his first "_writ_," and
chronicles its failure with a nonchalant stoicism which can hardly
conceal his vexation at being laughed at by his acquaintances among the
young lawyers of the town. His residence in Braintree seems to have been
a pleasant one. He had much leisure for study and reading, and made good
use of his time. He was acquainted with all the people of consequence in
the town, and was, as we have said, fond of visiting, calling in to take
a social pipe or glass, as was the fashion of the day, to chat with the
wife or daughter of the house, to discuss with the head of the family
the last political bubble of the hour, the prospect of the crops, the
expediency of this or that proceeding in the village, or any of the
local topics of the day. Sometimes we find him with a knot of young
fellows met together of an evening, discussing with one or two some
question in morals or rhetoric, or sitting abstracted with a book or his
pipe on one side the chimney, the room filled with smoke, the rest of
the party engaged in card-playing, backgammon, or other sedative game.
At another time, though somewhat later, he speaks of hearing "the ladies
talk about ribbon, catgut, and Paris net, riding-hoods, cloth, silk, and
lace;" and again he has a pleasant picture of taking tea at his
grandfather Quincy's--"the old gentleman inquisitive about the hearing
before the governor and council, about the governor's and secretary's
looks and behavior, and about the final determination of the board. The
old lady as merry and chatty as ever, _with her stories out of the
newspapers_." He had through life a serene equable mind, he took the
kindness and unkindness of fortune with even looks, and preserved his
relish for a joke undiminished, in all his circumstances. We have before
us two portraits of John Adams painted, the one when about forty years
of age, the other when he was ninety. The younger likeness is a face of
remarkable beauty, the forehead broad, serene, and intelligent, the
eyebrows dark and elegantly arched over a pair of eyes which we make no
doubt did fierce execution among the young women of the period who came
under their sparkling influence. The lips full, finely curved, and
giving an expression of great sweetness to the face, are yet firmly set,
and combine with the attitude of the head to convey an impression of
haughtiness and dignity. The chin is full, rounded, and inclined to be
double; the powdered hair and the stiff coat take away from the youthful
appearance of the picture.[5] The other portrait is from an original by
Gilbert Stuart, and was painted when John Adams was in his ninetieth
year. At this time he was obliged to be fed from a spoon; yet no one,
looking at this noble, vigorous head, with its fine color and
magnificent forehead, would suppose his age so great. The beauty of the
young man has grown into the fuller nobility of a face in which there
appears no trace of any evil passion, no mark of any uneasy thought, but
an undisturbed serenity that looks back on life and awaits death with
the happiest memories and the gladdest anticipations.
In 1768, Mr. Adams, by the advice of his friends, who were urgent with
him, removed to Boston, and took the house in Brattle Square called the
White House. His son, John Quincy Adams, was born the year before--his
life commenced with the most stirring period of his country's history,
and it was his good fortune to bring down to our times so clear a memory
of those events as to make a conversation with him on the subject an era
in the life of an American. Shortly after the removal of John Adams to
Boston, he was requested to accept an office under government; but
although it was offered to him without respect to his opinions, which
were well known to be hostile to the British rule in Massachusetts, and
although the office was very lucrative, yet he insisted on refusing it,
because he feared that he should sacrifice his independence in some
manner to the influences of the position. He therefore declined any
connection with the government, and continued the practice of the law,
which had now become the source of a very handsome income, and was
leading him by rapid steps into a very wide and honorable repute.
Before leaving Braintree, John Adams had become accustomed to a great
deal of exercise, riding horseback to Boston, Germantown, Weymouth, and
other adjoining towns; cutting down trees, superintending planting and
harvesting, and every way taking a good share of the work on his farm.
Some of the pleasantest portions of the "Diary" are those in which he
describes this part of his life. The following extract gives a moral
picture of his habits:--
"October, 22. Friday. Spent last Monday in taking pleasure with Mr.
Wibird. * * * * * * * *
Upon this part of the peninsula is a number of trees, which appear very
much like the lime tree[6] of Europe, which gentlemen are so fond of
planting in their gardens for their beauty. Returned to Mr.
Borland's,[7] dined, and afternoon rode to Germantown, where we spent
our evening. Deacon Palmer showed us his lucerne growing in his garden,
of which he has cut, as he tells us, four crops this year. The Deacon
had his lucerne seeds of Mr. Greenleaf, of Abington, who had his of
Judge Oliver. The Deacon watered his but twice this summer, and intends
to expose it uncovered to all the weather of the winter for a fair
trial, whether it will endure our winters or not. Each of his four crops
had attained a good length. It has a rich fragrance for a grass. He
showed us a cut of it in 'Nature Displayed,' and another of St. Foin,
and another of trefoil. The cut of the lucerne was exact enough; the pod
in which the seeds are is an odd thing, a kind of ram's-horn or straw.
"We had a good deal of conversation upon husbandry. The Deacon has about
seventy bushels of potatoes this year on about one quarter of an acre of
ground. Trees of several sorts considered. The wild cherry-tree bears a
fruit of some value; the wood is very good for the cabinet-maker, and is
not bad to burn. It is a tree of much beauty; its leaves and bark are
handsome, and its shape. The locust; good timber, fattening to soil by
its leaves, blossoms, &c.; good wood, quick growth, &c. The larch-tree;
there is but one[8] in the country, that in the lieutenant-governor's
yard at Milton; it looks somewhat like an evergreen, but is not; sheds
its leaves.
"I read in Thompson's Travels in Turkey in Asia, mention of a turpentine
called by the name of turpentine of Venice, which is not the product of
Venice, but of Dauphine, and flows from the larch tree. It is thick and
balsamic, and used in several arts, particularly that of enamelling.
"24. Sunday. Before sunrise.--My thoughts have taken a sudden turn to
husbandry. Have contracted with Jo. Field to clear my swamp, and to
build me a long string of stone wall, and with Isaac to build me sixteen
rods more, and with Jo. Field to build me six rods more. And my thoughts
are running continually from the orchard to the pasture, and from thence
to the swamp, and thence to the house and barn, and land adjoining.
Sometimes I am at the orchard ploughing up acre after acre, planting,
pruning apple-trees, mending fences, carting dung; sometimes in the
pasture, digging stones, clearing bushes, pruning trees, building to
redeem posts and rails; and sometimes removing button-trees down to my
house; sometimes I am at the old swamp burning bushes, digging stumps
and roots, cutting ditches across the meadows and against my uncle; and
am sometimes at the other end of the town buying posts and rails to
fence against my uncle, and against the brook; and am sometimes
ploughing the upland with six yoke of oxen, and planting corn, potatoes,
&c., and digging up the meadows and sowing onions, planting cabbages,
&c., &c. Sometimes I am at the homestead, running cross-fences, and
planting potatoes by the acre, and corn by the two acres, and running a
ditch along the line between me and Field, and a fence along the brook
against my brother, and another ditch in the middle from Field's line to
the meadows. Sometimes am carting gravel from the neighboring hills, and
sometimes dust from the streets upon the fresh meadows, and am sometimes
ploughing, sometimes digging those meadows to introduce clover and other
English grasses."[9]
Thus passed the days of his early married life in Braintree, between the
earnest study of the law, the participation in social intercourse with
friends and neighbors, and occasional Bucolical episodes. In 1768, as we
have said, he removed to Boston, and but seldom went into the country.
In 1771, however, we find him writing as follows:
"The complicated cares of my legal and political engagements, the
slender diet to which I was obliged to confine myself, the air of the
town of Boston, which was not favorable to me, who had been born and
passed almost all my life in the country, but especially the constant
obligation to speak in public, almost every day, for many hours, had
exhausted my health, brought on a pain in my breast, and a complaint in
my lungs, which seriously threatened my life, and compelled me to throw
off a great part of the load of business, both public and private, and
return to my farm in the country. Early in the Spring of 1771, I removed
my family to Braintree, still holding, however, an office in Boston. The
air of my native spot, and the fine breezes from the sea on one side,
and the rocky mountains of pine and savin on the other, together with
daily rides on horseback and the amusements of agriculture, _always
delightful to me_, soon restored my health in a considerable degree.
"April 16. Tuesday evening. Last Wednesday, my furniture was all
removed to Braintree. Saturday I carried up my wife and youngest child,
and spent the Sabbath there very agreeably. On the 20th or 25th of
April, 1768, I removed into Boston. In the three years I have spent in
that town, have received innumerable civilities from many of the
inhabitants; many expressions of their good will, both of a public and
private nature. Of these I have the most pleasing and grateful
remembrance. * * * * *
"Monday morning I returned to town, and was at my office before nine. I
find I shall spend more time in my office than ever I did. Now my family
is away, I feel no inclination at all, no temptation, to be any where
but at my office. I am in it by six in the morning, I am in it at nine
at night, and I spend but a small space of time in running down to my
brother's to breakfast, dinner, and tea. Yesterday, I rode to town from
Braintree before nine, attended my office till near two, then dined and
went over the ferry to Cambridge. Attended the House the whole
afternoon, returned and spent the whole evening in my office alone, and
I spent the time much more profitably, as well as pleasantly, than I
should have done at club. This evening is spending the same way. In the
evening, I can be alone at my office, and nowhere else; I never could in
my family.
"18. Thursday--Fast day. Tuesday I staid at my office in town; yesterday
went up to Cambridge, returned at night to Boston, and to
Braintree,--still, calm, happy Braintree,--at nine o'clock at night.
This morning, cast my eyes out to see what my workmen had done in my
absence, and rode with my wife over to Weymouth; there we are to hear
young Blake--a pretty fellow.
"20. Saturday. Friday morning by nine o'clock, arrived at my office in
Boston, and this afternoon returned to Braintree; arrived just at
tea-time; drank tea with my wife. Since this hour, a week ago, I have
led a life active enough; have been to Boston twice, to Cambridge twice,
to Weymouth once, and attended my office and the court too.
"But I shall be no more perplexed in this manner. I shall have no
journeys to make to Cambridge, no General Court to attend; but shall
divide my time between Boston and Braintree, between law and
husbandry;--_farewell politics_."[10]
During Mr. Adams's residence in Boston he did not always occupy the same
house. In April, 1768, he removed, as we have said, to the White House
in Brattle Square. In the spring, 1769, he removed to Cole Lane, to Mr.
Fayerweather's house. In 1770, he removed to another house in Brattle
Square.
In 1772 he again removed to Boston with his family, and finding, as he
says, that "it was very troublesome to hire houses, and to be often
obliged to remove, I determined to purchase a house, and Mr. Hunt
offering me one in Queen-street, near the scene of my business, opposite
the Court House, I bought it, and inconvenient and contracted as it was,
I made it answer, both for a dwelling and an office, till a few weeks
before the 19th of April, 1775, when the war commenced."
In 1774 Mr. Adams was appointed delegate to the first American Congress
at Philadelphia, and was obliged to leave his family in Braintree, while
he himself remained with the Congress. He continued to reside in
Philadelphia, visiting his family but seldom, and then in a very hurried
manner, till the year 1776, when he was appointed commissioner to France
in the place of Silas Deane, who was recalled. The treaty with France
having been concluded by Dr. Franklin before Mr. Adams reached Paris, he
returned home after an absence of a year and a half.
Hardly had he returned before he was again dispatched as Minister to the
Court of St. James. While abroad at this time he made some stay in
Paris, was afterwards at Amsterdam for the purpose of negotiating a loan
and forming a treaty of amity and commerce with Holland, and still
later, in 1785, was appointed Minister Plenipotentiary to Great Britain.
During all this time he had been separated from his wife--a space of
nearly six years--but in 1784, finding that there was no prospect of a
return, he sent for Mrs. Adams to join him in London. On reaching
London, Mrs. Adams found that her husband was in Paris; her son, John
Quincy Adams, was sent by his father to escort his mother and sister to
France. The letters of Mrs. Adams, describing their mode of life in
Paris, or rather at the little town of Auteuil, and also those which
give an account of her residence in London, are most charmingly written,
and we wish there was room for long extracts from them, but we already
trespass upon the reader's kindness. We have space for only one pretty
domestic picture.
The family are expecting a packet of letters from America, which their
friend Mr. Charles Storer has sent from London to Paris. They had some
difficulty in procuring them from the post-office.
"About eight in the evening, however, they were brought in and safely
delivered, to our great joy. We were all together. Mr. Adams in his easy
chair upon one side of the table, reading Plato's Laws; Mrs. A. upon the
other, reading Mr. St. John's "Letters;" Abby, sitting upon the left
hand, in a low chair, in a pensive posture;--enter J.Q.A. from his own
room, with the letters in his hand, tied and sealed up, as if they were
never to be read; for Charles had put half a dozen new covers upon them.
Mr. A. must cut and undo them leisurely, each one watching with
eagerness. Finally, the originals were discovered; 'Here is one for you,
my dear, and here is another; and here, Miss Abby, are four, five, upon
my word, six, for you, and more yet for your mamma. Well, I fancy I
shall come off but slenderly. Only one for me.' 'Are there none for me,
sir?' says Mr. J.Q.A., erecting his head, and walking away a little
mortified."
On his return from Europe, Mr. Adams resided--whenever political duties
permitted his absence from the seat of government--at the mansion in
Quincy, the name by which the more ancient portion of Braintree was
called.
The estate was purchased after the revolution. The house had been built
long before by one of the Vassall family, a well-known republican name
in England in the time of the commonwealth, some members of which had
transferred themselves to Jamaica under Cromwell's projects of
colonizing that island, and from thence had come to Massachusetts. But
time had changed them from republicans to royalists, and when the
revolution broke out they were on the side of the mother country. In
Quincy, however, the race had run into females, and the house belonged
to a descendant by the name of Borland, who sold it to the agent of Mr.
Adams. It was then, however, very different from what it is now. Mr.
Adams nearly doubled the size of it, and altered the front. It has since
been altered once or twice, and lately by the present occupant, Mr.
Charles Francis Adams, a grandson of the President.
In this house Mr. Adams continued to reside till his death in 1826.
During the time that he was in Philadelphia and Washington as President
and Vice-President, Mrs. Adams remained at Quincy, partly on account of
her health, partly to take charge of her husband's private property,
which had never been large, and which had suffered much diminution from
the expenses incident to public life.
Mrs. Adams's account of her residence in Washington--the troubles which
she had in procuring almost the necessaries of life in that out of the
way settlement--her description of Washington and the White House at
that early date, have been printed too often in newspapers all over the
country, to need insertion here. Not less interesting than these letters
are those which describe her life in Philadelphia; her little sketches
of society in that city, then the seat of government, have all the
charms which the unaffected letters of an elegant woman cannot fail to
display.
The following letter will conclude our article, showing, as it does, the
peaceful occupations of this happy aged couple, retired to their beloved
home to await the inevitable summons, to which they looked forward with
the beautiful resignation of minds in love with virtue, and conscious of
no offence against the laws of God or man.