31John Quincy Adams to John Adams, 27 July 1794 (Adams Papers)
I expected to have been on my way to Boston before this; but M r: Hamilton is gone into the Country, and I cannot be supplied with my instructions untill he returns. He has been expected every hour these four days, and it is very possible that four days hence he may still be hourly expected. In the mean while I am here lolling away my time, and sweating away my person, with nothing to do, and...
32John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 24 August 1794 (Adams Papers)
In its due time, I received your Letter from Philadelphia of the 27. of July. Although, in the Opinion of The Secretary of State, the Mission to Holland may be “almost exclusively reduced to a pecuniary Negotiation,” yet, in the Opinion of others among whom your father is one, the Post at the Hague is an important Diplomatick Station, which may afford many opportunities of acquiring political...
33Abigail Adams to John Adams, 18 June 1795 (Adams Papers)
I received yours of the 12 th. I wish congress may rise by the time you mention. a Gentleman reported here yesterday that he had heard that mr Langdon had said he was determind to oppose the Treaty in every article. people are very anxious— the col had letters from Halifax which informs him, that without Libeling the vessel, they proceed to unload her & will not permit the Captain nor a single...
34John Adams to Abigail Adams, 28 December 1794 (Adams Papers)
I went on Fryday night with M r Storer to the Drawing Room, where the Warmth of the Weather increased by a great fire and a Croud of good Company, gave me one of my annual great Colds. The Same Evening the large Lutheran Church in our old Neighbourhood took fire and was burnt down. The next morning M rs Otis was brought to bed and the Mother and the Daughter are very well. So much for News...
35John Adams to Abigail Adams, 9 February 1794 (Adams Papers)
Vive la Baggatelle! Dulce est desipere. I have no other Resource in my solitude, amidst all my gloomy forebodings of the future Miseries of my beloved Species. Our Allies, Our only Alies as the Demi-Crazies pathetically call them, have compleated their System by turning all their Churches into, Je ne seais quoi and if they should have any Government erected among them either by Themselves or...
36John Adams to Charles Adams, 2 January 1795 (Adams Papers)
I have received your Letter of December 30 th. — I approve of your caution and applaud your discretion. You ought nevertheless to reconoitre the Country round about you, like a good officer. Between you and me, I believe you to be Surrounded by a gang of sharpers, and I wish you to keep a good look Out, preserve your own honour; keep a clear Conscience and clean hands: but examine every Man...
37Abigail Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 30 November 1794 (Adams Papers)
Well my Dear Son, how did the watery world agree with you? I hope it was propitious to your passage, and that thirty or 40 days, at furthest Landed you safe in a Country, for which I have ever Since my residence in it, entertaind a fondness and partiality. As you are a New Traveller I expect from your pen; many judicious observations, but what will be most valuable to me, will be the News of...
38John Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 3 December 1794 (Adams Papers)
You have lost the Opportunity of sharing in the Glory of some of your Friends in this City, who have been out and returned, from the Campain against the Insurrection in the four Western Counties of Pensilvania. Your Friend Climer lost his Life, and is greatly lamented. ’Squire Cranch as his Father calls him was here Yesterday with M r Greenleaf, whose Agent as well as Lawyer he is to be at the...
39John Adams to Charles Adams, 11 May 1794 (Adams Papers)
Your Favour of April 19. I believe has not yet been acknowledged. The Extracts from the King of Prussia were very acceptable. Yesterday I received your favour of May 9 th.— You ask whether there might not exist Such an Equality in Society as the Democrats of this Day Seem to advocate? Yes my Son, there are many Such Societies, in the Forrests of America, called Indian Tribes. Yet among these...
40Abigail Adams to John Adams, 26 March 1794 (Adams Papers)
our two Tenants are come, and I have occupation enough. I have set them to clear the manure out of the Barn and to digg the Garden put all the wall up and look to the fences. when that is done, I shall send them to clear up the Bushes in Curtis’s pasture. I hope you will not be detaind longer than the Month of April. you will be weary of hearing of my wants, and of supplying them, but I find...
41John Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 11 February 1795 (Adams Papers)
Your Letter of the 19 of October from London gave me great Joy and all your other Friends of whom you have many much Pleasure— And I was again highly delighted to hear from M r Jay that he had Letters from your Brother at Amsterdam the 20 th of Nov r. M r Wilcocks who is kind enough to take Charge of this Letter is probably an Acquaintance of your s : You must take him with you in your Daily...
42John Adams to Abigail Adams, 1 April 1794 (Adams Papers)
Cheesman has at length arrived and I have rec d my Trunk in much better order than I expected. The People here are much cooler than they were last Week. The Embargo begins to be felt by many who have been the most noisy and turbulent. Speculation mingles itself in every political Operation and many Merchants have already made a noble Spec. of the Embargo by raising their Prices: but the...
43Charles Adams to John Adams, 13 February 1795 (Adams Papers)
I received your favor of the eleventh yesterday. M rs Smith has quite recovered from her illness and is doing very well Our electioneering campaign was opened in due form last monday that is to say that The Freeholders of this City were called together to hear who were the men whom Ric d Harrison Rob t Troup and Josiah Ogden Hoffman would chuse to have made Gov r and L t Gov r of the State....
44John Adams to Abigail Adams, 1 January 1794 (Adams Papers)
I have taken a Sheet of Paper, only to wish you an happy new Year and many happy repetitions of this Aniversary. I received yesterday a Letter, and Pacquet of his Liberty Papers and Pamphlets from M r B. Hollis dated 18. Feb. 1793. Where it has been I cannot guess. He Sends his best Wishes to you and hopes you have recovered your health and Spirits. I Suppose Columbus has now done with G— I...
45John Adams to Charles Adams, 11 September 1794 (Adams Papers)
Last night I received your kind Letter of Sept r. 3 d and am sorry to find that your Books were not then arrived. Before this day I hope they are in your Office, and I should be glad if you would inform me whether they are or not. The early Part of my Life was Spent among them, and they have never been many Days together out of my thoughts; so that I have contracted an habitual Affection for...
46Abigail Adams to John Adams, 19 June 1795 (Adams Papers)
I received yesterday yours of th 14 & 17 I am happy to learn that you are well, and hope the Senate will not be obliged to sit longer than tomorrow. I saw mr Jay last Evening. by the manner of his Speaking I thought he did not expect they would get up so soon. the Antis know not how to contain themselves, at the Secrecy of the Senate. they wish to be clamouring the whole time, and stand with...
47Abigail Adams to John Adams, 22 June 1795 (Adams Papers)
I was fearfull before I left Home of Such a Seige as has taken place. whatever else may be objected to the Treaty, that of a hasty decision cannot and ought not to be of the Number— as people are all alive upon the Subject, there are no doubt many Speaches put into the mouths of particular senators according to their former sentiments & opinions— one day we here of very warm Debates. an other,...
48Abigail Adams to John Adams, 12 February 1794 (Adams Papers)
Yours of the 26 th of Jan’ ry I received last evening. You talk of not rising till june. why I know not what I shall possibly do, every Farm to Man—and with hands perhaps that I am unacquainted with. a scene of Buisness quite distant from me, when my Garden & potato Yard are full enough for me to attend to. why I shall have to travell from one Farm to the other, and not bring much to pass...
49Abigail Adams to John Adams, 4 January 1795 (Adams Papers)
I received by our Thursday Post, yours of Decbr 18 & 23 together with the Bennets Strictures. you may be sure Bennet is a favorite writer with me for two reasons. the first is; that he is ingenious enough, to acknowledg & point out the more than Egyptian Bondage, to which the Female Sex, have been subjugated, from the earliest ages; and in the Second place; that he has added his Mite, to the...
50John Adams to Abigail Adams, 17 February 1794 (Adams Papers)
I this day rec d your favours of the 8. and 12 th. but how this last could have leaped to this distance in five days I know not. It is impossible to Say precisely when Congress will rise: but I will go home as soon as possible; I hope in April. I am very willing to confide all Arrangements to you— I like shaw and his Wife: and I like Richards and Joy from your Account of them.— We will try a...
51John Adams to Abigail Adams, 2 December 1794 (Adams Papers)
I have rec d your favour of Nov. 23.— M r Cooper The Friend of our Diplomatic at the Hague, I hear was very active in the Election of M r Ames.— I wish that both Parties and all Parties may be convinced that Some Qualification of Voters is necessary; but if Negroes & Sailors and Tapsters all unqualified by Law as Oliver Cromwell used to call them are to vote for one why not for another.? You...
52Abigail Adams to John Adams, 6 December 1794 (Adams Papers)
Your kind favours of the 19 th 23 & 26 of Nov’ br came safe to Hand, together with the pamphlet. the writer appears to have ransakd Pandimonium, & collected into a small compass the iniquity and abuses of Several generations, “sitting down all in Malice & Naught extermating.” If the representations of our Democratic Societies both of Men and measures, for these two years past, were to be...
53John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 12 May 1794 (Adams Papers)
Your Letter of April 27 was put into the Post office at New York and I have neither seen nor heard of M r Dorr nor M r Jones. It is probable they found a Conveyance for their Letters in the ship which carries our Envoy Extraordinary and their Journey to this Town became unnecessary. I should have been glad to have seen them and I suppose they might have obtained their Request without...
54John Adams to Charles Adams, 17 May 1794 (Adams Papers)
I am delighted with your delicious little Letter of 14 th. —but was puzzled to guess where you got your Description of Lubberland or what do the French call it? Pays de Cocany or some such Word. Does he get this, says I, from Old Chauar, or Spencer, or from shakespear? Young M r Otis, turned me to the Passage in elegant Extracts— It is it seems from the Tempest, which was to me, once very...
55John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 3 April 1794 (Adams Papers)
I have rec d your favour of the 22 d I believe it is, and am glad to hear that the People of Boston are disposed to Stand firm on neutral Ground. Much will depend upon their Stability. There are so many Interests constantly contriving to draw Us off, from that Position, that if Boston should fail Us We should be in great danger. I feel for the Sufferers under the Unexampled depredations of the...
56John Adams to Charles Adams, 14 February 1795 (Adams Papers)
As you Seem to wish to know my sentiments of M r Kents Lecture I will give you a few Hints to assist your own Reflections and Inquiries but as they may be liable to misconstruction and Misrepresentation, they must be in Confidence between you and me. I am much pleased with the Lecture, and esteem the Talents and Character of the Professor: indeed I wish you to consider whatever I may write...
57John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 3 January 1793 (Adams Papers)
The Public Papers will inform you that M r Jefferson has resigned and that M r Randolph is appointed Secretary of State. The Attorney General is not yet nominated. M r Lewis M r Lawrence M r Benson M r Gore, M r Potts &c have been mentioned in Conversation. The Motives to M r Jeffersons Resignation are not assigned, and are left open to the Conjectures of a Speculating World. I also am a...
58Charles Adams to Abigail Adams, 22 September 1794 (Adams Papers)
My books arrived in good order and well conditioned the day after I last wrote to my father. By some mistake the 28 th volume of The Dictionaire Diplomatique was left behind. Though I have not seen an account of the departure of my brothers I suppose from my father’s last letter that e’er this they must have sailed One half of your children are called away from you and though seas do not...
59John Quincy Adams to Abigail Adams, 25 October 1794 (Adams Papers)
We have been already ten days in this place, but there has been no opportunity to Boston since our arrival. And altho’ I have done but very little, yet I have been so perpetually busy, that I have scarce found time even to write to the Secretary of State, and to my Father. My Brother I presume has informed you, how pleasant our passage was in every respect, excepting the conveyance, & how very...
60John Adams to Abigail Adams, 20 June 1795 (Adams Papers)
I received yesterday two Letters from each of our Sons at the Hague, who were very well and in good Spirits on the 25 th of April: but the Letters contain So much Information, that I have been obliged to lend them to The Secretary of the Treasury: I shall inclose them to you however on Monday All the next Week will be taken up, I Suppose in further Investigations of the Subject before Senate,...