John Adams to Abigail Adams, 26 January 1796
John Adams to Abigail Adams
Philadelphia January 26. 1796
Yesterday I came to Senate as usual on a monday morning pleasing my Imagination and my heart with the hope and Expectation of a Letter from—my dearest Friend. No Letter for The Vice President Says Mathers!1
All Day in bad humour—dirty Weather—wet walking—nothing good—nothing right.
The poor Post Offices did not escape—it was some blunder—some carlessness of theirs—in Philadelphia—New York or Boston
Or Perhaps Mam is Sick—Oh dear! Rhumatisms—Oh dear! Fever & Ague! Thus peevishly fretfully and unphilosophically was Yesterday passed. Yet to devert it I read a Number of Books in Cowpers Homer and Smoaked I know not how many Segars.2
I have had the Agreable Society of Josiah Quincy & Martin Lincoln, to assist in consoling me a little of late.3
There is absolutely nothing to write public nor private but such as the above— Adieu
J. A
RC (Adams Papers); internal address: “Mrs. A.”
1. James Mathers (1750–1811) was originally from Ireland. He served as the doorkeeper of the Continental Congress from 1788 to 1789 and of the U.S. Senate from 1789 until his death ( 5:239).
2. That is, William Cowper’s translation of The Iliad and Odyssey of Homer, 2 vols., London, 1791.
3. Martin Lincoln (1769–1837), son of Gen. Benjamin Lincoln, managed his father’s estates and, with his brother Theodore, built the Cape Cod Lighthouse under the direction of their father, who served as supervisor of lighthouses ( 3:12; David B. Mattern, Benjamin Lincoln and the American Revolution, Columbia, S.C., 1995, p. 188, 216).