I am not sure my Dear George whether your last Letter was answered or not but at any rate you will not be much grieved at receiving another supposing that to have been the case as in that Letter you assure me that both my Letters and my advice are of consequence to you and afford you pleasure—Upon this ground then I shall continue writing as I have much more time than you have and send you a...
12From John Quincy Adams to George Washington Adams, 18 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
I direct this Letter to Quincy, concluding that you will be there during the Vacation which commenced last Friday—My last Letter to you, was dated the first of March, since which I have received only one from you—dated the 26th. of April. It would have given me pleasure to have received that which you wrote me on your birth-day; and if instead of giving it to Mrs: Gilman’s boy, you had taken...
I do not recollect whether I answered your last Letter my memory not being remarkably good and keeping no account of dates but I rather think I did not in consequence of your father having undertaken it. I thank you for your attention in sending me the North American Review but your father has it at the Office now, so that it will not be worth your while to take that trouble any longer You...
Your father has intended writing to you several days but something or other perpetually occurring he has not yet fulfilled his intention—And finding nothing to do I shall devote half an hour to your and in the first place tell you how much I am flattered by the improvement which I am informed has taken place in your appearance and manners and which your Grandmother obligingly attributes to my...
15From John Quincy Adams to George Washington Adams, 10 August 1818 (Adams Papers)
It is a great affliction to me to be deprived as I am by constant and indispensable obligipations, of the pleasure of writing to you, at least every week; but so it is, and I am now to acknowledge the receipt since I wrote you last of your Letters of 17. May. N. 8.—of 1. June. N. 9. and of the 2d: of this Month, which is without number but should have been numbered 10. Your observations upon...
In Joke while I was in Boston you one day said you would lend your Books to your Uncle Tom in New Orleans I then laughed at the idea but on arriving here he I found a Letter from him in which he requests such a loan from your father and as I know that in that way it would be difficult to procure them you would be rendering me a most essential service if you send a box of them to him which he...
17From John Quincy Adams to George Washington Adams, 17 November 1818 (Adams Papers)
I have received a Letter from my eldest Son, which informs me that in consequence of a difficulty which had taken place at College, the President at the request of my dear and honoured father had consented that he should retire to Quincy, till the fermentation, was over, where he should study something or other, till the class is re-organized. As my Son in the same Letter desires me to assure...
What have you been doing? where has your reason flown? while your poor Grandmother was yet warm in her grave; while your own mother whose all of happiness in this world depends upon the good conduct of her children was confined to her bed with a fever, what were you doing? following the foolish example of a set of wild and unruly young men whom you had not fortitude to condemn tho’ you must...
19From John Quincy Adams to George Washington Adams, 6 December 1818 (Adams Papers)
I received about a fortnight since a few lines from you so ill written that it was with difficulty that I could read them, and to my great surprize dated at Quincy, when I had expected you were assiduously pursuing your studies at Cambridge, after an interruption not less melancholy than indispensable—Your Letter barely hinted at the temporary dissolution of your Class, and by its brevity and...
Your father wrote you a Letter yesterday in which he desires you to remain with your Grandfather to which I readily consented although with a pang which has absolutely made me sick such delight had I in the anticipation of your visit—My duties as it regards my children have always by some circumstance or other been rendered particularly painful and the sacrifices required have been almost...