your Letter of Novbr 16th was an unexpected pleasure, for after yours of october the 13th, I had given up the Idea of receiving a line from you untill june, or july. you may easily imagine that your Letter was not only an unexpected, but a welcome guest, and the more so as it came drest in smiles of more content, than some of your Letters. I do not however wonder at your dislike of a climate...
My letter of Friday last informed you of the arrival of the Fingal at Havre, and of the dispatches from the Government, brought by her that we had received—I should at the same time have told you that the Ajax, the Dutch vessel in which Mr. Changuion went to America, arrived on the 21st: instt: at the Texel, after a passage of 34 days from Boston. I now add, by way of episode that the Dutch...
Mr: Shaw, an American Gentleman, belonging to New-York has just called upon me, and informs me that he shall proceed in the course of this day for St: Petersburg. He has a Courier’s Passport from Count Lieven, and has obligingly offered to take anything I have to forward—I therefore send the packet for Mrs. Krehmer, which I sometime since received from Miss du Roveray, and two letters from...
I did succeed in filling my four pages for you last Tuesday in time to dispatch them by that Evenings Post, under cover to Amsterdam. Before the British Plenipotiaries came, I bespoke your indulgence in case I should after their arrival remit in the frequency, or abridge the length of my subsequent Letters to you. Since they have been here, we have at different times had a great pressure of...
If you keep the file of my Letters, and will look back to that of 5. August. you will find it contains an incartade against the Post-Office, for treating you and me so ungraciously, by its caprices and delays in the transmission of our Letters to each other.—It is very agreeable to me to find that my next Letter after that, to you, was delivered at the proper day the Wednesday, for the first...
I have a thousand apologies to make to you, Madam, for not having troubled you sooner with a line, which to avoid fatiguing you, I omit altogether—In fact I have as yet met with nothing of sufficient importance to deserve your attention and I can hardly flatter myself that you will find any thing here to repay the pain of reading. To be sure, I should pity the man, who could travel from...
127From John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 23 August 1814 (Adams Papers)
We had last Friday, after my letter of that day to you was closed, a conference with the British Commissioners at their request, which will probably be the last—Lord Castlereagh himself had arrived here the Night before, and left this place on his way to Bruxelles the day after—We did not see him; but at the Conference it is scarcely a figure of speech to say that we felt him—Our opponents...
128From John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 2 June 1814 (Adams Papers)
I wrote you by the last Post, that it was my intention to leave this City for Gothenburg this day, and that my next Letter to you, would probably be from that place—I still hold my purpose of departing at six O’Clock this Evening; but I have not Patience to wait untill I reach Gothenburg before I write to you again—Having taken a Press Copy of my last, I now enclose it to you, lest by some...
Your favour of 30. September is still the latest that I have received from you, and it has left me in a solicitude more than ordinary to hear from you again—first because it complains that both yourself and Charles were unwell; and secondly because it expresses some displeasure at what I had written you in the Letter of 6. September, to which it is an answer—It could be my earnest wish to...
It is a long time since I addresed a Letter to You, and a much longer since I received a Letter from you. altho there are so many natural impediments, and artificial obstruction in the way of a free communication, I will not wholy relinquish the hope I have: that some of the many Letters I have written may find there way to you. vessels arrive from the North, but do not bring any tydings of...
131From John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 15 July 1814 (Adams Papers)
The stream of high and mighty travellers from London, through this place has been incessant since the passage of the Emperor Alexander—The two Sons of the king of Prussia, and his brothers the Princes Henry and William; the second Son of the Sovereign Prince of the Netherlands, Count Nesselrode, and lastly Field-Marshal Prince Blucher, have all been successively here—Most of them have stopp’d,...
132From John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 3 January 1815 (Adams Papers)
A happy New-Year! and many, many happy years to my dearest wife, and to my beloved Son Charles, and his far distant brothers!—It begins under better and more promising auspices, than we have known for many years; and may it please almighty God, that its progress and termination, may correspond with so propitious a commencement! You perceive that I dwell with delight upon the contemplation of...
133From John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 19 July 1814 (Adams Papers)
The false alarm, that I gave you in my last Letter, of the arrival of the British Commissioners, came to us from no less a personage than the Mayor of the City—It was occasioned by the real arrival of two British General Officers, who the next Morning proceeded on their way to Ostend—Letters have since been received from England, by which it appears that we may expect the Commissioners in the...
On Saturday last, I wrote you a few lines by Mr. Shaw, a Gentleman of New-York, whom you may perhaps recollect, although I did not, until he reminded me that he had once dined with us, at our house in the Adelphi–Buildings, in company with Mr. Boylston—I remembered perfectly well that dinner, and a circumstance of the ludicrous kind, which occurred between him and Boylston—But he mentions...
135From John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 26 August 1814 (Adams Papers)
It is vain to attempt accounting for the irregularities of the Post-Office—Yesterday I received your N. 18 (which should have been numbered 19) of 28. July; and a Letter from Mr Harris, dated the day before—These Letters have been four entire weeks on the way—But Messrs: Gallatin, Bayard and Hughes, all received at the same time, Letters from Harris, dated 2. August—six days later than his...
136From John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 30 August 1814 (Adams Papers)
Your Letter of the 2d. instt. addressed directly to me at the Hotel des Pays-Bas, came safely to hand on Saturday the 27th: It had therefore been 25 days on the road, and further confirmed the opinion that the Post is somewhere transmitted only once a week; and that the Post that starts on Saturdays is the one that goes through without being stopp’d—I should therefore from the commencement of...
137From John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 7 June 1814 (Adams Papers)
Since my departure from Gothenburg Stockholm, I have been in such a constant tumult of motion, and emotion, that I have not been able to put pen to paper, except to write my name in the day-book at the Post-houses on the road—I have much to say to you, of no sort of importance, but which I want to say, because every thing is important to those whom we love—I mean, as the Clown in Shakespear...
I will not let mr Ingraham depart without a few Lines to you. I have written to you Several times since the date of your last Letter to me was in May. it carried with it so many melancholy traits, that I was greived to find how deeply You had been wounded. the Resignation, and fortitude you discoverd, after the first Paroxisms of your Greif had Subsided, made me hope, that it would not prey...
I feel asham’d My Dear Neice when I think how few Letters I have written to you since you left us. I should be inexcusable indeed if I had not known your other Friends had not kept you inform’d of the welfair of your dear Boys under our care. I have receiv’d three Letters from you, for which I sincerely thank you, the last august 27th considering the difficulties attending the conveyence of...
140From Abigail Smith Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 15 May 1810 (Adams Papers)
When I closed my Letter; last week to my son by captain Smith, I fully intended to have written to you, but my health has been very miserable for the last three Months, so that for many weeks I have not been able to touch a pen, a universal debility and weakness daily reminds me of my decay. it is then that the distance, and seperation from my dear Children most Sensibly wounds me, yet it...
141From John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 6 January 1815 (Adams Papers)
There is a news boy’s new year’s address, in vulgar doggerel Flemish verse, circulating with many others, but which it seems some of the printers declined publishing. It alludes to the Bon-mot of the Prince de Ligne about the Congress at Vienna—“Le Congrés danse , mais il ne marche pas”—and then recommends to the Sovereigns and great Ministers assembled at the Austrian Capital to turn their...
142From Maria Pavlovna to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 20 July 1814 (Adams Papers)
Le Grand Maître des Cérémonies a l’honneur deprévenir Madame d’Adams, que le 22. de ce mois pour celebrer la fête de Sa Majesté L’Impératrice Mère et celle de Son Altesse Impériale Madame la Grande Duchesse Marie Pavlovna il y aura au Palais de Peterhoff Bal masqué, Souper et Illumination. Madame d’Adams est invitée à venir descendre & diner dans le Pavillon destiné à reçevoir le Corps...
143From Grand Master of Ceremonies of the Russian Court to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 11 December 1811 (Adams Papers)
Le Département des Cérémonies a l’honneur d’annoncer à Madam Adams qu’Elle est invitée, ainsi que Mademoiselle Johnson, sa soeur, au Bal de Sa Majesté l’Impératrice Mère, le 12. de ce mois, à huit heures du soir. MHi : Adams Papers.
144From John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 4 October 1814 (Adams Papers)
As news like those of the Catastrophe at Washington, seldom linger on the way, instead of a fortnight, which I anticipated in my last Letter as the term—in the course of which the account of that event would reach us, it came within twenty-four hours after I had given you my expectation of it—It was on Saturday Evening the first of this Month that we received the first accounts, and they came...
145From John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 3 May 1814 (Adams Papers)
I wrote you a few lines, at one O’Clock on Sunday morning from Jegelicht, the last Stage before this place, as the Post for St: Petersburg was going through immediately after I arrived there—As my luck would have it, I had just then met with two disagreeable accidents, the only ones that befell me on the Road—One was breaking the neck—of my Carriage, which I certainly thought was better than...
My calculation of the date of the next Letter I should receive from you, after the renewal of your writing at my request was sufficiently exact. I had fixed the 15th: of October for the date, and the 8th: of this month, or between that day and this, for me to receive it—The Letter is dated 16. October, but in your next, of 18. October, which I also now possess, you say it was by mistake...
147From John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 22 July 1814 (Adams Papers)
As I am reduced to the necessity of copying all my own Letters, and as one of the duties the most indispensable to my heart is that of punctuality in my Correspondence with you, I have made it a principle to have my Letter ready for you in the Morning of the Post-day upon which it is dispatched, although it does not go to the Post-Office, untill 8 in the Evening. Hence it was that I had only...
148From Grand Master of Ceremonies of the Russian Court to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 31 December 1811 (Adams Papers)
Le Département des Cérémonies a l’honneur d’annoncer à Madame Adams et à Mademoiselle Johnson, sa sœur, qu’Elles sont invitées au Bal masqué de la Cour, Lundi 1er Janvier 1812. MHi : Adams Papers.
On Saturday morning, Mr: Goulburn took, the last of the British Legation, his departure for London, and Mr: Bayard and Mr: Clay, took theirs, together for Paris—Mr Gallatin proposes to go this day, and thenceforth I shall be the only member of either mission left here—When we signed the Treaty, I expected to have been prepared to leave the City by this day—Since then I have postponed my...