Browsing: Diary of Charles Francis Adams, Volume 1

This is the earliest manuscript page of Adams’ diaries and contains epitomes of a longer journal now lost. Although cryptic, the entries give some idea of how the thirteen-year-old Adams lived in Washington. The sample also shows how Adams allotted two lines in this index notebook for each day of the month, used dominical letters, and introduced each day’s entry with the date and the time of his rising. All these distinctive diary habits are explained in the Introduction. A glance at the illustration also makes the reader aware of the young man’s rather loose punctuation, which the editors have conventionalized for the sake of readability.