Adams Papers Digital Edition

Diary of Charles Francis Adams, volume 3

Tuesday. 12th.

Thursday. 14th.
Wednesday. 13th. CFA

1830-01-13

 Wednesday. 13th. CFA
Wednesday. 13th.

The Weather was cold and the sky cloudy this morning when I went to the Office. It began to snow but it did not moderate sufficiently to allow of the fall of any quantity. I was engaged in the supervision of the repairs necessary for the House in the rear of my Office. It gives me much trouble, as I find myself standing in danger of being taken in constantly by workmen or others who think me young and easy to be imposed upon. One man cautions me, and another man cautions me until I feel as if I had rather more to do than I was able. But this is my first trial on this Agency. So long as Houses are occupied, it is an easy business, but when empty, and they need considerable repair, the trial begins.

I called in a few moments to see Mr. Brooks, and wrote a part of a letter to my Father on business, from which I desisted to see Mr. Curtis who came in to talk over the unfortunate affair of Mr. Vaughan. My father wrote me a letter upon the subject,1 but we decided upon nothing. He advises Mr. Curtis to go to England in person, but he seems rather doubtful upon it. Returned home. After dinner read the remarks by various Authors upon the Oedipus of Sophocles, La Harpe and Brumoy, who agree in their praises. It is a good tragedy but not so much to my taste as the wilder ones of Aeschylus. I also finished my Dissertation which upon reading over I did not admire. It did not appear to me as well as I expected. Evening at home reading Clarissa, until Mr. William Brooks came in who sat with us for a very considerable time.2 He is a cousin of Abby’s, and was tolerably agreeable.

 1.

8 Jan. (Adams Papers). Following the dispatch to Petty Vaughan, the English agent of Thomas Boylston, of papers designed to effect the transfer of funds collected by Vaughan from the French Government and due the Boylston estate (see above, entries for 12 Sept., note, and 2 Nov. 1829, note. 2 Nov. 1829, notes ), Vaughan acknowledged their receipt but delayed proceeding because he was “sick in bed.” A second letter from him to JQA, enclosed by CFA in his letter of 31 Dec., brought information that Vaughan had, at some point after collecting the funds, placed them in the hands of his uncle, William Vaughan, whose failure Petty Vaughan 132had now to report. Though JQA had known and respected William Vaughan for nearly fifty years, he suspected that Petty Vaughan, knowing of his uncle’s financial straits, had placed the money with him, hoping thereby to provide him temporary relief, JQA’s proposal that Nathaniel Curtis, his coexecutor, go to England, like other efforts initiated to recover the funds, came to nothing. CFA seems to have been involved in this phase only as a conveyor of messages and correspondence. See JQA, Diary, 8, 13, 23, 28 Jan.; JQA to Nathaniel Curtis, 8 Jan., to Nathaniel Curtis and Mrs. W. N. Boylston, 13, 23 Jan., 4 Feb. (all LbCs and in Adams Papers).

 2.

William Gray Brooks, a son of Peter C. Brooks’ brother Cotton Brown Brooks of Portland (1765–1834), in 1833 married another cousin of ABA’s, Mary Ann Phillips (b. 1808), daughter of Lydia (Gorham) and John Phillips of Andover. Their sons included Phillips Brooks ( DAB ). William Gray Brooks’ Diary in 9 vols. (1838–1877, with breaks) is among the Brooks MSS, MHi.