John Quincy Adams Digital Diary

7. VII:30. My wife intended to have gone to London this day; but upon receiving an answer from Mrs Delafield, concluded not to go. I walked as far as Brentford, where the Carriage overtook me. I had proposed paying some visits, but it was too late when I reached town. I stopped at Richardson’s N. 96. Pall Mall, and made some enquiries about Wines, and took samples. Went to N. 28 Craven Street; to which place Smith has removed the Office, and his lodgings— I found there the box which had arrived from Russia, in the 107Ship Holderness, addressed to me. It had been brought yesterday by a Custom-House Officer, and opened by him— It contained only two Books, one a Quarto Volume elegantly bound, a Manuscript addressed to me, by F. E. Montreal, upon the external Commerce of Russia, by the Black Sea, and the Sea of Azoff. And the other La Pie’s Chart of the Mediterranean and Black Seas. There was also a Letter from Robert Aspland, with a copy of the Memoirs of Thomas Brand Hollis, by their Author Dr Disney—and a number of Mr Aspland’s own publications; chiefly upon the subject of Unitarianism— A note from T. M. Jones, sending me Mr Pillet’s Book upon England. And there were Cards from Mr Rotch, Dr Platt, P. V. Ogden and F. B. Ogden, the last of whom has lately arrived from America; and left with his Card, a Letter of Recommendation from my brother— These papers and the copies of Page’s Correspondence with Earl Bathurst, relative to Cook’s cause which I now read, engaged me till five. I left Couling’s maps, as he had requested at N. 415. Strand, and went with Smith and dined at my old Leyden acquaintance Dr Cooke’s. N. 71. Gower Street. The Company consisted of Mr Frend, Mr Burdett, Dr. Cooke the navy Chaplain, and Mr Const and Mr Cunningham, two Gentlemen whom I had not seen before— I soon found that they were not in political opinion with the rest of the Company— The political Conversation however was of a very moderate character.— A Surgeon of the Northumberland, named Warden, has just published an account of his Conversations with Napoleon at St Helena; in which he touched upon some of the heaviest charges that have been brought against him; and among the rest that of his having poisoned his sick at Jaffa— Mr Const appeared anxious to discredit the account of the matter, as told by Napoleon to Warden; and said, that Desgenettes, the Surgeon, to whom the proposal of administering the Opium to the sick was made, died in this Country— That he told Dr Bailey, who had repeated it at the table where we were sitting, that Buonaparte had proposed to him to despatch all the sick with opium—that he made no assertion that they were in a state beyond the chance of recovery— That he Desgenettes had refused; saying that his business was to heal, and not to kill; and had left him; and did not attend again at the hospital— That the sick were committed to another man; and all died; giving it to be understood that what he had refused to do, had been done by another— We had also conversation upon the riots that took place in London, last Monday—upon Jewish Sacrifices, and upon Astronomy, in which I perceive Mr Frend is an Anti Newtonian. We sat at table until past eleven— I then took Smith to his lodgings, and it was half past one in the Morning when I reached home—