John Quincy Adams Digital Diary

10. V: Edward Wyer was at my house, and afterwards at my Office— He has a Commission as Consul at Hamburg, but has now been here upwards of a year with no other occupation but to solicit a profitable Office— Last winter he was engaged the whole Session of Congress in endeavouring to obtain the establishment of a Navy agency or agency for Seamen at Hamburg without success— It was with the utmost difficulty that I withstood the pressure of application to recommend it officially from the Department— He is now urging me and the President to direct me to introduce into the estimates of the Department an appropriation for such an agency the ensuing year— Mr Hogan likewise called upon me— He is commercial agent at the Havanna, which he says produced him 2500 dollars in a year; but as the yellow fever is at the Havanna the whole year round he is afraid of having his family there, and wishes to exchange his present appointment for a similar agency to Chili 445and the Western Coast of South-America. Mr Mariano presented himself again as an applicant. He is an Italian, once attached to the Court of Napoleon, and having some office in the household of his Empress, Maria Louisa— He says he was at one time Governor of Parma. At the downfall of Napoleon, Mariano sought a refuge in this Country, and became a teacher of Languages at the Transylvania University at Lexington, Kentucky. Last Spring when C. S. Todd was appointed as Agent to go to Venezuela, though it was intended to be kept secret, Mariano heard of it, after Todd had left Kentucky, but before he had embarked at Baltimore, and came posting after him to go with him as Secretary or Interpreter; abandoning his office of teacher of languages, because he told me he had found it ennuyant. He brought letters of Recommendation to the President, and to me, from Mr Holley, the President of the University, and from Mr Clay— Here he became an applicant for office, and has so continued to this time— I sent him early in the Summer some Spanish papers to translate, which he did; but declined accepting any compensation for it, and wrote me that he expected something of a higher order of service than that— I had nothing of a higher order to give him, and he has been hanging on, renewing from time to time his applications, and pleading his distressed situation— About two Months since he went upon a tour to Boston whence he has just returned, and this morning he came to renew his claims for appointment, but I have nothing to bestow.— T. Cook was here.— I had also a visit from the Baron de Lederer, with a Latin Commission as Consul of the Emperor of Austria at New-York. I called at the President’s— He is yet employed in the draft of his Message to Congress—