John Quincy Adams Digital Diary

27. V. Wednesday— From Quincy to Walpole.

Sent Mary’s large trunk, by Gillet of the Quincy Stage, with a Note to Charles, asking him to send on the Trunk by the Stage to Providence to-morrow— At eleven my Son John’s wife, with her two infant daughters, John Kirke and his wife, left Quincy, in the Barouche; with the ponies— I gave Mary a Letter for her husband, and with Salmon Farrar, the Chaise and one of the large horses, accompanied them on their first days Journey. We dined at Bride’s at Dedham; and reached Fuller’s Tavern at Walpole, just before four O’Clock— The weather was fair and moderate— I had intended to go with them as far as Providence; but finding that Mary and both the Children bore the Journey this day perfectly well— I concluded if the weather should be fair in the Morning, to proceed no farther but return to Quincy— At Bride’s I saw a Boston Patriot Newspaper, with the proceedings of the Norfolk County Convention of National Republicans on Monday— They nominated Genl. H. A. S. Dearborn, as a Candidate to represent the District in the 22d. Congress; and passed Resolutions one of which was in honour of Mr Clay. But an old man at Bride’s, the same who accosted me there when I passed through in June, told me that the Anti-masonic Convention had met yesterday and nominated Mr French now a member of the Senate of the Commonwealth— I attempted to both read and write this Evening at Walpole, with little success— I read a few pages of Mr Dane’s Appendix. He shews very forcibly that under our System, no State Legislature possess the power to nullify an Act of Congress: there are two or three indirect allusions to the Hartford Convention, of which Dane was a member, and to its doctrines—with a consciousness of the error of their proceedings; an effort to be understood as denying that they had any designs hostile to the Union; and a decently veiled admission that they were standing upon untenable ground, and acting under their influence of factious motives— This morning I finished reading the Dedication by Ernesti of his Cicero to Stiglitz. I had read it once before with Admiration. Of all the Editors and Commentators of the Greek and Latin Classics, I should pronounce Ernesti the first.