John Quincy Adams Digital Diary

5

9. VI:30. Friday.

Clay Henry Crittenden John J. Southard Samuel L Whittlesey Elisha Mrs Whittlesey. Janes Henry F. Love Thomas C Hall Hiland Allen Heman, Briggs George N. Loyall George Chapman R Martin J. L Jones J. W. Patton John M Johnson Henry Chauncey Isaac Beaumont Andrew Wagener D. D. Turner James. Lawrence Abbott Mrs Lawrence Miss Bigelow Evans Hugh Elliot William jr Pickering.

I have hitherto enjoyed since my arrival here an unusual portion of health, but the sore throat and the catarrhal cough, last evening came upon me, and this day gave me warning that my time of exemption from them has past— I kept house all the morning, and received a multitude of visitors by cards. Mr Clay, Mr Crittenden the Senators from Kentuckey, and Mr Southard of New Jersey came in, and we had some conversation— After dinner I took a walk of about an hour— A person by the name of Pickering came and enquired if I had a book called the Theory of the Earth, by a man of New-Hampshire named Ira Hill— I had some recollection of such a man’s having called upon me some years since, with books, but not with a theory of the Earth— I asked Mr Pickering to call again to morrow Morning— Mr Hugh Evans of Baltimore spent the Evening with us— I had not seen him for several years, and did not at first recognize him— My first acquaintance with him was in 1822. when he came here to take Fanny Johnson, who was half-sister to his wife, with him to Baltimore— Fanny Johnson afterwards married a young man at Frederick— Mr Evans is now here upon a Negotiation with the Postmaster General Amos Kendall for the transportation of the Mail, upon the Rail-road— Mr Elliot came here to make enquiry concerning certain passages in my Eulogy upon James Madison— One of them was that in which I said that the credit of the acquisition of Louisiana was perhaps due more to Robert 6Robert R. Livingston than to any other man— He seemed to think this was an injustice to the Memory of James Monroe, and intimated that Mr. Monroe had left to him an injunction to protect his posthumous fame against that Hyena John Armstrong— He brought with him a Certificate of a share in the Washington library which he said Mr Monroe had given him, and a fragment of an old Letter from Mr Monroe— Elliot said that Mr Monroe had been exceedingly distrustful of Edward Livingston, and appeared to think he was communicating to me a momentous secret, by the information, that when Mr Monroe arrived at Havre, the fact was communicated immediately to Napoleon by the Telegraph on the 8th. of April 1803. and that the Negotiation was first commenced, by a note from Talleyrand to Mr. Livingston upon the 10th. of April— This Elliot supposed was a full explanation of what I had mentioned in the Eulogy on Madison as an extraordinary coincidence— I explained to Mr Elliot, that the co-incidence to which I had alluded there was the arrival of Mr Monroe in France, precisely at the time when Napoleon had determined to go to War with Great-Britain; and that the Telegraph communication to Napoleon, of Mr Monroe’s arrival at Havre was an incident altogether immaterial, and could add nothing to the merit or service of Mr Monroe in this Negotiation— I told him that in the Eulogy upon Mr Monroe I had given a similar narrative of that transaction, and had taken care to do him entire Justice. He had never seen my Eulogy upon Mr Monroe, and asked me for a copy of it which I gave him— He told me that he had a great collection of Historical Scraps.