Diary of John Quincy Adams, volume 1
Was all day at home, and in the evening, closed my Letter to my Sister,1 as the Post goes for Boston, to-morrow, one day sooner than common, and Captain Lyde2 sails in a few days, for London: it kept me up exceeding late, or rather till very early, for it was near 2, in the morning, when I finish'd; I burn't my fingers, bruised my toes,3 and went to bed: but what was worst of all I affronted Miss Nancy by speaking somewhat too abruptly.
Letter not found.
Boston Packet and formerly captain of the ship Active, in which AA and AA2 sailed to England from Boston in 1784 (Boston Independent Chronicle, 12 Jan.; JA, Diary and Autobiography,
3:154, 156).
JQA probably meant that he burned his fingers on the candle and bruised his toes in the dark afterward.