Adams Family Correspondence, volume 3
I cannot recollect whether I sent No. 311 before. I promised your Husband to continue to forward the Journals: But my Wish is not to break the Numbers so as to spoil a Set for any body else. If therefore I at any Time repeat a Number you will be so good as to return it; and if I omit one you will demand it. I suppose Mr. A did not leave the 1st. 2402d. or 3d. Vol.2 in his Library. If he did I will send you a Set of 1779 to keep at home; and forward myself directly to the Navy Board what I design for him. But you must not keep any of the Pages of 1778, because I shall have but one Course of them.
Of the weekly issues of the Journal of Congress for 1779; see the preceding letter.
Of the Journals of Congress issued in volume form, for 1774–1775, 1776, and 1777, respectively. The volume for 1778 had not yet been published. For copies surviving among JA's books, see
Catalogue of JA's Library
, p. 60–61.
Before Mr. Adams left me he mentiond 2 or 3 gentlemen to me to whom he would have me apply for advice and assistance during his absence. You Sir was one of those Friends upon whom he directed me to rely who would consider my Situation and render me any little services I stood in need of.1
My present request is to be informd of the rate of exchange of hard Money into paper. There are so many persons disposed to take advantage of me, in this respect that unless I can find a Friend or two upon whom I can rely, I shall be imposed upon as I have heretofore been, and I have need enough I am sure of making the best exchange in my power.
The fluctuating state of our currency and the exorbitant demand for every necessary of life, together with the high taxes renders it more peculiarly difficult to be deprived of a partner at this day.
It has been my Lot in Life to be called repeatedly to the painfull task of seperating from the dearest connexion in Life. Honour and Fame of which the world talk, weigh but lightly against the Domestick happiness I resign, and the pain and anxiety I suffer.—One only consideration preponderates the scale, The hope of rendering Essential service to a distressd and Bleeding Country.
Be pleased sir to present my Respectfull complements to Mrs. Lowell tho I have not the pleasure of an acquaintance with her.2 A few lines left for me at Mr. I. Smiths Boston will be safely conveyed to me and will greatly oblige your Humble Servant,
John Lowell, identified and mentioned with some frequency in earlier volumes, was a Boston lawyer and a member of the Massachusetts Constitutional Convention.
As his 3d wife John Lowell had in 1778 married the former Rebecca Russell, widow of James Tyng (Ferris Greenslet, The Lowells and Their Seven Worlds, Boston, 1946, p. 63).