A very quiet day without incident. My time consumed in writing a note or two and in a general survey of my private accounts for the last half year. They do not show any essential variation form the scale of the preceding years, notwithstanding the increased number of the family and the changes of the daughter’s illness. Not a single person to see me. A walk same as yesterday—and a quiet evening closed the year.

And an eventful year it has been as well to the Country as to me individually. We have passed in safety through a portentous period to the safety of the Government, and have carried forward the military operations to a point which permanently establishes the preponderance of power on its side. For all these mercies, it becomes us to be humbly thankful. On the other hand, although I and all the members of my family have been providentially spared to see the light of another year, it has not been without serious illness to several of them at different times. Especially the last six months have passed with constant anxiety about the condition of our dear Mary, which is alas! not yet over. We have remained in England a little too long for the younger members, whose systems do not seem to adapt themselves so well to the climate as those of their parents. Personally, my position remains greatly favored—fare more so than I merit. In worldly matters, the prosperity has continued unabated. One serious loss has happened in my Wife’s family circle, in the person of her sister Mrs Frothingham, the shock of which had however been much broken by the long preparation which her illness had made for it to our minds. It is the close of the third full year of my residence abroad, and reminds me forcibly of the study diminution of the remnant of my days which I could devote to my country at home. Here are no interests to animate my exertions. Let me be grateful for the fact that I may have been hitherto of some use in avoiding danger and in securing a good understanding at this event. If I can be instrumental in securing the peace of the two country es through this war, my time expended here will not have been wasted. With such reflections I finish the record of another year.173