Diary of Annie Adams Fields

Friday. 29. Yesterday afternoon drove to Beverly to see Lucy Larcom. She is living in the upper rooms of a little cottage house which still belongs to some of her relatives. These country people of Beverly have sold everything near the shore to the Boston summer visitors who bringing large...

August 4. We are enduring a fearful drought. Scarcely any rain has fallen since we came to this place nearly five weeks ago. This too is near the time of harvest. However the clouds are mustering, as they always do in time after all, and although it is excessively warm I think we are sure soon...

August 5. A fresh yellow morning but poor J. could not get up, not feeling strong. We drove out, however, to Beverly quite early while the freshness of the morning was still upon everything and this was a renewing of body and spirit. Beverly changes in behalf of its growing company during the...

August 6. A great sound of the sea comes in my window. I think a cool wind from the east brings it on. J. has gone to town and I have lingered under the trees this morning feeling the double glory of freshness and deep green. Last night the moon shone on the bay and Dr. Bartol rowed us gently...

August 7. Last night we took tea at Mrs Towne’s on Eagle Head. The moon was shining, the waters sparkling, the pines full of odors, the ground moist enough to make walking agreeable, so that our stroll home was most lovely. Mr. Bartol insisted upon going with Jamie in the boat (which carried...

August 8. The weather can be called nothing less than gorgeous, from the dewiness of the morning to this yellow afternoon, neither cold nor warm in the house, when it is a luxury to breathe. But J. went to town feeling anything but strong and I fear the heat of the city will not revive him.

August 10. Jamie sat next a man, in the train from Boston a day or two ago, who has obtained a sudden importance in this vicinity, of which he is a native, by his speculation in land. He is a great bore but J., if anybody, can gather honey out of such thistles. J. asked “What sort of a man do...

Friday August 12. Jamie came from town on the 12th after a long hot day. It was still raining although very warm when he arrived and we sat at the window in the good Bartols room looking out upon the thick curtain of grey-cloud which was frequently pervaded by distant lightning. It was calm and...

Saturday. Still warm, but damp now, found it too wet to sit out of doors so came in to write letters; the insects are humming everywhere with the first hint of autumn in their wings.

Sunday. August 14. A cold rain set in last night and everything was drenched this morning so we have had a day indoors except a drive to Gloucester this afternoon. We saw the town glimmering in the distance as we approached more like some of the towns of the Cornice road in Italy than any thing...

Thursday August 18. A warm day with a cool south wind blowing. The weather has been cool, almost autumnal for two days and everybody has been refreshed by the change. Such a summer! is the outcry everywhere. Fechter has returned and Jamie has seen him but he is very busy and surrounded with...

Sunday August 28. Not one word while Jamie was here for every little moment I counted his not mine.

Tuesday August 30. Last Saturday we went to Nahant to dine with Longfellow. All his family were at home, except Charley who has wandered far away from that cheerful nest. Fechter went with us and during our trip down in the boat from Boston, where I was obliged to go first on business, he talked...

September 15. Events have rushed on so rapidly and the journals have been so crowded with news that the days have been almost too short to keep pace with them. Today France has declared herself Republican, the Prussians have been supplicated to treat with a fallen nation whose Emperor is already...

Sunday Seper 18. 1870. It is getting late at night but tomorrow we leave Manchester and it would be a relief to make a note of a few thoughts which crowd upon me. I have just finished reading a few letters of poor Charlotte Bronté gathered up from some private source where they should have...

Saturday. Septer 24. Just returned from Amesbury where we went yesterday morning early to make a visit to Mr. Whittier. He was expecting us and we saw him characteristically looking down the street for us from his front yard. The moment we came in sight, however, he retreated into the house and...

Sunday—at home. We had promised ourselves the happiness of a visit to Mrs Putnam but Jamie dined at the Club yesterday & Mr. Saml Hooper asked him to dine there today with Mr. Sumner and Mr. Catacazy the Russian minister and I did not think, as the Editor of the first magazine in the country,...

Monday morning. A glorious shower yesterday has restored the earth and the morning arose clear and glorious in beauty. Poor France more and more miserable, Prussia more & more determined, the news from Europe is indeed sad!

September 30. Dark easterly weather with the trees dropping their leaves because of the excessive drought of the season. We often see as many leaves as the trees wear now, a whole month later in the season. People are getting back to town and the old city life is renewed, though for the first...

October 5. Mother and Sarah are here for a fortnight or three weeks. I cannot get much beyond housekeeping and plans for their pleasure while they are here and it is happier for the household if I think of little else; I see this plainly. People are getting back to town and are full of “res...

Jamie and one of the alumni has gone to Cambridge to the laying of the corner stone of Memorial Hall. It will be a solemn service I doubt not.

Sunday Oct 9. Have been re-reading Edwin Drood to mother and Sarah. What a keen satire upon what is called journal keeping is that journal by Jasper.

Friday. October 14. This morning, last year, (and fresh, and cold and foggy it was!) we drove early, while the housemaids were still creeping out to make the pavements still more wet and sloppy, to the railway station for Liverpool, in London. Mr. Dickens came immediately after our arrival and...

We have had quite an eventful week. Sunday night Miss Glyn came to tea with all the Reverend Alger family & two Miss Cushmans, wards of Mrs Botta of N.Y. Miss Glyn sang us the songs from the mad scene in Hamlet, very sweetly also reread parts of Antony & Cleopatra. Her voice is beautiful and it...

Monday night—we were obliged to go to Dorchester to dear Mrs. Baker’s, (as good a woman as ever breathed,) but we should not have left Mother and Sarah except for an English clergyman & his daughter who were visiting her and had brought letters to us as well as to her, just now. We found the...