Perhaps the preceding detail belongs more properly to a memoir of Mr. Adams than that of his wife. Yet it would be impossible to furnish any accurate idea of her character without explaining the precise nature of the influences acting upon her, whilst still young, and when that character was taking its permanent form. There was no one who witnessed his studies with greater interest, or who sympathized with him in the conclusions to which his mind was forcing him, more deeply, than Mrs. Adams. And hence it was, that, as the day of trial came, and the hour for action drew near, she was found not unprepared to submit to the lot appointed her. Mr. Adams was elected one of the delegates on the part of Massachusetts, instructed to meet persons chosen in the same manner from the other colonies, for the purpose of consulting in common upon the course most advisable to be adopted by them. In the month of August, 1774, he left home, in company with Samuel Adams, Thomas Cushing, and Robert Treat Paine, to go to Philadelphia, at which place the proposed assembly was to be held. It is from this period that the correspondence between these parties, now submitted, becomes interesting. The letter of the 19th of August of this year[3] portrays her own feelings upon this, the first separation of importance from her husband, and the anxiety with which she was watching the course of events. Yet there is in it not a syllable of regret for the past or of fear for the future; but, on the contrary, an acute perception of the obstacles in the way of an immediate return to peaceful times, and a deliberate preparation, by reading and reflection, for the worst. The Congress confined itself, in its first sessions, to consultation and remonstrance. It therefore adjourned after the lapse of only two months. It is during this time that the letters in the present volume which bear date in 1774 were written. They furnish a lively exhibition of the state of public feeling in Massachusetts. That dated on the 14th of September is particularly interesting, as it gives an account of the securing the gunpowder from the British, in her own town of Braintree, as well as a highly characteristic trait of New England, in the refusal to cheer on a Sunday. The last of this series, dated on the 16th of October, shows that all remaining hopes of peace and reconciliation were fast vanishing from her mind; and in an affecting manner she "bids adieu to domestic felicity perhaps until the meeting with her husband in another world, since she looks forward to nothing further in this than sacrifices, as the result of the impending contest."[4]