“What a contrast the following correspondence of the two rival Presidents of the greatest republic of the world, reflecting an old age dedicated to virtue, temperance, and philosophy, presents to the heart-sickening details occasionally disclosed to us, of the miserable beings who fill the thrones of the continent. There is not, perhaps, one sovereign of the continent, who in any sense of the word can be said to honor our nature, while many make us almost ashamed of it. The curtain is seldom drawn aside without exhibiting to us beings worn out with vicious indulgence, diseased in mind, if not in body, the creatures of caprice and insensibility. On the other hand, since the foundation of the American Republic, the chair has never been filled by a man for whose life (to say the least) any American need once to blush. It must, therefore, be some compensation to the Americans for the absence of pure monarchy, that when they look upward, their eyes are not always met by vice, and meanness, and often idiocy.” The administration of Mr. Adams was remarkable for the peace and prosperity of the country, and there was therefore no event in Mrs. Adams’ social life of a stirring nature. Her husband was certainly the most learned man who has yet occupied the Presidential chair. No one at all acquainted with his life will deny this assertion. Profoundly versed in the lore of the ancients, he was yet more thoroughly acquainted with the history of modern governments, and was a deep thinker, as well as an eloquent speaker. A Southern clergyman visited him during his administration, and was astonished to find he was intimately acquainted with all sects and creeds, and had read every book he could mention. Finally he remembered one work of importance, and asked if he had read it. Mr. Adams had not, whereupon the minister, delighted with his success, told it everywhere and was afterward known as the man who had read one more book than John Quincy Adams. Mrs. Adams retired from the White House with heartfelt pleasure, and sought the quiet her delicate health demanded. The following interesting account of an interview with ex-President Adams, by a Southern gentleman, in 1834, affords some conception of the home of Mrs. Adams at Quincy.