But it was signed and who can say, in face of the fact, that Philadelphia was any the worse for its feasting? And what if it proved a dead weight to John Adams, did Boston, did any other town do more in the cause of patriotism and independence?
One inevitable feature of the "sinful feasts" was the Madeira John Adams drank at a great rate, but suffered no inconvenience from. I could not dispense with it in these old records, such a sober place does it hold in my own memories of Philadelphia. The decanter of Madeira on my Grandfather's dinner table marked the state occasion, and I would not have recognized Philadelphia on my return had the same decanter not been produced in welcome. It was an assurance that Philadelphia was still Philadelphia, though sky-scrapers might break the once pleasant monotony of low, red brick houses and motor horns resound through the once peaceful streets.
From the beginning Madeira was one of the things no good Philadelphia household could be without—just the sound, dignified, old-fashioned wine the Philadelphian would be expected to patronize, respectable and upright as himself. Orders for it lighten those interminably long letters in the Penn-Logan correspondence, so long that all the time I was reading them, I kept wondering which of the three I ought to pity the most: Penn for what he had to endure from his people; Logan for having to keep him posted in his intolerable wrongs; or myself for wading through all they both had to say on the subject. As time
