Among other topics, including national politics and the sectional crisis, Tucker describes Boston as a place of some danger due to robberies and other crimes:

“ … The California trade seems to revive, three Ships Sailed on Thursday & two or three in the early part of the week, & there is now nine Ships & other vessels up to sail soon & there is a meddling crop of cotton, southern goods will be had this Season in pts from the eastern Side of the continent. … The political action in Texas, & some of the Southern States looks gloomy in the extreme, but whether their resolves of State, & political conversations will really be carried out, time alone will disclose. I am clearly of opinion that there is wrong & injustice on both sides North & South, but I still cherish the hope that there is conservative power in Congress, & the Union to lay all these exciting & alarming questions at the foot of a just compromise, & everlasting Settlement honorable alike to both Sections of the Union…

This City does not partake of Puritan manners, & safety to persons, & property, & there is far less personal Security in this capitol of New England than in any City or town in any part of Britain, not a day & night passes but what there is more, or less personal assault & violence committed & frequent robberies in all Sections of the City, last eve at 7:30 P.M. a market man had his desk robbed of $ 200 in cash & pocket books of valuable papers & notes, by Some boys from the out side who got all his treasure through a window, neither of the Suspected party was over 12 years of age, these are precocious lads, it is reported they have a clew to the rogues. As good men are very Scarce, I do not pretend to leave my lodgings after tea. In viewing the action of Congress & of the Several States in their conventions, I am more fearful of disastrous results than many people who look at the matter in a different view & I judge from reading our history some time before - & subsequent to the Revolution, the first grievance was met from the colonies much in the same way as the present agitation of Northern wrongs & Southern rights are having on the political horizon at this day, & why not the Same results follow in Separation of the Union, if Something is not speedily done to heal & Settle these exciting & dangerous questions & wrongs, both of the N. & South …”