formed with him for President which long outlived the one from which they withdrew. It is said that he did not confine himself to the regular studies of the institute, but used his extra hours in reading history and theological works. The work which he accomplished must have been nearly double that of many students. Yet he found time for many vigorous games. He soon left many of the classes behind, and at the opening of his second year he was appointed as a teacher of some of the lower classes. In that way, by doubling his hours of work, and taking for study, many hours of the night, he was able to keep on in his recitations with the advanced classes, while he taught the lower grades. The way did not open for him to secure the funds with which to go to college, at the time when he had prepared himself for the Freshman classes, and so he kept on teaching, and preaching, and studying the text books of the regular college courses. It was for a long time in doubt whether he would be able to enter any college, his financial means were so limited. But he never abandoned the hope, sooner or later, in some way, to obtain the money. He was not one of those young men who wished to graduate from college for the social standing which it was supposed, through the ignorance of the public, to give a man, whether he had learned little or much. He desired the opportunities which colleges, libraries, and learned men could give to enlarge the field of his study. He knew that he could obtain elsewhere all that the colleges could give, and more, by persevering hard work over the books, and actually did secure for himself the first two years' course of college classes. Yet he saw that he could progress faster with congenial associates and among men more learned than he. One day, he thought of his uncle, Thomas Garfield, whose various enterprises had been successful, and who had acquired a fortune. It occurred to him that his uncle might be willing to lend him enough to enable him to attend two years at Williams College in Massachusetts, where he heard that the expense was not great, and the standard of scholarship high. He had studied so faithfully that he felt very sure of entering two years in advance. But he disliked very much to ask any person to lend him money. It was a most humiliating step to take. He sought advice from relatives, and they told him to try it. So he reluctantly went to his uncle, and asked for the use of five hundred dollars, until he could finish his college course, and earn that sum by teaching. His uncle had always been kind to him, and had seemed to take a friendly interest in his welfare; but yet the nephew had the strongest doubt regarding the success of his petition for so large an amount of money. It was a large sum for a poor young man to borrow, but a very small sum on which to undertake two years of college life, five hundred miles from home. His uncle met him in a generous manner, and saying that he felt sure of his pay, if his nephew lived, loaned young Garfield the sum for which he asked. The young man, conscientiously desiring that his uncle should be secured in case of his death while in college, procured a policy on his life, in a Life Insurance company, for five hundred dollars, payable in case of his death to his uncle. Thus the way opened to him, at last, for a collegiate education, and young Garfield, full of joy and ambition, took leave of his mother at Orange, and of his school-mate, Lucretia Rudolph, at Hiram, and with the sum his uncle had lent him, slightly augmented by a little sum he had saved, started on his long journey toward the classic Berkshire hills of the old Bay State. Just before his departure for Williams he wrote a private letter to a friend, explaining his reasons for choosing Williams rather than the college of his denomination at Bethany. A part of it was as follows: *** "After thinking it all over I have made up my mind to go to Williamstown, Massachusetts. There are three reasons why I have decided not to go to Bethany. Ist. The course of study is not so extensive or thorough as in Eastern colleges. 2d. Bethany leans too heavily toward slavery. 3d. I am the son of Disciple parents, am one myself, and have had but little acquaintance with people of other views; and, having always lived in the West, I think it will make me more liberal, both in my relig ious and general views and sentiments, to go into a new circle, where I shall be under new influence. These considerations led me to conclude to go to some New England college. I therefore wrote to the President of Brown University, Yale and Wil liams, setting forth the amount of study I had done, and asking how long it would take me to finish their course. "These answers are now before me. All tell me I can graduate in two years. They are all brief, business notes, but President Hopkins concludes with this sentence: If you come here we shall be glad to do what we can for you.' Other things being so nearly equal, this sentence, which seems to be a kind of friendly grasp of the hand, has settled that question for me. I shall start for Williams next week." CHAPTER VIII. LIFE AT WILLIAMS COLLEGE, HIS HEALTH. APPEARANCE OF THE HOOSAC VALLEY. — THE SCEN- THE three years of study at Hiram had not impaired young Garfield's health, and when, in September, 1854, at twenty-three years of age, he presented himself before the faculty at Williamstown College, for examination, he was a picture of health and strength. His broad shoulders, large face, bright blue eyes, high forehead, and brown hair were visible over the heads of many of his fellow students, and he was at once known among them as the "Ohio giant." He appears to have been delighted with the professors, with the locality in which the college was situated, and with the extended mountain scenery. In his letters to his friends in Ohio, he was quite enthusiastic in his descriptions of the men and the landscapes. In fact he had been especially favored during his school days in the natural scenery which surrounded academies and college. Williamstown is |