CAMBRIDGE, November 6, 1877.
To JNO SMITHE, in ye Village of Newe Haven and Colonie of Connecticutte.
DEARE JNO, - I promised to send you from time to time an epistle wherewith you might be assured that I was still of this world, and still devoted to you, so I take this opportunitie of enclosing these lines to you in a cover to my dear mother. Harvard College, you must know, is situate in a lonely plain, not far from y towne of Boston. There is one principal building in which we all sleep, partake of nourishment, and abyde, numbering twenty-seven souls. It is a large and fair brick structure two storeys high, and I am led to believe that there is scarce an equal to it on this side y ocean. The sleeping apartment consists of a large dormitory furnished with comfortable straw cots. We rise at five and go out into the yard to wash bye y time-honoured pump, after which y head professor - there are two tooters beside - conducts prayers. Oh Jno! how proud I am to be a son of one of the glorious May-flour pilgrims! How I delight in this matutinal devotion! How it strengtheneth me for y daily duties. We have twenty recitations a week. My hardest branches are Spelling and arithmetic. In y latter I find compound fractures especially difficult Most of y college felloes are goode and pious, but there are two whom y Evil One hath enthrald. They - poor wicket creatures! do frequently sneak to a forest in the neighbouring hamlet of Watertown and do play cards, y which offence is punishable with expulsion. I pray daily that the fetlock of sin may be loosed from them, but I fear lest the devil harden their hearts against repentance. Now, I must say farewell, for 't is nine o' the clock, and we retire regularly at this hour.
HEZEKIAH GOODBOY.
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