AN UNPUBLISHED WEBSTER LETTER

This letter was written by Webster when he was struggling in the Boscawen law office to Samuel Fessenden, then a junior in college, near the beginning of a friendship which continued Until The Seventh of MarCh SPeeCh. The OPinion of college life from the perspective of the alumnus of four years, the favorite themes of conversation he notes, help us to a picture of the affable and sententious young lawyer. The letter belongs to Miss Anna Fessenden of Salem, a granddaughter of nthe recipient and was made available for publication by Professor Porter G. Perrin '17 of Middlebury College-EDITOR

Boscawen, N. H.

April 8, 1805

Dear Fessenden,

At the end of a fortnight, I sit down to answer your epistle, which I read, thanked the author, and deposited in my files of "letters to be answered," there to rest until I made a tour to Amherst, to attend the Court of Common Pleas. That you enjoy health, is so capital a portion of information, from one friend to another, that surely you ought not to doubt whether it would give me pleasure. Health is more essential to a scholar, than any one, at least, of the nine muses, & ought to be cherished & courted as seriously. Yet a proper at- tention to health is, of all things, the most seldom. Preciseness, timidity, squeamishness, & affected regimen, are most despicable follies, & generally no way conducive to health. Exercise is the student's panacea. I entreat you to use much of it, for I know the spirit with which you study, & the necessity that you guard against the effects of sedentary habits—You seem to doubt whether College is paradise. I do not know that it is otherwise pleasant, than as it is a place where literature is pursued. The growth & expansion of the mincl certainly confer a very high pleasure. To feel that we know more today than we knew yesterday, & that we shall probably know more tomorrow than we know today, is bliss—Aside from this consideration, I do not know that College is preferable to any other place, where a hundred human beings are jostling against each other.

We feel your absence, from our village, as _ sensibly as might be expected. Winter, & its business, are passed over. Men have something to do, other than visit Law offices, at this season, & therefore we are left to nod over our. folios. I do not regret this, for really during the last six months, I have seen so little of my books, that' I am obliged, by civility, to accost them as I would any other friend, after a long absence, with "how have you been this long time?"—l only regret that you are not here, that we might sit down, of an evening, in the corner, defeat Buonaparte, rout the Jacobins in Congress, assign every great man his proper rank, decide the merits of authors, & puff out a thousand wise opinions, to ascend in curves, with the smoke of our cigars.

Miss R. G. is in fine health & temperament. She sometimes does me the honor to ask of me after your welfare. In one respect, you are exalted to an equality with the skies—a thing pleasant, no doubt, to a man of your ambitions—for you furnish the topic of conversation.

I wish it were in your convenience to spend the autumn & winter in our School. But of this, & all other things, we will converse, when we see ourselves together in June—In the meantime, let me hear of you very frequently if you intend to oblige.

Your Friend

Dooley carrying the ball