For some years after she went to Vassar, she still continued the work for the Nautical Almanac; but after a while she relinquished that, and confined herself wholly to the work in the college.

“1866.  Vassar College brought together a mass of heterogeneous material, out of which it was expected that a harmonious whole would evolve—­pupils from all parts of the country, of different habits, different training, different views; teachers, mostly from New England, differing also; professors, largely from Massachusetts, yet differing much.  And yet, after a year, we can say that there has been no very noisy jarring of the discordant elements; small jostling has been felt, but the president has oiled the rough places, and we have slid over them.

“...  Miss ——­ is a bigot, but a very sincere one.  She is the most conservative person I ever met.  I think her a very good woman, a woman of great energy....  She is very kind to me, but had we lived in the colonial days of Massachusetts, and had she been a power, she would have burned me at the stake for heresy!

“Yesterday the rush began.  Miss Lyman [the lady principal] had set the twenty teachers all around in different places, and I was put into the parlor to talk to ‘anxious mothers.’

“Miss Lyman had a hoarse cold, but she received about two hundred students, and had all their rooms assigned to them.

“While she had one anxious mamma, I took two or three, and kept them waiting until she could attend to them.  Several teachers were with me.  I made a rush at the visitors as they entered, and sometimes I was asked if I were lady principal, and sometimes if I were the matron.  This morning Miss Lyman’s voice was gone.  She must have seen five hundred people yesterday.

“Among others there was one Miss Mitchell, and, of course, that anxious mother put that girl under my special care, and she is very bright.  Then there were two who were sent with letters to me, and several others whose mothers took to me because they were frightened by Miss Lyman’s style.

“One lady, who seemed to be a bright woman, got me by the button and held me a long time—­she wanted this, that, and the other impracticable thing for the girl, and told me how honest her daughter was; then with a flood of tears she said, ’But she is not a Christian.  I know I put her into good hands when I put her here.’ (Then I was strongly tempted to avow my Unitarianism.) Miss W., who was standing by, said, ’Miss Lyman will be an excellent spiritual adviser,’ and we both looked very serious; when the mother wiped her weeping eyes and said, ’And, Miss Mitchell, will you ask Miss Lyman to insist that my daughter shall curl her hair?  She looks very graceful when her hair is curled, and I want it insisted upon,’ I made a note of it with my pencil, and as I happened to glance at Miss W. the corners of her mouth were twitching, upon which I broke down and laughed.  The mother bore it very good-naturedly, but went on.  She wanted to know who would work some buttonholes in her daughter’s dress that was not quite finished, etc., and it all ended in her inviting me to make her a visit.