Yesterday morning about ten o’clock I set out for New Haven with S. Barrell and arrived well a little before dark.  I went directly to Dr. Dwight’s, which I easily found, and delivered the letter to him, drank tea at his house, and then Mr. Sereno Dwight carried me to Mr. Davis’s who had agreed to take me.  While I was at Dr. Dwight’s there was a woman there whom the Dr. recommended to Sam.  B. and me to have our mending done, and Mrs. Davis or a washerwoman across the way will do my washing, so I am very agreeably situated.  I also gave the letter to Mr. Beers and he has agreed to let me have what you desired.  I have got Homer’s Iliad in two volumes, with Latin translation of him, for $3.25.  I need no other books at present.

S. Barrell has a room in the north college and, as he says, a very agreeable chum.

Next spring I hope you will come on and fix matters.  I long to get into the college, for it appears to me now as though I was not a member of college but fitting for college.  I hope next spring will soon come.

My whole journey from Charlestown here cost me L2 16_s._, and 4_d._, a great deal more than either you or I had calculated on.  I am sorry to be of so much trouble to you and the cause of so much anxiety in you and especially in mama.  I wish you to give my very affectionate love to my dear brothers, and tell them they must write me and not be homesick, but consider that I am farther from home than they are, 136 miles from home.  I remain

Your ever affectionate son,
S.F.B.  MORSE.

It would seem, from other letters which follow, that he had difficulty in keeping up with his class, and that he eventually dropped a class, for he did not graduate until 1810.  He also seems to have been rooming outside of college and to have been eager to go in.

It is curious, in the light of future events, to note that young Morse’s parents were fearful lest his volatile nature and lack of steadfastness of purpose should mar his future career.  His dominating characteristic in later life was a bulldog tenacity, which led him to stick to one idea through discouragements and disappointments which would have overwhelmed a weaker nature.

The following extracts are from a long letter from his mother dated November 23, 1805:—­

“I am fearful, my son, that you think a great deal more of your amusements than your studies, and there lies the difficulty, and the same difficulty would exist were you in college.

“You have filled your letter with requests to go into college and an account of a gunning party, both of which have given us pain.  I am truly sorry that you appear so unsteady as by your own account you are....

“You mention in the letter you wrote first that, if you went into college, you and your chum would want brandy and wine and segars in your room.  Pray is that the custom among the students?  We think it a very improper one, indeed, and hope the government of college will not permit it.  There is no propriety at all in such young boys as you having anything to do with anything of the kind, and your papa and myself positively prohibit you the use of these things till we think them more necessary than we do at present....