The transition from school to college was very pleasant to him. “I am having a grand time,” he wrote; “heaps of pleasant occupation; just enough work in getting my lessons to make it interesting, and manly fellows to associate with, who have some experience of life, in place of those narrow-minded little scatter-wits of ---- School memory. Up here you hear the question, How can he write? or, Is he a deep man? Is he a solid scholar, or a mere dig? Is he a fellow of principle? etc., etc., instead of, Is he handsome? Does he dress well? How much money has he? or, Will he stand treat? My mind has a chance to get well waked up.” By nature he was full of energy; and full occupation was essential to his happiness. In his Bible he had pasted the following extract from Sir Fowell Buxton: “The longer I live, the more I am certain that the great difference between men, between the feeble and the powerful, the great and the insignificant, is _energy_,--invincible determination; a purpose once fixed, and then ‘death or victory.’ That quality will do anything that can be done in this world; and no talents, no circumstances, no opportunities, will make a two-legged creature a man without it.” Into his endeavors to get the full benefit of out-door exercise he carried this energy, while on the Hudson River, and also at Williamstown. He delighted in the scenery among our mountains, and often went on rambles of five, ten, and sometimes twenty miles or more. He was a close observer of nature, and often indulged in lively descriptions of what he saw. Never was a son or brother more affectionately eager to return to his beloved ones at home; but after a week or ten days’ solace in their society, such was the inexorable demand of big nature for some useful employment, that he could not bring himself to remain without it. In December, 1862, his first college vacation, he offered his services to the Christian Commission, and was sent to the Army of the Potomac, in which he labored, at Camp Convalescent, and at Falmouth, acceptably and heartily, for nearly six weeks. From Camp Convalescent he wrote: “I have now made fair trial of camp-life, and find it, in some respects, inferior to home-life. Nevertheless, we make ourselves pretty comfortable. We go round camp in the day-time, distributing and talking with the men: also in the hospitals we read and pray with the soldiers. We have a prayer-meeting in our tent every morning at half-past nine. It is a very pleasant meeting; our tent is quite filled--twenty men or more. The men here are well off for food, clothing, and fuel, but they want some one to look after their souls.”