In the following year (1821), his course at the Academy having come to an end, he took the entrance examinations for Bowdoin College. Though both he and his elder brother passed these successfully, they did not go to the College at Brunswick for another year. Henry then entered upon his course of study with such earnestness and enthusiasm that in a class, consisting of students several of whom later became notable, he ranked as one of the first. Like his classmate Hawthorne, he was especially devoted to the study of literature. So genial and courteous was his bearing toward all, and such a lively interest did he take in all the worthier activities of the life at the college, that though he chose as his intimate friends only those whose tastes agreed with his own, he was generally liked and admired. Perhaps the success of his course at Bowdoin increased his confidence in his ability to write for publication, though indeed it had been proved that the outcome of his first venture along this line had not after all destroyed the budding hopes of the young writer. For previous to entering college he had continued to make contributions to the _Gazette_. Other compositions in both prose and verse were now sent at various times to the Portland periodical; and in October, 1824, appeared in a Boston magazine entitled _The United States Literary Gazette_ the first of a series of seventeen poems composed by _H. W. L._ A constant sympathizer and admirer during these early years of authorship was Henry's friend William Browne, a boy whose literary aspirations had led him to form with Henry, before the latter entered Bowdoin, a sort of association by which various literary enterprises were attempted. Indeed, it seems probable that at this time Henry looked rather to such companions than to his parents for appreciation of his developing ability. At all events, we find him writing to his father in March, 1824: "I feel very glad that I am not to be a physician--that there are quite enough in the world without me. And now, as somehow or other this subject has been introduced, I am curious to know what you do intend to make of me--whether I am to study a profession or not; and if so, what profession. I hope your ideas upon this subject will agree with mine, for I have a particular and strong prejudice for one course of life, to which you, I fear, will not agree. It will not be worth while for me to mention what this is, until I become more acquainted with your own wishes." Later, however, urged by the unpleasant prospect of being compelled to obey his father's desire that he become a lawyer, Henry decided that he must express his own hopes quite plainly. In a letter of December, 1824, appears the passage: