his special fancy by rebuilding another old house, and the place, after his death, and, much later, after that of my mother, fell to my eldest brother, who still possesses it.[11] I am not sure, but I think it was after two years of the Clinton Grammar School that I was transferred to Fairfield Academy.[12] Fairfield, Herkimer County, lies high on the hills, between the West and East Canada creeks, seven miles north of Little Falls. I went there first in October, 1825, the date I fix by that of the completion of the Erie Canal. For that autumn, I think in November, I walked one afternoon, along with some other students, down to Little Falls to see there the arrival of the canal-boat which bore the canal-commissioners, with the governor, De Witt Clinton at their head, on their ceremonious voyage from Buffalo to New York city. It reached Little Falls near sunset, and we walked to Fairfield that evening. The reason for my being sent to Fairfield Academy was that the principal of the academy was Charles Avery, uncle of my companion from infancy, Eli Avery, of our town, who died two years ago, who had been educated by the help of Eli’s father, Colonel Avery, one of the owners of Paris furnace. Charles Avery several years later took the professorship of chemistry, etc., at Hamilton College, lived to over ninety, I think, and through all his later years seemed to be very proud of having been my teacher. I cannot say that I owe much to him, even for teaching me mathematics, which was his forte. My capital memory allowed me to “get my lessons” easily, and that sufficed; and I had none of the sharp drilling and testing which I needed. He lingers in my memory in another way. He was sharp at turning a penny in various ways; among them, he for the first year and more jobbed the board of his nephew Eli and myself, who were chums, paying for it in cooking-stoves and the like from Paris furnace, in which through his brother he had an interest, and boarding us round, from one house to another (we had our room in the academy buildings) until the stove which cooked our dinner was paid for. Sometimes our fare was good enough; but one poor widow, who took us in her turn, fed us so much upon boiled salt cod, not always of the sweetest, that the sight of that dish still calls up ancient memories not altogether agreeable. I think it was not at that time, but at a somewhat later date, and with less excuse, that we mended our diet upon one occasion, one winter’s night, by carrying off the principal’s best fowls from the roost, skinning them, as the most expeditious and neatest way, and broiling them in our room as the pièce de résistance, for they were tough, in a little supper we got up.