One night, the story goes, the vigilant proctor actually found young Toombs playing cards with some of his friends. Fearing a reprimand, Toombs sought his guardian, who happened to be in Athens on a visit from his home in Greenesboro. It is not certain that young Toombs communicated the enormity of his offense, but he obtained leave to apply to Dr. Waddell for a letter of discharge. The learned but severe scholar had not received the proctor's report, and gave the young student a certificate of honorable dismissal. Later in the day the President met Toombs walking around the campus. "Robert Toombs," said he, "you took advantage of me early this morning. I did not then know that you had been caught at the card-table last evening." Toombs straightened up and informed the doctor that he was no longer addressing a student of his college, but a free-born American citizen. The halls of Athens are fragrant with these stories of Toombs. No man ever left so distinctive a stamp upon the place or gave such spicy flavor to its traditions. Among the college-mates of Robert Toombs at Athens were Stephen Olin, Robert Dougherty, and Daniel Chandler, the grandfather of the unfortunate Mrs. Maybrick of England, and the man whose chaste and convincing appeal for female education resulted in the establishment of Wesleyan Female College--the first seminary in the world for the higher culture of women. The closest of these companionships was that of George F. Pierce, a young man like Toombs, full of brains and energy--even then a striking and sparkling figure. The path of these men commenced at the door of their _alma mater_, and although their ways were widely divergent, the friends never parted. Two of the finest orators in Georgia, one left his impress as strongly upon the Church as did the other upon the State. One became bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church and the other a Whig senator. One day these men met, both in the zenith of power, when Toombs said: "Well, George, you are fighting the devil, and I am fighting the Democrats." Closer in friendship their hands clasped as age swept over their raven locks and stalwart shoulders. Bishop Pierce never hesitated to go to Robert Toombs when his churches or his schools needed money. Toombs would give to the Methodist itinerant as quickly as he would to the local priest. Whether he was subscribing for a Catholic Orphans' Home or a Methodist College he would remark, as he gave liberally and freely, "I always try to honor God Almighty's drafts." Pierce and Toombs had much in common--although the one was full of saintly fire and the other, at times, of defiant irreverence. It was Pierce whose visits Toombs most enjoyed at his own home, with whom he afterward talked of God and religion. The good bishop lived to bury the devoted Christian wife of the Georgia statesman, and finally, when the dross of worldliness was gone, to receive into the Methodist Church the bowed and weeping figure of the giant Toombs.