He induced ten students to join him, and hired Professor Dunshee to give them lessons for one month.

During that time he read the Eclogues and Georgics of Virgil entire, and the first six books of Homer's Iliad, accompanied by a thorough drill in the Latin and Greek grammar.

He must have "toiled terribly," and could have had few moments for recreation.
When the fall term commenced, in company with Miss Almeda Booth, a mature young lady of remarkable intellect, and some other students, he formed a Translation society, which occupied itself with the Book of Romans, of course in the Greek version.

During the succeeding winter he read the whole of "Demosthenes on the Crown." The mental activity of the young man (he was now twenty) seems exhaustless.

All this time he took an active part in a literary society composed of some of his fellow-students.