him, and he began to think of going to some better
college in the older-settled and more cultivated eastern states, where
he might get an education somewhat higher than was afforded him by the
raw "seminaries" and "academies" of his native Ohio. True, his own
sect, the "Disciples' Church," had got up a petty university of their
own, "Bethany College"--such self-styled colleges swarm all over the
United States; but James didn't much care for the idea of going to it.
"I was brought up among the Disciples," he said; "I have mixed chiefly
among them; I know little of other people; it will enlarge my views and
give me more liberal feelings if a try a college elsewhere, conducted
otherwise; if I see a little of the rest of the world." Moreover,
those were stirring times in the States. The slavery question was
beginning to come uppermost. The men of the free states in the north
and west were beginning to say among themselves that they would no
longer tolerate that terrible blot upon American freedom--the
enslavement of four million negroes in the cotton-growing south. James
Garfield felt all his soul stirred within him by this great national
problem--the greatest that any modern nation has ever had to solve for
itself. Now, his own sect, the Disciples, and their college, Bethany,
were strongly tinctured with a leaning in favour of slavery, which
young James Garfield utterly detested. So he made up his mind to
having nothing to do with the accursed thing, but to go east to some
New England college, where he would mix among men of culture, and where
he would probably find more congenial feelings on the slavery question.

Before deciding, he wrote to three eastern colleges, amongst others to
Yale, the only American university which by its buildings and
surroundings can lay any claim to compare, even at a long distance, in
beauty and associations, with the least among European universities.
The three colleges gave him nearly similar answers; but one of them, in
addition to the formal statement of terms and so forth, added the short
kindly sentence, "If you come here, we shall be glad to do what we can
for you." It was only a small polite phrase; but it took the heart of
the rough western boy. If other things were about the same, he said, he
would go to the college which offered him, as it were, a friendly grasp
of the hand. He had saved a little money at Hiram; and he proposed now
to go on working for his living, as he had