ll, under the tuition of all the Livingston
girls, Sarah, Susan, Kitty, and Judith, he felt very sociable indeed;
and if his ears, sometimes, were soundly boxed, he looked so penitent
and meek that he was contritely rewarded with the kiss he had snatched.

The girls regarded him as a cross between a sweet and charming boy to be
spoiled--one night, when he had a toothache, they all sat up with
him--and a phenomenon of nature of which they stood a trifle in awe. But
the last was when he was not present and they fell to discussing him.
And with them, as with all women, he wore, because to the gay vivacity
and polished manners of his Gallic inheritance he added the rugged
sincerity of the best of Britons; and in the silences of his heart he
was too sensible of the inferiority of the sex, out of which, first and
last, he derived so much pleasure, not to be tender and considerate of
it always.

Before the year of 1773 was out Mr. Barber pronounced him ready for
college, and, his choice being Princeton, he presented himself to Dr.
Witherspoon and demanded a special course which would permit him to
finish several years sooner than if he graduated from class to class. He
knew his capacity for conquering mental tasks, and having his own way to
make in the world, had no mind to waste years and the substance of his
relatives at college. Dr. Witherspoon, who had long been deeply
interested in him, examined him privately and pronounced him equal to
the heavy burden he had imposed upon himself, but feared that the board
of trustees would not consent to so original a plan. They would not.
Hamilton, nothing daunted, applied to King's College, and found no
opposition there. He entered as a private student, attached to no
particular class, and with the aid of a tutor began his customary
annihilation of time. Besides entering upon a course of logic, ethics,
mathematics, history, chronology, rhetoric, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, all
the modern languages, and Belles Lettres, he found time to attend Dr.
Clossy's lectures on anatomy, with his friend Stevens, who was studying
medicine as a profession.

King's was a fine building facing the North River and surrounded by
spacious grounds shaded by old sycamores and elms. There were many
secluded corners for thought and study. A more favourite resort of
Alexander's was Batteau Street, under whose great elms he formed the
habit of strolling and muttering his lessons, to the concern of the
passer-by. I