Chapter

Dear Daddy-Long-Legs,

Behold me--a Sophomore! I came up last Friday, sorry to leave
Lock Willow, but glad to see the campus again. It is a pleasant
sensation to come back to something familiar. I am beginning to feel
at home in college, and in command of the situation; I am beginning,
in fact, to feel at home in the world--as though I really belonged
to it and had not just crept in on sufferance.

I don't suppose you understand in the least what I am trying to say.
A person important enough to be a Trustee can't appreciate the
feelings of a person unimportant enough to be a foundling.

And now, Daddy, listen to this. Whom do you think I am rooming with?
Sallie McBride and Julia Rutledge Pendleton. It's the truth.
We have a study and three little bedrooms--VOILA!

Sallie and I decided last spring that we should like to room together,
and Julia made up her mind to stay with Sallie--why, I can't imagine,
for they are not a bit alike; but the Pendletons are naturally
conservative and inimical (fine word!) to change. Anyway, here we are.
Think of Jerusha Abbott, late of the John Grier Home for Orphans,
rooming with a Pendleton. This is a democratic country.

Sallie is running for class president, and unless all signs fail,
she is going to be elected. Such an atmosphere of intrigue you should
see what politicians we are! Oh, I tell you, Daddy, when we women get
our rights, you men will have to look alive in order to keep yours.
Election comes next Saturday, and we're going to have a torchlight
procession in the evening, no matter who wins.

I am beginning chemistry, a most unusual study. I've never seen
anything like it before. Molecules and Atoms are the material employed,
but I'll be in a position to discuss them more definitely next month.

I am also taking argumentation and logic.

Also history of the whole world.

Also plays of William Shakespeare.

Also French.

If this keeps up many years longer, I shall become quite intelligent.

I should rather have elected economics than French, but I
didn't dare, because I was afraid that unless I re-elected
French, the Professor would not let me pass--as it was,
I just managed to squeeze through the June examination.
But I will say that my high-school preparation was not very adequate.

There's one girl in the class who chatters away in French as fast
as she does in English. She went abroad with her parents when she
was a child, and spent three years in a convent school. You can
imagine how bright she is compared with the rest of us--irregular verbs
are mere playthings. I wish my parents had chucked me into a French
convent when I was little instead of a foundling asylum. Oh no,
I don't either! Because then maybe I should never have known you.
I'd rather know you than French.

Goodbye, Daddy. I must call on Harriet Martin now,
and, having discussed the chemical situation,
casually drop a few thoughts on the subject of our next president.
Yours in politics,
J. Abbott