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were at the house which stood nearly
where Franklin's statue stands now, just below King's Chapel. His
servant had put ashes on the coast which the boys had made, on the
sidewalk which passes the Chapel as you go down School Street. When
the boys remonstrated, the servant ridiculed them,--he was not going to
mind a gang of rebel boys. So the boys, who were much of their fathers'
minds, appointed a committee, of whom my friend was one, to wait on
General Haldimand himself. They called on him, and they told him that
coasting was one of their inalienable rights and that he must not take it
away. The General knew too well that the people of the town must not
be irritated to take up his servant's quarrel, and he told the boys that
their coast should not be interfered with. So they carried their point.
The story-book says that he clasped his hands and said, "Heavens!
Liberty is in the very air! Even these boys speak of their rights as do
their patriot sires!" But of this Mr. Robbins told me nothing, and as
Haldimand was a Hessian, of no great enthusiasm for liberty, I do not,
for my part, believe it.
The morning of April 19, 1775, Harrison Gray Otis, then a little boy of

eight years old, came down Beacon Street to school, and found a
brigade of red-coats in line along Common Street,--as Tremont Street
was then called,--so that he could not cross into School Street. They
were Earl Percy's brigade. Class in history, where did Percy's brigade
go that day, and what became of them before night? A red-coat
corporal told the Otis boy to walk along Common Street, and not try to
cross the line. So he did. He went as far as Scollay's Building before he
could turn their flank, then he went down to what you call Washington
Street, and came up to school,--late. Whether his excuse would have
been sufficient I do not know. He was never asked for it. He came into
school just in time to hear old Lovel, the Tory schoolmaster, say,
"War's begun and school's done. _Dimittite libros_"--which means,
"Put away your books." They put them away, and had a vacation of a
year and nine months thereafter, before the school was open again.
Well, in this old school I had spent four years of my boyhood, and here,
as I say, my manhood's acquaintance with boys began. I taught them
Latin, and sometimes mathematics. Some of them will remember a
famous Latin poem we wrote about Pocahontas and John Smith. All of
them will remember how they capped Latin verses against the master,
twenty against one, and put him down. These boys used to cluster
round my table at recess and talk. Danforth Newcomb, a lovely, gentle,
accurate boy, almost always at the head of his class,--he died young.
Shang-hae, San Francisco, Berlin, Paris, Australia,--I don't know what
cities, towns, and countries have the rest of them. And when they carry
home this book for their own boys to read, they will find some of their
boy-stories here.
Then there was Mrs. Merriam's boarding-school. If you will read the
chapter on travelling you will find about one of the vacations of her
girls. Mrs. Merriam was one of Mr. Ingham's old friends,--and he is a
man with whom I have had a great deal to do. Mrs. Merriam opened a
school for twelve girls. I knew her very well, and so it came that I knew
her ways with them. Though it was a boarding-school, still the girls had
just as "good a time" as they had at home, and when I found that some
of them asked leave to spend vacation with her I knew they had better
times. I remember perfectly the day when Mrs. Phillips asked them
down to the old mansion-house, which seems so like home to me, to eat
peaches. And it was determined that the girls should not think they

were under any "company" restraint, so no person but themselves was
present when the peaches were served, and every girl ate as many as for
herself she determined best. When they all rode horseback, Mrs.
Merriam and I used to ride together with these young folks behind or
before, as it listed them. So, not unnaturally, being a friend of the
family, I came to know a good many of them very well.
For another set of them--you may choose the names to please
yourselves--the history of my relationship goes back to the Sunday
school of the Church of the Unity in Worcester. The first time I ever
preached in that church, namely, May 3, 1846, there was but one
person in it who had gray hair. All of us