A few days ago I was gratified by the reception of a long letter from you. I had long since reckoned your name on my list of confirmed delinquents but if you will promise to do better in future I will erase it. It does seem as you say there is a strange fatality attending our correspondence for your letter in reply to mine from Columbus has never reached me. I am pained to see you so much disposed to melancholy because I am in the same condition myself & consequently unable to offer consolation. I cannot say that I percieve any light ahead. Those old wiseacres who during the war were always crying out, "Never mind Boys, keep a good heart. You know the darkest hour is just before day" have disgusted me with hope. I believe the only way to be happy now is to content ourselves with the old aphorism that "whatever is, is right"2 and endeavor to make the best of it. To day I know I am comfortably seated in a pleasant room before a cheerful fire, and outside all is cold & disagreeable the ground being covered with snow & sleet. I can remember the time when it was different, when I had nought but the ground for a bed and rocks for a pillow, and in this I percieve a blessing. But the blessing ends here and my limited vision is incompetent to pierce the thick darkness further. The future of the South is to me a mysterious horror and I decline to contemplate it. My imagination has not even yet shaped my own future but awaits the development of events. In College I am persuing an irregular course which comprises all the studies of the Senior & Junior classes with the exception of the Latin & Greek. Having but one year to employ here I thought I would during that time approximate finishing the whole course as nearly as I could. The inconveniences of an irregular course which before rendered it objectionable I now regard as reccommendations. Not wishing to enter into the struggle for College offices and distinctions the isolation which it affords, freeing me as it does from the boring calls & interruptions consequent upon such contests, is particularly agreeable. I am boarding at Dr. Malletts and occupy the office in his yard. All the Doctor's professional books remain in the office furnishing me an excellent opportunity if I were so inclined to learn something of Medicine. My present intention however is in favor of "the Law" though I have not yet fully decided upon that point. Next May I shall turn my back on College walls forever, & I allow myself the intervening time to arrive at a final conclusion. You desired me to give you some details in regard to this old place and I shall endeavor to do so. But I am puzzled to know where to begin. I suppose however, you would like most to know first if the old Ξ Chapter is yet alive.3 I am sorry that I am unable to answer you in the affirmative. Embarrassed by paucity of numbers & the scarcity of new material she was obliged to discontinue. We thought it was better she should die with honor than live in disgrace, rather than place the badge of Δ.Ψ. upon an unworthy member we surrendered our existence. There are now only two Clubs in College Ζ.Ψ. & Χ.Φ. As usual in such cases College politics set them at varience and they are at daggers' points. The number of students in College is very small not more than seventy five. Many of them have been soldiers and consequently are not very remarkable for orderly behavior. Of the old students there are only two besides myself. Will Reeves you no doubt remember. He was from Tennessee, in our class and your section. Jim Wall was in the Junior Class & ran for marshall against Josh Wright. I was not acquainted with him before but I like him now very much. Will Rencher graduated last June, delivering the valedictory. The old corps of professors are still retained and all look as well as ever. They are always glad to hear of their old scholars & take great pleasure in tracing their whereabouts. Old Gov. Swain during one of his lectures to us last session in speaking of Judge Ruffin mentioned your father & yourself & gave us the reason why you were called Ruffin. In the village there has been considerable change. Mrs. Hargraves' dwelling, Mr. Carr's store and Loader's large tailoring establishment adjacent to it, have been burned to the ground.4 Loader himself has for sometime been keeping a boarding house and running the hack line between this place & Durham. Old Mr. [Charles P.] Mallett has left his book store & gone to farming. His store is now the Post Office. Benton Utley5 possesses the largest dry goods establishment in town & occupies the stand formerly owned by Mr. Mickle6 whose circumstances were so much reduced by the war that he was unable to continue his business. He (Mickle) is the only one of your Creditors I have yet been able to see. He at first presented me the account with the first endorsement, but I told him I thought that probably you would be better pleased to have him make the estimate for himself and he then added the second.7 Old Mr. Mallett is absent from the Hill & will not return in less than a week hence. Wayne McDade has not been living here for some time. He resides at present in Wilmington. I have not been able yet to find out the amount of the accounts with the Di Society, but I will do so as soon as I can. If you paid your account you would be entitled to a diploma it is true, but the Society has been so poor since the war that it has been unable to purchase them and I cannot therefore ensure your getting one. And now in regard to money which you have sent me I sincerely assure you that you would have pleased me much better by keeping it in your own pocket until more prosperous times. I had forgotten that you were in my debt. I am glad that Willie has become acquainted with you & I hope you will like him. He is a boy of a warm heart & an affectionate disposition & I love him earnestly. But he has his faults which I very much deplore viz, a violent temper & loose notions in regard to the truth of the revealed religion. The former I have no doubt age & association will correct, but the latter I fear the studies of his Profession are not calculated to remove. When religious convictions have not been firmly fixed in ones mind by long habit or right reasoning the investigations of Physical Science have a tendency to produce skepticism, and upon Willie who has not enjoyed the advantages of a liberal education I am apprehensive of the result. I am no Christian myself yet I believe in "the plan of Salvation" as firmly as any Divine, and it seems to me any man would be miserable who did not. The thought of annihilation is a horrible conception to me and I had rather exist in eternal punishment than die & be nothing. Now Good Bye, and let me beg you to lay aside some of your constitutional tardiness and gratify with an earl[y] reply—Your old friend