Over Life’s tempestuous sea;
Unknown waves before me roll,
Hiding rock and treacherous shoal.
Wondrous Sovereign of the sea,
Jesus, Saviour, pilot me.”
Our cry out, we felt better. Belle experimented with the gas, finally succeeding in lighting it. (It was a week or more before I felt safe in doing it—I disliked that sudden noise just as it ignited, it made me jump; and I always felt doubtful whether I had turned it off, too, and had to call Belle to come and see if it was leaking.)
As the supper hour was long past, we ate the remnants of our lunch, looked out on the strange street with the hurrying passers-by, explored the bath-room, and, after much investigation about the fixtures, took our first baths in a bath-tub, and went to bed for the night, in almost a cheerful frame of mind. We talked long in the darkness, getting better acquainted than we had in all the years of school together. Never especially congenial, as children contending together for the supremacy of the things we espoused—Republicanism and Methodism versus Democracy and the Baptist faith—over these in former years we had waged war; but there in the darkness we discussed earnestly and amicably our individual faiths (or doubts, now, in my case), our hopes, our ideals, coming to a better understanding than ever before.
In the morning the sun shone gloriously. In the great dining room a hundred or more girls were seated. No doubt we showed by our awkwardness that it was our first venture into city life; but we had a grip on ourselves, and felt equal to the day’s experiences; they couldn’t possibly be worse than yesterday’s and, I felt exultantly, we had lived through them. As she left the dining room the Superintendent nodded kindly to us, later sending for us to come to the office. There she told us they would manage to keep us a week, or until a room could be secured for us at the branch Association on Berkeley Street, a newer and better building, and much nearer the College. This was indeed good news, and we started off for College with almost pleasurable anticipations-so bright was the sun, so crisp the October air, and so eager were we to see what was in store for us.
I remember well those first walks to and from the College; our perceptions alert, everything so different from what we were accustomed to; the ordinary street scenes, the ways of the people, the peculiar pronunciation of the passers-by, even of the newsboys—everything was food for wonder, amusement, or ridicule to the two village girls: Why didn’t they build their side-walks on a level, instead of making the pedestrian step down at every crossing, and then up again? Gradually we learned that these marked the ends of blocks. We did not like the houses built all together, they looked queer and dismal. We marvelled at the huge dray-horses, and laughed at the queer herdics tumbling along; we puzzled over the street cries; we looked with interest at the “Tech” boys as we passed them on their way to the Institute of Technology, and felt a community of interest with them, as well as with the Conservatory students, as, crossing a little park, we saw them file into the New England Conservatory of Music. On nearing the College we saw the medical students coming briskly from all directions, nearly all of them carrying what seemed to be part and parcel of their equipment—the ubiquitous brown-leather Boston bag.
A thrill of expectancy went through me as, turning into Concord Street, we felt ourselves a part of this life. The building looked quite familiar on seeing it for the second time, and despite our disheartening experiences of the previous day, I went up the steps eagerly, in half-suppressed excitement.