"I awoke in the morning, and having peeped from my window and found the weather as bad as ever, I again pressed my pillow with design to woo a morning nap. All at once I recollected the extraordinary vision or dream of the past night--every circumstance clearly presenting itself to my mind--every look and gesture of the figure, and every word uttered, seemed engraved on my memory--I tried to convince myself that it was a dream; I argued with myself and resolved that it was a dream--but something within me said, 'it is no dream.' For several days I thought of nothing else; but at sixteen we are not fond of a long continued musing about any thing, good or bad; and in the excitement of hunting, fishing, and going to meetings on Sundays, the impression wore off by degrees.
"I returned to college, studied hard, frolicked harder, and was indefatigable in every piece of mischief which could be devised by the collective wisdom and ingenuity of eighty boys; and having several times narrowly escaped suspension and once been threatened with dismission absolute, I finished the course, and came to Richmond to amuse myself in every way I could find out; and for want of other matter to engage me, to dip a little into the sublime study of the law. The winter of 1831-2 was commencing. The redoubtable cholera had not yet arrived in America; but all were dreading it. Folks here seemed determined to take time by the forelock and live merrily while they could. I made acquaintances; and received invitations to parties, of which I attended many, where I cannot aver that even my small stock of ideas was much augmented, though on the score of creature comforts they were very pleasant; and by dutifully and honestly paying the expected visit after, acquired the repute of an honest, polite and agreeable young man. Some unthinking youths are so shortsighted as to care very little about paying a visit after a party, though they are very particular in paying it _before_ one is to take place. That was not my plan: I was always addicted to the calculation of chances, and argued that as one party had been given at a particular house, possibly, nay probably, (bating accidents) another might be in the course of time. Upon this principle I acted, and do not think that I ever lost by it. The winter passed and summer came on.--I went to the White Sulphur Springs, and by eating huge dinners and suppers, and drinking the dreadful waters; galloping about the mountains in Miss ----'s train, and occasionally walking five or six miles to fish, I got into prodigious health--my limbs grew firm and hard as iron, and I felt strong enough to brain a wild bull, or hug a bear to death. But I grew tired of this life, and early in the fall came back to Richmond to see what in the deuce the people were doing with the cholera. The newspapers said the city was as silent and gloomy as a charnel house.