The drinking customs of the day which had now reached a fearful extent, and African slavery and the discussions concerning it, caused a shaking of the dry bones seldom equalled; for conscience, self-interest, and the law of God were pitted against each other. The main shaft that carried the wheels of business in Portland was the lumber trade, which consisted in transporting lumber to the West Indies and bartering it for molasses, a large portion of which was made into rum that went all over the country. There was new rum for poor people, and West India rum for those in better circumstances. I have seen my mother, as often as Parson Lancaster exchanged with my father, mix Holland gin and loaf sugar and warm it for him before he went into the pulpit and after he came out. I once went with my father to a funeral in Beaver (now Brown) Street, and a decanter of liquor and glasses were set on the coffin. At eleven o’clock on each day the bell would ring, the masons come down from the ladders, the joiners drop their tools, and all would partake of rum, salt-fish, and crackers. This great obstacle, in a measure taken out of the way, led to the development of a spirit of Christian enterprise which I leave to abler tongues and pens to describe.
[Among papers especially treasured by Mr. Kellogg was found the following letter:--
“DEAR MR. KELLOGG: The coming Commencement will be the fiftieth anniversary of your graduation. It is our custom to call first on a representative of the class of fifty years ago; and as goes his speech, so goes the dinner. Now you are not only the natural representative of the class of fifty years ago, but one of the most widely known and universally beloved of all the graduates of our whole hundred years. So we shall look to you for the response from the Class of ’40. You must not fail us. If you do not report yourself present at the formation of the procession in the morning, we shall send a sheriff and posse after you. The Congressmen will not be here this year. The success of the dinner depends on your coming, and giving us such a send-off as you only can give to a crowd of Bowdoin College boys. It will be a sad day for Bowdoin College if there shall ever be a generation of students who know not Elijah Kellogg. “Faithfully yours,