TO MISS CAY.                                                                 Trin. Coll., 13th January 1854.

All my correspondents have been writing to me, which is kind, and have not been writing questions, which is   kinder. So I answer you now, while I am slacking speed to get up steam, leaving Lewis and Stewart, etc., till next   week, when I will give an account of the five days. There are a good many up here at present, and we get on very   jolly on the whole, but some are not well, and some are going to be plucked or gulphed, as the case may be, and others are reading so hard that they are invisible. I go to-morrow to breakfast with shaky men, and after food I am   to go and hear the list read out, and whether they are through, and bring them word. When the honour list comes  out the poll-men act as messengers. Bob Campbell comes in occasionally of an evening now, to discuss matters   and vary sports. During examination I have had men at-night working with gutta-percha, magnets, etc. It is much  better than reading novels or talking after 5 ½ hours' hard writing.

Hunter is up here all the vacation. Do you know anything of him in Edinburgh? His father, who is dead, or his    uncle, were known in Edinburgh, but I am not up in that subject. The present man is a freshman at Queen's, and is  a thundering mathematician, is well informed on political, literary, and speculative subjects, and is withal a jolly sort  of fellow with some human nature at the bottom, and lots of good humour all through. He does not talk much, and   when he does it is broad Scotch and to the purpose. I hope to see more of him next term. Old Charlie Robertson
is in better case I think than usual, and rejoices in the good opinion of several men whose opinion is most worth   having. He has become better known and better estimated of late, especially since Sandy came up. He  did pretty well in the three days, and does not fret about anything. The snow here is nearly gone, and it looks like  frost again. I have never missed a long tramp through the slush day by day. When one is well soaked in a snow    wreath, cleaned and dried, and put beside a good fire, with bread and butter and problems, one can eat and grind
like a miller. . . I have been reading a book of poems called Benoni, by Arthur Munby of Trinity, which are above   the common run of such things (not Lorenzo Benoni, illustrated by J. B., which I have seen but not read). Have   you seen the Black Brothers, a small book of Ruskin's, illustrated by Doyle;—a good child's book, which big   people ought to read.