THOMAS HILL. 427 



He established himself as a tanner in New Brunswick, N. J., and after- 

 ward served for many years as Judge of the Court of Common Pleas. 

 In 171)7 he married as a second wife Henrietta Barker, a grand-niece 

 of Rev. Joshua Toulmin (D. D., H. U. 1794), an eminent Unitarian 

 minister. Her father had left Eugland on account of the persecution 

 to which he had been subjected because of his religious faith and 

 his sympathy with Dr. Priestley. Of this marriage, Thomas, the ninth 

 and youngest child, was born, on the 7th of January, 1818. He in- 

 herited from his father a robust physical constitution, and mental pow- 

 ers of a high order. His early education was chiefly under the charge 

 of his sisters, who had the sole care of him after his mother's death in 

 1824. He was an indefatigable reader in his boyhood, and attributed 

 the formation of his scientific tastes to the reading of Franklin's and 

 Erasmus Darwin's works at the age of twelve. The more logical 

 statement would be, that without a native proclivity to science no boy 

 of twelve would read such books. He went to school from his ninth 

 to his twelfth year. His father died in 1828, and, as he left his family 

 with slender provision for their support, Thomas in 1830 was placed 

 as an apprentice in a newspaper office, whence was issued his first lit- 

 erary production in the form of a poetical New Year's Address to the 

 patrons of the paper. In 1833 he was sent for a year and a half to an 

 Academy near Philadelphia, of which his oldest brother was the Prin- 

 cipal. He then became an apothecary's apprentice, and remained in 

 that employment more than three years and a half. 



Young Hill had from a very early period looked upon the Christian 

 ministry as the only profession which he was willing to choose for his 

 life work ; and when his brothers found that this was not a mere boy- 

 ish fancy, but, so far as it could be, a settled purpose, they did what 

 they could to enable him to realize it. He was already an advanced 

 scholar in mathematics, conversant with the physics and chemistry of 

 the time, and to some degree an adept in botany and zoology ; but he 

 knew not a word of any language except his own. He commenced his 

 preparation for college in May, 1838, and in August of the following 

 year entered the Freshman Class of Harvard University, having studied 

 first with Rev. Rufus P. Stebbins of Leominster, and then for a few 

 months at the Leicester Academy. He passed his entrance examina- 

 tion with but one condition, and that was in arithmetic, in which he 

 was probably by far his examiner's superior. I think that I know T 

 how and why he was thus conditioned. The examination in arith- 

 metic then consisted in the solution of problems, or, to use the ver- 

 nacular, in doing sums on the spot. With his habit of prompt mental 



