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                                                                                                                                              Isaac
                                                                                                                      Goffstown, N.H. Dec. 20. 1849

Dear Brother

          Your letter of 12, 19 inst was received just now; and now, while not having yet written from its perusal. will I commence a reply thereunto. I was extra glad to get your letter today; I had been much wanting it for some time. I always had a very sharp appetite for your letters; and now that you are away from home and folks, and not well, besides, I grow terrible fretted & anxious if I do not hear from you frequently. So much so that I can hardly keep from starting right off to go and see you for myself. At any rate you may expect to see me there sometime. I want to go over that Atlantic & St. Lawrence Railway. Besides there is some prospect that I may be out of business here before a great while, if they do not soon succeed in raising money to push the Road forward, and then I may have nothing to do but poking about to see the folks for a spell.
  Hardly any thing in your letter affects me so much as your lecture upon my indolence & lack of ambition. I know it! I know it! I have long known it! It troubled me dreadfully in College. I fear it can never be overcome, if indeed it does not grown upon me. It is partly on account of that that I chose my present employment. Physical exercise is a pleasure to me, and I am always industrious in it; but my mind is - I am ashamed to say it - lazy; it will work bravely - when compelled to - but without absolute necessity it is almost impossible to make it. The "Spur" somehow fails to affect it. I am afraid it is not "the clear spirit."

[top and left-hand side upside down]This letter may be not as much as yours, but I have not probably as much leisure and if you will write soon & often, I gladly will. write certainly when Dr. M's decision is communicated.