Henry KL Dalzell to James Hugh Moffatt

Brilliant, O, 11/22/01 Dear old Jim: I have been sitting here alone by my lamp & coal fire for some time and just began to think of you & Princeton, and I was thinking how pitiful it is that we have so easily dispersed & how far scattered you & the rest of us are from one another. We never thought did we?, how easily our

new interests would absorb us. I have been thrown among a contentious & gossiping mining & mill working class, up here where I am tonight. I left a sure place in my Grandfathers & father's bank to get some livelier work. This place I thought would enable me to get some good hard experience with all sorts of men. It has been a hard place. The mine was improperly located when opened years ago; the coal is thin, tho of excellent quality, and thus far two superintendents have failed

to overcome the natural disadvantages and get out the expected amount of coal. We think we see light ahead and I may be in a discouraged mood tonight - but it has been a long pull. You see I've met a rough class, & not a very elevating one. Many of the workmen I admire but the greater part of hte impress me unfavorably. There is much drinking, and the gross and unnecessary profanity hurt me. Their coarse jests, in some unexplainable way

always seem to strike thro me at God. And I believe in Christ, Jimmy, as do you, only you must realize how much nearer you are to great teachers, to the founts of information and advanced hope in morality, than this rough little town furnishes. I hope I do not in the above give you to understand that there are no excellent people here for there are - many who in dignity & simplicity are the peers of any people I've ever met. But my greatest joy comes when Saturday comes for then I go home. I have a little

brother who always greets me in the hall. He looks in my suit case for apples & tells me every thing that has interested him during the week - from his guinea fowls to his dog, pidgeons, & pony. I wish you had a small brother, Jimmy like him: He has a very handsome black Shetland pony for which father got him a small cowboy pommel saddle. He could'nt wait for morning that night but I must needs get a light & go out into the bars