After returning from sea Elijah found Portland and Portland ways no more congenial to him than they had been before he went away, and again he left home and went to Gorham to try life among his McLellan relatives. He lived for a time in the family of Major Warren on a farm some two miles out of the village, matching his own strength of muscle with that of the regular farm-hands. He was not there a great while, however. Rev. Mr. Kellogg came out from Portland and interviewed Mr. Alexander McLellan, a near relative of his own wife, and the result of that interview was that Elijah was, after the fashion of the time, indentured as an apprentice to Mr. McLellan to do general work on the place for the period of one year. The purpose of this indenture, however, was rather to restrain and hold him in one stated place than to make a servant of him, for he became at once a true member of the family “in good and regular standing.” He took his position and did his share of the work on the place in a faithful and orderly manner. His experience on the ship had been of great benefit to him. He had there learned the lessons of obedience and of industry,--lessons absolutely essential for every boy to learn if he would ever arrive at a worthy maturity. Now, instead of blocks and ropes and belaying pins, his tools were the plough, the hoe, the scythe, and the axe, and while using these he could almost fancy himself a pioneer. All this was a very wholesome kind of life and a right life in its way. Still it was no proper life for such a young man as by this time Elijah Kellogg had become. All his friends seemed to feel the incongruity of it, and the truth of this began to dawn upon himself, also. He began to feel, and to feel very strongly, that this sort of life was not up to his own level. The bird is for a life higher than the ground, and in like manner he was for something higher than the farm. There was a real genius in the soul of this boy that was reaching up toward intellectual exercises. Decks of ships, fields of corn, loads of lumber, were all good, but for him there was something better. The play of intellect appealed to him now more than the play of muscle did. All the associations in the family where he lived and those throughout the village were such as to encourage and foster this new ambition. This new feeling, this new ideal which was fast taking possession of his mind, was only an indication that the doors of boyhood were closing and the doors of manhood were beginning to open. He was gradually coming to understand himself and to have a dawning perception of some God-given powers, which, if they were properly trained, might result in the accomplishment of fine things. This vision of what he might sometime perform, if he would, rose to the front, and for the time assumed the leadership of his life. He was as obedient to this vision as Saint Paul was obedient to the vision he had near the city of Damascus, or as Abraham Lincoln was obedient to those dreams and visions that he had while he was managing the flatboat on the great river. The McLellan family, where he was living, were heartily in sympathy with this new development. From oldest to youngest they all felt that it was not a proper thing that this young man who was so gifted and who showed so many marks of a true genius should spend his energies on the farm and in the shop. There is iron for the place of iron and steel for the place of steel and silver for that of silver. This was a piece of silver, and he ought to take his proper place. It is needless to say how much this _change of aim_ on the part of Elijah gladdened the heart of his own father. It was indeed a day of general thanksgiving when this young man put himself in the way of a higher intellectual development and entered Gorham Academy as one of its students. This was one of the best academies in the country at that day. Its presiding genius was Master Nason who was known far and wide, not only as one who could keep rude boys in subjection to school rules by a liberal use of the birch, but as one who possessed faculty and power to stir the minds of pupils and impart to them rich stores of knowledge. New England has seen few instructors equal to Master Nason. The names of boys whom, in the old Academy at Gorham, he fitted for college, have in several instances become known all over the country, and some are known round the world. The Academy is proud of its roll of graduates, and those who studied under Mr. Nason have always been proud of their teacher.