Page:History of the University of Pennsylvania - Montgomery (1900).djvu/333

Rh a public ceremony of this kind would draw some of the hostility exhibited by the partisans of the Assembly against its Provost, personally towards the College and its Trustees. Three of the young men were ready for their degrees; And/ew Allen, James Allen, and John Morris had undergone the usual public examination with approbation, but they had to await the commencement exercises of 1759 for their public reception. l

But in the midst of Mr. Smith's trials and imprisonment, came the romance of his life. In his acquaintance with Judge Moore and his family, he could not but be attracted by the charms of his daughter Rebecca, a beautiful and accomplished girl. She was a faithful visitor to her Father in his confinement, and while the Judge and the Provost in their long hours of imprisonment must have often conferred together upon their wrongs and have fostered each in the other common courage and endurance, and maintained a mutual hope of ultimate freedom, the latter must have had frequent and favorable opportunities of cultivating an acquaintance with the former's lovely visitor; an engagement followed, and in a few weeks after his liberation they were married on 3 June, 1750, at Moore Hall, in Chester County, the Judge's residence. Mrs. Smith's eldest sister, Williamina, had married in 1748, Dr. Phineas Bond. Of this alliance, his Biographer records: he was indebted for a well-assorted and happy connexion; it was every way judicious; family, fortune and external circumstances, combined with considerations of feeling to make it wise. 1 Minutes, 8 Tune, 1759. See Smith i. 186.