November 3 Saturday – In Hartford Sam received a letter from Will Bowen (evidently lost) just as he was

…starting out of town to attend a wedding, & so my mind was privately busy, all the evening, in the midst of the maelstrom of chat & chaff & laughter, with a sort of reflections which create themselves, examine themselves, & continue themselves, unaffected by surroundings — unaffected, that is, undeterred by the surroundings, but not uninfluenced by them. Here was the near presence of the two supreme events of life: marriage, which is the beginning of life, & death which is the end of it. I found myself seeking chances to shirk into corners where I might think, undisturbed; & the most I got out of my thought, was this: both marriage & death ought to be welcome; the one promises happiness, doubtless the other assures it [Nov. 4 to Bowen].

This was part of Sam’s answer to Bowen’s letter of the following day. It’s not known what out of town wedding Sam attended.