Gallaudet and Clerc were the best of buddies. No letter in the ASD collection gives us a better idea of the connection that these two pioneers had. While this feeling may have changed and aged with time, on April 18,1818, Thomas began a routine update of his activities with this very special opening:
"Oh! how delightful it was to me to receive your kind letter! I do thank my God I have onefriend, yes one friend, dear to me, in whom I have always confided, to whom I have opened the in-most of my soul, who will never abandon me - it is you. You whom when I first saw - I esteemed; you, who was so kind to me in France; you who taught me how to teach the poor deaf & dumb; you who trusted in me when we left together your native land; you, who crossed the great deep with me; you who went with me from city to city begging for the deaf objects of our care; you who have laboured with me one year in leading the immortal souls to the knowledge of their God & Saviour; you who have been my counselor in difficulty, my succour in melancholy, my friend always. Oh! Let the tie which binds us together be never broke. Let us live together, let us serve the same heavenly father, let us trust in the same Saviour, let us labour in the same duty. Soon we shall finish the short journey of life. Will you lay the turf on my grave, or shall I weep over yours? Let us live together & and dispense the goodness of God to the poor deaf & dumb."
-Laurent-