The New Hampshire Gazette

NEW-YORK, March 13.

PRINCETON COLLEGE.

We have not yet been able to ascertain with precision the circumstances attending the destruction of this celebrated institution -The following details are the most correct we have yet been able to obtain :

" Last Saturday afternoon, about one o'clock, a fire was discovered issuing from the belfry of this venerable edifice. A strong S. S. W. wind blew, which in a very short space, spread the blaze over the whole roof, threatening destruction at the same time to a considerable part of the town.— The flames caught and kindled on 5 or 6 houses, but were happily extinguished without much injury being sustained. As all human efforts to save the College was in vain, and at this moment (6 o'clock) that magnificent and celebrated edifice, the pride of the State, and chief support of the town, is in one entire ruin, exhibiting in its destruction the most awful spectacle that I had ever beheld.—The house of Mr. Agnew, adjoining the College, was several times on fire, but was fortunately rescued from the devouring element."

"There are strong suspicions that it must be the act of some incendiary, as the fire began in the belfry, where a spark could not settle with the wind."

Extract of a letter from a Student at Princeton, dated Sunday.

" Yesterday's mail has informed you of the melancholy scene we have just witnessed here. The College, that proud and stately edifice, which for near fifty years has stood the boast of New-Jersey, is now a pile of ashes. Every heart is now overcome with grief, and every countenance covered with a gloom at the sad and mournful spectacle still exhibited by the smoking ruins. The conflagration excited in the breast of every one, feelings of the most poignant distress --still-still we weep at it. The students saved their clothes and furniture, and the philosophical apparatus, by great exertion, was also preserved ; but all the books belonging to the college, as well as the elegant libraries of the Whig and Cliosphic societies, and every thing belonging to those valuable institutions have been consumed.

Alumni of Nassau Hall ! Ye whom she has often exultingly placed on the list of American sages and patriots, and who still dwell with delight on the recollection of your alma mater, will you not drop a tear of sorrow with your youthful successors at this intelligence ? It was here you received the germ of those manly and elevated sentiments. which since have flourished with such luxuriance. It was here you imbibed that noble and ardent thirst for honorable distinction in your country, which has placed you on such pre-eminent ground. It was here, in the morning of life, you trod all the paths of science and of literature, amidst all the delights of juvenile pastimes and friendships!

And are we to lose the hope we had cherished of imitating your bright example ? Nassau Hall is no more ! —Those walls and those apartments which your high fame has rendered classic, now bear the gloomy marks of the destructive and overwhelming ravages of a cruel element, while Clio and Urania, arrayed in sable, mourns over the loss of the beloved objects of their care."

Three thousand dollars were subscribed at Princeton, for the purpose of erecting a new building, on the afternoon at the conflagration.