Mr. Jefferson ultimately derived so much from his deposit in the State Treasury, that he was wont, in after years, as he rode past the goodly farm which had been thus sacrificed, to say, smilingly, to some accompanying grandchild: "I owned that once, and sold it for a great-coat!" He was wont, also, to say, that he had a second time paid his British debts to Lord Cornwallis. When that officer plundered and ravaged his estate of Elk Island,' he inflicted direct and necessarily resulting damages, which, according to Mr. Jefferson's estimate, more than equalled the amount of his British debt and its interest during the war. The second and third sales made by Mr. Jefferson to make his "third payment" of that debt, took place at unfavorable periods, and the final effect on his estate has been seen. His remaining property consisted of about ten thousand acres of land, the contents of his house, etc., and about one hundred and fifty slaves. Most of the land was fertile and favorably situated. Well managed, and increased in value by the subsequent rise in property as the country became more thickly settled, it should have made him an independent, and, in our country, and among the rural class, a rich man. There were periods before his death when considerable portions of his estate would have sold for fifty dollars an acre.' As a member of the Virginia Assembly, as a member of Congress, and as Governor of Virginia, Mr. Jefferson's official salaries had not more than met the extra expenses which the offices occasioned. His salary in France did not meet expenses." As Secretary of State, he had generally lived rather retiredly and plainly, and his salary nearly equalled his expenditures. As Vice-President, he for the first and last time derived some pecuniary advantage from an office. During his Presidency his disbursements exceeded his income-but a portion of them went to the completion of his house, and to the improvement and embellishment of his estate. In none of these offices was his style of living noticed either for parsimony or extravagance ; though, as a general thing, he had much of a particular kind of company, in addition to the usual throngs who flutter about 1 See vol. i., p. 340, et seq. 2 See his letter to Madison, February 17th, 1826. * But some of these were incurred for valuable articles which continued in his possession, such as books and pictures. The first of these sales took place in 1776. He disposed of lands to the amount of £4,200, and not receiving his pay in hand, offered the bonds to Mr. Evans, the agent of the creditors. They were declined. The creditors, of course, fairly had their option in this, but the result, without proving beneficial to them, was particularly injurious to their debtor. The bonds, by the conditions of the subsequent treaty of peace, would have been payable in gold and silver to British holders, and the makers of them were amply responsible. But, although Mr. Jefferson had sold before the emission of paper money, and at hard money prices, he was compelled to receive his pay in the former when it was worth but about two and a half per cent. of its nominal value. The State of Virginia, crushed under the calamities of the war, was then calling on her citizens who owed money to British subjects, to bring it into the treasury to be applied to the support of the war-stipulating to become answerable for the British debts. Mr. Jefferson deposited in the treasury the paper money he had received in payment of his bonds. English remittances were generally suspended during the war, owing to the great risk of capture. Subsequently to the war, and before Virginia had determined what action to take in regard to the discharge of her engagements, Mr. Jefferson wrote to his English creditors, from Paris (January 5th, 1787), a letter, from which we take a few extracts: "I am desirous of arranging with you such just and practicable conditions as will ascertain to you the terms at which you will receive my part of your debt, and give me the satisfaction of knowing that you are contented. What the laws of Virginia are, or may be, will in no wise influence my conduct. Substantial justice is my object, as decided by reason, and not by authority or compulsion." After mentioning his deposit in the Virginia treasury to the credit of his correspondents, he added: "Subsequent events have been such, that the State cannot, and ought now, to pay the same nominal sum in gold or silver, which they received in paper; nor is it certain what they will do: my intention being, and having always been, that, whatever the State decides, you shall receive my part of your debt fully. I am ready to remove all difficulty arising from this deposit, to take back to myself the demand against the State, and to consider the deposit as originally made for myself, and not for you." He however stated a variety of considerations, not necessary here to be repeated, which ought, he thought, to exempt him from the payment of interest during the war. Mr. Jefferson ultimately derived so much from his deposit in the State Treasury, that he was wont, in after years, as he rode past the goodly farm which had been thus sacrificed, to say, smilingly, to some accompanying grandchild: "I owned that once, and sold it for a great-coat!" He was wont, also, to say, that he had a second time paid his British debts to Lord Cornwallis. When that officer plundered and ravaged his estate of Elk Island,' he inflicted direct and necessarily resulting damages, which, according to Mr. Jefferson's estimate, more than equalled the amount of his British debt and its interest during the war. The second and third sales made by Mr. Jefferson to make his "third payment" of that debt, took place at unfavorable periods, and the final effect on his estate has been seen. His remaining property consisted of about ten thousand acres of land, the contents of his house, etc., and about one hundred and fifty slaves. Most of the land was fertile and favorably situated. Well managed, and increased in value by the subsequent rise in property as the country became more thickly settled, it should have made him an independent, and, in our country, and among the rural class, a rich man. There were periods before his death when considerable portions of his estate would have sold for fifty dollars an acre.' As a member of the Virginia Assembly, as a member of Congress, and as Governor of Virginia, Mr. Jefferson's official salaries had not more than met the extra expenses which the offices occasioned. His salary in France did not meet expenses." As Secretary of State, he had generally lived rather retiredly and plainly, and his salary nearly equalled his expenditures. As Vice-President, he for the first and last time derived some pecuniary advantage from an office. During his Presidency his disbursements exceeded his income-but a portion of them went to the completion of his house, and to the improvement and embellishment of his estate. In none of these offices was his style of living noticed either for parsimony or extravagance; though, as a general thing, he had much of a particular kind of company, in addition to the usual throngs who flutter about 1 See vol. i., p. 340, et seq. 2 See his letter to Madison, February 17th, 1826. But some of these were incurred for valuable articles which continued in his possession, such as books and pictures. official mansions. Travellers, learned men, investigators in every department of mind and matter, were drawn to his board as if by a natural affinity. It is probable that the surplus income of his farms about met the excess of his expenses over his official salaries, in all his public positions except the Presidency-and it would have done so in that office but for the Embargo. When that measure fell with such crushing effect on all who purchased luxuries, Mr. Jefferson made no change in his manner of living, and he consequently left office owing $20,000. We have given his land-roll for 1794, showing that he then owned 10,647 acres of land, and some city lots. In 1809, he owned 10,004 acres, with the same smaller parcels. The farms were generally the same, except that he had given fifteen hundred acres of his Bedford estate to one of his daughters—and on the other hand, had acquired about eight hundred acres on Buffalo Creek, and one hundred adjoining his Albemarle possessions. He had now a valuable mansion, containing many costly articles, including an expensive library. The number of his servants in Albemarle was one hundred and fourteen, and in Bedford, eighty-six.' His farms had the ordinary complement of "stock," and there was a flouring-mill at Monticello of considerable cost, and several small manufacturing shops. Altogether, the value of his property was probably not far from $200,000. 1 We do not find that Mr. Jefferson had sold any slaves for the sixteen preceding years. Sixty-six had been included in the marriage settlements of his daughters, and some liberated. Some idea of the mortality among this class of people, may be derived from the following facts. From 1801 to 1810 inclusive, there died in Mr. Jefferson's family-none in 1801, 1802, 1803, or 1804; one in 1805; three in 1807; one in 1808; three in 1809; three in 1810. The deaths were mostly among aged persons and very young children. 2 Some agricultural reader in a different region of the country, may be curious to know what and how much this implies. In the winter of 1809-10, the census of the "store stock"-that is, the stock wintered over after annual sales, putting down provisions, etc.-included (says the farm-book). in Albemarle, 13 work horses, 10 mules, 15 cows, 21 other cattle, 49 sheep, and 118 swine; in Bedford, 11 work horses, 30 cows, 55 other cattle, 46 sheep, and 194 swine. The mill, including its canal or race, ultimately cost $30.000. Its profits were reduced by the damage occasionally suffered from the floods of the Rivanna. Mr. Jefferson's memoranda mention that on the 22d of April, 1804, a "fresh" carried the water above the hoppers in the toll-mill-and this wanted six feet of the height of water in a fresh in 1795, and nine feet of that of the "great fresh" on the 26th of May, 1771! In February, 1810, three inches of rain fell in an hour, creating a flood which did incredible damage in the abrasion of the sloping plowed lands but the rise in the stream is not stated. On the 9th and 10th of November, 1810, there fell four and threequarter inches of rain in forty-eight hours; the water entered the mill four feet deep, and swept away so much of the dam that it required a considerable outlay and some months of labor to repair it. On the 29th of July, 1814, twelve and one-eighth inches of rain fell in twenty hours. The Rivanna rose fifteen feet, and "Hardware [creek] was said to have risen thirty-feet perpendicular." Among the shops we have referred to, was a nailery, where six tons of nails were It would seem that with so much apparently productive capital the debt we have mentioned should have constituted but a slight burden on Mr. Jefferson's estate. There were drawbacks on the availability of that capital which persons unfamiliar with Southern life might readily overlook. The lands were immediately profitable no further than they could be worked; and the whole number of slaves on a plantation gives no definite idea of the effective farm labor. By Mr. Jefferson's. roll of slaves in 1810, it appears that out of the two hundred composing the whole number, ninety-five were under fourteen years of age, and twenty over fifty years of age. From those in the prime of life must be deducted the sick, nurses, cooks, etc. The planter must have his mechanics, "door yard" and menial servants-and though these save expenditure in one direction, they are withdrawn from the class which produce the main salable staples of the farm. And those too young or too old for work must be supported from the products of the land, and in part from the proceeds of its marketed staples. Mr. Jefferson's family was not large nor particularly expensive. It came to consist of the family of his son-in-law, Mr. Randolph,' and generally of some other relatives. To the made by hand in 1810. There was a weaving shop, containing five looms, but its product was as yet trifling. Mr. Jefferson could not endure separation from his only remaining daughter. His sonin-law's affairs gradually became hopelessly embarrassed. Mr. Randolph was a generous man and lavished liberal sums on kinsmen deprived of what he considered their just patrimony, by the consequences of a second marriage. The Embargo and the succeeding Nonintercourse seriously affected his property. He engaged in the manufacture of flour during the war, and was unfortunate in it mostly losing by the consequences of one accident au amount of flour worth about thirty thousand dollars. His affairs were additionally broken up by absence from home. He was appointed colonel of the 20th U. S. regiment in 1813, and marched to Canada. He resigned in 1814, in consequence of a misunderstanding with General Armstrong, the Secretary of War. He was elected Governor of Virginia in 1819, and held the office three years, the full continuous period permitted by the constitution. But the main sources of his misfortunes, and many of his traits of character are thus described in a letter to us from one who knew him intimately, and loved him tenderly: "It was in the service of persons having very small claims on him, that he wasted his patrimony and even his wife's fortune. He could not say No to importunate pleaders, to distressed kinsmen or neighbors, distressed oftentimes by the result of their own folly. He stood security again and again for men, to whose selfish entreaties and false statements he sacrificed his fortune and his peace of mind; and was always. crippled by debts not of his own contracting. He was for a long time persuaded that his embarrassments were only temporary, and that all he wanted was time and economy to work through his difficulties. He might have retrieved his fortunes,. but the same fatality of character pursued him. Again and again he yielded to the soli citations of his friends; again and again he believed their solemn assurances--Your name, only your name, we pledge our sacred honor that you shall never be called on to pay a farthing.' But he always was called on to pay not one farthing,' but generally the whole amount of the debt. From this it might be supposed that Colonel Randolph was. what is called an easy tempered man, gentle, and easily entreated. Not so: his temper was irritable and violent. It was firmness that he needed, not fire. "He had other weaknesses which neutralized the effects of many high qualities, and |