in an agitated, unsettled state in reference to its foreign policy, but with many elements at home of enduring prosperity and grandeur. The territory of the nation had been enlarged, its resources developed, and its financial system conducted with economy and masterly ability; time had been gained for the inevitable coming struggle with England, and though the navy was not looked to as it should have been, it had more than given a pledge of its future prowess in its achievements in the Mediterranean.

Jefferson was now sixty-six, nearly the full allotment of human life, but he was destined to yet seventeen years of honorable exertion-an interval marked by his popular designation, "the sage of Monticello," in which asperities might die out, and a new generation learn to reverence him as a father of the State. He had been too much of a reformer not to suffer more than most men the obloquy of party, and he died without the true Thomas Jefferson being fully known to the public. In his last days he spoke of the calumny to which he had been subjected with mingled pride and charitable feeling. He had not considered, he said, in words worthy of remembrance, "his enemies as abusing him; they had never known him. They had created an imaginary being clothed with odious attributes, to whom they had given his name; and it was against that creature of their imaginations they had levelled their anathemas." We may now penetrate within that home, even, in the intimacy of his domestic correspondence, within that breast, and learn something of the man

His questioning

were

Thomas Jefferson.
turn of mind, and to a certain extent,
his unimaginative temperament, led
him to certain views, particularly in
matters of religion, which
thought at war with the welfare of
society. But whatever the extent of
his departure, in these things, from the
majority of the Christian world, he
does not appear, even in his own family,
to have influenced the opinion of
others. His views are described, by
those who have studied them, to re-
semble those held by the Unitarians.
He was not averse, however, on occa
sion, to the services of the Episcopal
Church, which, says Mr. Randall, "he
generally attended, and when he did
so, always carried his prayer-book, and
joined in the responses and prayers
of the congregation." Of the Bible
he was a great student, and, we fancy
derived much of his Saxon strength
of expression from familiarity with its
language.

If any subject was dearer to his heart than another, in his latter days, it was the course of education, in the organization and government of his favorite University of Virginia. The topic had long been a favorite one, dating as far back with him as his report to the Legislature in 1779. It was revived in some efforts made in his county in 1814, which resulted in the establishment of a college that in 1818 gave place to the projected University. Its courses of instruction reflected his tastes, its government was of his contrivance, he looked abroad for its first professors, and its architectural plans, in which he took great interest, were mainly arranged by

him. He was chosen by the Board of Visitors, appointed by the governor, its rector, and died holding the office. An inscription for his monument, which was found among his papers at his death, reads: "Here lies buried, Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of American Independence, of the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom, and Father of the University of Virginia."

fervor: "All eyes are opened or The opening to the rights of man. general spread of the light of science has already laid open to every view the palpable truth, that the mass of mankind have not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God." This was the last echo of the fire which was wont to inspire senates, which had breathed in the early councils of liberty, which had kept pace with the progress of the nation to a third generation. A few days after, at noon of the day which had given the Republic birth, to the music of his own brave words, exactly fifty years after the event; in full conscious

The time was approaching for its employment, as the old statesman lingered with some of the physical infirmities, few of the mental inconveniences of advanced life. His fondness for riding blood horses was kept up almost to the last, and he had always his family, his friends, his books-faithful to the end to the sublimities of Eschylus, the pas-ness of his ebbing moments; with tran sion of his younger days. He was much more of a classical, even, than of a scientific scholar, we have heard it said by one well qualified to form an opinion; but this was a taste which he did not boast of, and which, happily for his enjoyment of it, his political enemies did not find out. In the decline of life, when debt, growing out of old encumbrances and new expenses on his estates, was pressing upon him, these resources were unfailing and exacted no repayments. His pen, too, ever ready to give wings to his thought, was with him. Even in those last days, preceding the national anniversary which marked his death, he wrote with his wonted strength and

quillity and equanimity, passed from earth the soul of Thomas Jefferson. His old comrade, John Adams, lingered at Braintree a few hours longer, thinking of his friend in his dying moments, as he uttered his last words: "Thomas Jefferson still survives." They were too late for fact, but they have been accepted for prophecy, and in this spirit they are inscribed as the motto to the latest memorial of him of whom they were spoken. Thus, on the fourth of July, 1826, passed away the two great apostles of American liberty; the voice which, louder, perhaps, than any other, had called for the Declaration of Independence, and the hand that penned it.

Ergrad snechling tider of Congress 1873 by Johnson Ply 4So, in the office of the Librarian, of Congress að Vashington.

MARIA EDGEWORTH.

TH

3

HE history of the Edgeworths in Ireland ascends to the reign of Elizabeth, when two brothers of the stock left England, one, Edward, to become Bishop of Down and Connor, the other, Francis, succeeding to his brother's property, to marry an Irish lady and establish the family in the country. From this union, in the early part of the seventeenth century, Maria Edgeworth was descended. There appears always to have been a great deal of spirit and independence in the family, with unusual daring and adventure. The wife of Francis Edgeworth, who is described as very beautiful, was the daughter of a baronet, and, desirous of the social privileges it conferred, when the title was offered to her husband, quarreled with him for not accepting it. She then left him to attach herself to Henrietta Maria on the continent, and, on the death of the queen, returned, not to her family, but to expend a large fortune in founding a religious house in Dublin. Captain John Edgeworth, her son, married a lady of Derbyshire, who, in the absence of her husband, narrowly escaped death in his castle of Cranallagh, when it was fired and plundered by the rebels.

Their infant son would have been
murdered on this occasion had not his
life been saved by a faithful servant,
who, swearing that a sudden death
was too good for him, proposed to
"plunge him up to his throat in a bog
hole and leave him for the crows to
pick his eyes out." The suggestion
was accepted, and in this way the
child was concealed till he could be
safely carried through the rebel camp
to Dublin, hid in a pannier under eggs
and chickens. Before the boy grew
up, his mother died and his father was
married again to a widow lady in Eng-
land, of whom he became suddenly
enamored at first sight, in the cathe-
dral at Chester, while travelling on his
way home to Ireland. The story of this
engagement is somewhat humorously
told by their descendant, Richard Lo-
vell Edgeworth, who, as we shall see,
had naturally a sympathy with such
affairs of the heart. The lady, it ap-
pears, when seen in church, had a full-
blown rose in her bosom. As she was
coming out, the rose fell at the gallant
captain's feet. "The lady was hand-
some-so was the captain-he took up
the rose and presented it with so much
grace to Mrs. Bridgman, that, in con-

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