fidence as one who would do faithfully and exactly what he was told.

Jefferson inherited from his father nineteen hundred acres of land, and began the practice of law when he became of age in 1764. His practice very soon became extensive, and yielded him an income of three thousand dollars, while from his plantation he received about two thousand dollars, making a sum total of five thousand dollars a year. This was a handsome income as property was then rated; for the very best highlands of Albemarle were valued at not more than two dollars an acre. In 1774 he had increased his estates to five thousand acres, and several fine farms came to him with his wife.

The entire valley was originally held by a few settlers, Peter Jefferson, William Randolph, Nicholas Meriwether, and Robert Walker, who in 1735 received large grants of wild land from the crown which in course of time were divided into farms.

Jefferson's birthplace is in sight of the portico of his mansion. The house in which his father and mother lived stood upon a sunny slope in the valley of the Rivanna, which winds around like a silver ribbon among the hills of red clay. There is so much oxide of iron in the soil that it stains. the hands and looks almost the color of crimson. The land is lean, but the view is superb. From the cupola of the mansion you can look into half a dozen counties. The home of President Monroe, known as Ashlawn, lies about eight miles down. the valley; Madison's home, a few miles north, was called Montpelier.

Monticello is five hundred and eighty feet high in the form of a cone. It slopes eastward one and a half miles to the Rivanna River. The view ex

tends about forty-seven miles to the Blue Ridge Mountains. West and southwest is an irregular range known as the Ragged Mountains, and at their base in full view of Monticello sits the University of Virginia. The top of the hill was levelled for a building-site, six hundred by two hundred feet. The landscape slopes gently on every side from this lawn; one hundred feet from the eastern end stands the mansion. With its projecting porticos east and west, the width of the house is one hundred feet each way. It approaches on either hand within fifty feet of the brow of the mountain, with which it is connected by covered ways ten feet wide, whose floors are level with the cellars, and whose flat roofs form promenades nearly level with the first floor of the dwelling. These, turning at right angles at the brow and widening to twenty feet, extend one hundred feet, and terminate in one-story pavilions twenty feet square, the space beneath the terraces being used for business offices.

From the northern terrace the view is superb. Here Jefferson and his guests were accustomed to sit in the summer evenings until bedtime. Here perhaps has been assembled more patriotism, wisdom, and learning than in any other garden in America.

The mansion is of the Doric order of Grecian architecture, with heavy cornices and massive balustrades. The interior is in the Ionic style. The front hall recedes six feet within the wall of the building, and a portico, the full height of the house, projects twenty-five feet with stone pillars and steps. The hall is also the full height of the house and passages leading off to other parts of the building terminate in octagonal apartments, leaving recesses on three equal sides. Piazzas pro

ject six feet beyond; their roofs, being the height of the house, rest on brick arches. The northern piazza connects the house with the public terrace, while the southern is sashed in for a greenhouse. East of the central passage, on each side of the hall, are lodging-rooms, this front being one and a half stories. On the west front the rooms occupy the whole height, making the house one story, except the parlor or central room, which is surmounted by an octagonal story with a dome. This was designed for a billiard-room, but before completion a law was passed prohibiting public and private billiard-tables in Virginia. It was to have been approached by stairways connected with a gallery at the inner extremity of the hall which communicates with the lodging-rooms on either side above, but the use designed for the room being prohibited, the stairways were never erected.

The parlor projects twenty feet beyond the body of the house and is covered by a portico. The original plan of the projection was square; but when the cellar was built up to the floor above, the room was extended beyond the square by three sides of an octagon, leaving a place next to the cellar wall not excavated where the faithful Cæsar and Martin concealed their master's plate when the British visited Monticello in 1814. The floor of this room is in squares of wild cherry, very hard, susceptible of a high polish, and the color of mahogany. The border of each square, four inches wide, is of light-colored beech. After nearly seventy years of use and abuse, a half hour's dusting and brushing will make it look like a handsome tessellated floor.

Monticello was the finest mansion in that section of the State. Its hospitality was famous, particu