whole confab I will tell you, word for word if I can when I see you which God send, may be soon.”
After this, he dates his letters at “Devilsburg,” instead of Williamsburg, and says in one of them, “I believe I never told you that we had another occasion.” This time he behaved more creditably, told “Belinda” that it was necessary for him to go to England, explained the inevitable delays and told how he should conduct himself until his return. He says that he asked no questions which would admit of a categorical answer – there was something of the lawyer in this wooing! He assured Miss Rebecca that such a question would one day be asked. In this letter she is called “Adinleb” and spoken of as “he.”
Miss Burwell did not wait, however, until Jefferson was in a position to seek her hand openly, but was suddenly married to another. The news was a great shock to Jefferson, who refused to believe it until Page confirmed it; but the love-lorn swain gradually recovered from his disappointment.
With youthful ardour they had planned to buy adjoining estates and have a carriage in common, when each married the lady of his love, that they might attend all the dances. A little later, when Page was also crossed in love, both forswore marriage forever.
For five or six years, Jefferson was faithful to his vow – rather an unusual record. He met his fate at last in the person of a charming widow – Martha Skelton.
The death of his sister, his devotion to his books, and his disappointment made him a sadder and a wiser man. His home at Shadwell had been burned, and he removed to Monticello, a house built on the same estate on a spur of the Blue Ridge Mountains, five hundred feet above the common level.
He went often to visit Mrs. Skelton who made her home with her father after her bereavement. Usually he took his violin under his arm, and out of the harmonies which came from the instrument and the lady’s spinet came the greater one of love.
They were married in January of 1772. The ceremony took place at “The Forest” in Charles City County. The chronicles describe the bride as a beautiful woman, a little above medium height, finely formed, and with graceful carriage. She was well educated, read a great deal, and played the spinet unusually well.
The wedding journey was a strange one. It was a hundred miles from “The Forest” to Monticello, and years afterward their eldest daughter, Martha Jefferson Randolph, described it as follows:
“They left ‘The Forest’ after a fall of snow, light then, but increasing in depth as they advanced up the country. They were finally obliged to quit the carriage and proceed on horseback. They arrived late at night, the fires were all out, and the servants had retired to their own houses for the night. The horrible dreariness of such a house, at the end of such a journey, I have often heard both relate.”
Yet, the walls of Monticello, that afterwards looked down upon so much sorrow and so much joy, must have long remembered the home-coming of master and mistress, for the young husband found a bottle of old wine “on a shelf behind some books,” built a fire in the open fireplace, and “they laughed and sang together like two children.”
And that life upon the hills proved very nearly ideal. They walked and planned and rode together, and kept house and garden books in the most minute fashion.
Births and deaths followed each other at Monticello, but there was nothing else to mar the peace of that happy home. Between husband and wife there was no strife or discord, not a jar nor a rift in that unity of life and purpose which welds two souls into one.
Childish voices came and went, but two daughters grew to womanhood, and in the evening, the day’s duties done, violin and harpsichord sounded sweet strains together.
They reared other children besides their own, taking the helpless brood of Jefferson’s sister into their hearts and home when Dabney Carr died. Those three sons and three daughters were educated with his own children, and lived to bless him as a second father.
One letter is extant which was written to one of the nieces whom Jefferson so cheerfully supported. It reads as follows:
“Paris, June 14, 1787.
“I send you, my dear Patsey, the fifteen livres you desired. You propose this to me as an anticipation of five weeks’ allowance, but do you not see, my dear, how imprudent it is to lay out in one moment what should accommodate you for five weeks? This is a departure from that rule which I wish to see you governed by, thro’ your whole life, of never buying anything which you have not the money in your pocket to pay for.
“Be sure that it gives much more pain to the mind to be in debt than to do without any article whatever which we may seem to want.
“The purchase you have made is one I am always ready to make for you because it is my wish to see you dressed always cleanly and a little more than decently; but apply to me first for the money before making the purchase, if only to avoid breaking through your rule.
“Learn yourself the habit of adhering vigorously to the rules you lay down for yourself. I will come for you about eleven o’clock on Saturday. Hurry the making of your gown, and also your redingcote. You will go with me some day next week to dine at the Marquis Fayette. Adieu, my dear daughter,
Mrs. Jefferson’s concern for her husband, the loss of her children, and the weary round of domestic duties at last told upon her strong constitution.
After the birth of her sixth child, Lucy Elizabeth, she sank rapidly, until at last it was plain to every one, except the distracted husband, that she could never recover.
Finally the blow fell. His daughter Martha wrote of it as follows:
“As a nurse no female ever had more tenderness or anxiety. He nursed my poor mother in turn with Aunt Carr, and her own sister – sitting up with her and administering her medicines and drink to the last.
“When at last he left his room, three weeks after my mother’s death, he rode out, and from that time, he was incessantly on horseback, rambling about the mountain.”
Shortly afterward he received the appointment of Plenipotentiary to Europe, to be associated with Franklin and Adams in negotiating peace. He had twice refused the same appointment, as he had promised his wife that he would never again enter public life, as long as she lived.
Columbia
She comes along old Ocean’s trackless way —
A warrior scenting conflict from afar
And fearing not defeat nor battle-scar
Nor all the might of wind and dashing spray;
Her foaming path to triumph none may stay
For in the East, there shines her morning star;
She feels her strength in every shining spar
As one who grasps his sword and waits for day.
Columbia, Defender! dost thou hear?
The clarion challenge sweeps the sea
And straight toward the lightship doth she steer,
Her steadfast pulses sounding jubilee;
Arise, Defender! for thy way is clear
And all thy country’s heart goes out to thee.
The Story of a Daughter’s Love
Aaron Burr was past-master of what Whistler calls “the gentle
