But—says the Marquis—I perceive my journal is something like the conversation I had with Mr. Jefferson; I pass from one object to another, and forget myself as I write, as it happened not unfrequently in his society. I must now quit the friend of nature, but not Nature herself, who expects me, in all her splendor, at the end of my journey; I mean the famous Bridge of Rocks, which unites two mountains, the most curious object I ever beheld, as its construction is the most difficult of solution. Mr. Jefferson would most willingly have conducted me thither, although this wonder is upward of eighty miles from him, and he had often seen it, but his wife being expected every moment to lie in, and himself being as good a husband as he is an excellent philosopher and virtuous citizen, he only acted as my guide for about sixteen miles, to the passage of the little river Mechum, when we parted, and, I presume to flatter myself, with mutual regret."[18]
The following warm letter of congratulation to General Washington shows the affection felt for him by Jefferson:
To General Washington.
Monticello, October 28th, 1781.
Sir—I hope it will not be unacceptable to your Excellency to receive the congratulations of a private individual on your return to your native country, and, above all things, on the important success which has attended it.[19] Great as this has been, however, it can scarcely add to the affection with which we have looked up to you. And if, in the minds of any, the motives of gratitude to our good allies were not sufficiently apparent, the part they have borne in this action must amply convince them. Notwithstanding the state of perpetual solicitude to which I am unfortunately reduced,[20] I should certainly have done myself the honor of paying my respects to you personally; but I apprehend that these visits, which are meant by us as marks of our attachment to you, must interfere with the regulations of a camp, and be particularly inconvenient to one whose time is too precious to be wasted in ceremony.
I beg you to believe me among the sincerest of those who subscribe themselves your Excellency's most obedient and most humble servant,
TH. JEFFERSON.
The delicate condition of Mrs. Jefferson's health, alluded to in the preceding letter, continued to be such as to excite the alarm of her friends, and their worst apprehensions were soon realized. After the birth of her sixth child she sank so rapidly that it was plain there was no hope of her recovery. During her illness Jefferson was untiring in his attentions to her, and the devotion he showed her was constant and touching. The following account of the closing scenes of this domestic tragedy I take from Mrs. Randolph's manuscript:
During my mother's life he (Jefferson) bestowed much time and attention on our education—our cousins, the Carrs, and myself—and after her death, during the first month of desolation which followed, I was his constant companion while we remained at Monticello. …
As a nurse no female ever had more tenderness nor 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. For four months that she lingered he was never out of calling; when not at her bedside, he was writing in a small room which opened immediately at the head of her bed. A moment before the closing scene, he was led from the room in a state of insensibility by his sister, Mrs. Carr, who, with great difficulty, got him into the library, where he fainted, and remained so long insensible that they feared he never would revive. The scene that followed I did not witness, but the violence of his emotion, when, almost by stealth, I entered his room by night, to this day I dare not describe to myself. He kept his room three weeks, and I was never a moment from his side. He walked almost incessantly night and day, only lying down occasionally, when nature was completely exhausted, on a pallet that had been brought in during his long fainting-fit. My aunts remained constantly with him for some weeks—I do not remember how many. When at last he left his room, he rode out, and from that time he was incessantly on horseback, rambling about the mountain, in the least frequented roads, and just as often through the woods. In those melancholy rambles I was his constant companion—a solitary witness to many a burst of grief, the remembrance of which has consecrated particular scenes of that lost home[21] beyond the power of time to obliterate.
Mrs. Jefferson left three children, Martha, Mary, and Lucy Elizabeth—the last an infant. As far as it was possible, their father, by his watchful care and tender love, supplied the place of the mother they had lost. The account of her death just given gives a vivid description of his grief, and so alarming was the state of insensibility into which he fell, that his sister, Mrs. Carr, called to his sister-in-law, who was still bending over her sister's lifeless body, "to leave the dead and come and take care of the living."
Years afterwards he wrote the following epitaph for his wife's tomb:
To the Memory of
MARTHA JEFFERSON,
Daughter of John Wayles;
Born October 19th, 1748, O. S.;
Intermarried with
THOMAS JEFFERSON
January 1st, 1772;
Torn from him by Death
September 6th, 1782:
This Monument of his Love is inscribed.
If in the melancholy shades below,
The flames of friends and lovers cease to glow,
Yet mine shall sacred last; mine undecayed
Burn on through death and animate my shade.[22]
MARTHA JEFFERSON RANDOLPH.
From Portrait by Sully.
CHAPTER IV.
Visit to Chesterfield County.—Is appointed Plenipotentiary to Europe.—Letter to the Marquis de Chastellux.—Goes North with his Daughter.—Leaves her in Philadelphia, and goes to Congress.—Letters to his Daughter.—Sails for Europe.—His Daughter's Description of the Voyage.—His Establishment and Life in Paris.—Succeeds Franklin as Minister there.—Anecdotes of Franklin.—Extracts from Mrs. Adams's Letters.—Note from Jefferson to Mrs. Smith.
A short time after Mrs. Jefferson's death, Jefferson went with his children to Ampthill, in Chesterfield County, the residence of Colonel Archibald Cary. This gentleman had kindly offered his house to him, that he might there have his children inoculated for the small-pox. While engaged as their chief nurse on this occasion, he received notice of his appointment by Congress as Plenipotentiary to Europe, to be associated with Dr. Franklin and Mr. Adams in negotiating peace. Twice before the same appointment had been declined by him, as he had promised his wife never again to enter public life while she lived. Mr. Madison, in alluding to his appointment by Congress, says:
The reappointment of Mr. Jefferson as Minister Plenipotentiary for negotiating peace, was agreed to unanimously, and without a single adverse remark. The act took place in consequence of its being suggested that the death of Mrs. Jefferson had probably changed the sentiments of Mr. Jefferson with regard to public life.[23]
Jefferson himself, in speaking of this appointment, says in his Memoir:
I had, two months before that, lost the cherished