Cabell to remain loyal to the greatest purpose of his life. Appealing at once to his patriotism and his sense of duty, Jefferson said: "I know well your devotion to your country, and your foresight of the awful scenes coming on her, sooner or later. With this foresight, what service can we ever render her [the University] equal to this? What object of our lives can we propose so important? What interest of our own which ought not to be postponed to this? Health, time, labor, on what in the single life which nature has given us, can these be better bestowed than on this immortal boon to our country? The exertions and the mortifications are temporary; the benefit eternal. If any member of our college of visitors could justifiably withdraw from this sacred duty, it would be myself, who, 'quadragenis stipendiis jamdudum peractis,' have neither vigor of body nor mind left to keep the field; but I will die in the last ditch. And so, I hope, you will, my friend, as well as our firm. breasted brothers and colleagues, Mr. Johnson and General Breckenridge. Pray then, dear and very dear sir, do not think of deserting us, but view the sacrifices which seem to stand in your way as the lesser duties, and such as ought to be postponed to this, the greatest of all. Continue with us in these holy labors, until having seen their accomplishment, we may say with old Simeon, 'nunc dimittas, Domine.'" 1

Cabell replied, "It is not in my nature to resist such an appeal." Without further words upon the subject of domestic comfort, rural pleasure, or literary ease, this noble scholar returned to politics and to the business of sustaining the University by good legislation. He continued to serve the institution as legislator, visitor, and rector until his death, in 1856. Such was the self-sacrificing and devoted spirit which entered into the life and constitution of the University of Virginia. The final recognition of the university idea and its loyal maintenance through every crisis, by the common people of Virginia, illustrates the truth of Robert Browning's verse:

THE FATHER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA.

Emerson's words, with which the writer began the present monograph, recur now with renewed force: "An institution is the lengthened shadow of one man." This saying has peculiar significance to one who has studied with some care the origin of the University of Virginia, and who has stood in front of Jefferson's house at Monticello and looked across that beautiful country toward the "academical village" which represents the best energies of his life. From that height Jefferson watched day by day the building of his University. It is a local tradition that often, when the work of the masons appeared to be going wrong, Jefferson would mount his horse and ride over in hot haste to

Jefferson's letter to Cabell, January 31, 1821.

correct the error. We can well believe it; for in August, 1820, he wrote to John Adams: "Our University, four miles distant, gives me frequent exercise, and the oftener, as I direct its architecture." The buildings of the University of Virginia are Jefferson's thoughts materialized in artistic form. If those pavilions and that grand rotunda should ever be shaken down by an earthquake, the future archæologist might perhaps find the name of Jefferson upon every stone in the ruins.

Jefferson died with the feeling that the University was not yet fully appreciated by his fellow-citizens; but he was confident that posterity would do it justice. He once wrote to Cabell: "I have long been sensible that while I was endeavoring to render our country the greatest of all services, and placing our rising generation on the level of our sister States (which they have proudly held heretofore), I was discharging the odious function of a physician pouring medicine down the throat of a patient insensible of needing it. I am so sure of the future approbation of posterity, and of the inestimable effect we shall have produced in the elevation of our country by what we have done, as that I can not repent of the part I have borne in co-operation with my colleagues." The University was the noblest work of Jefferson's life. His system of higher education marks the continuation of his personal, vitalizing influence in Virginia and in the country at large more truly than does any other of his original creations.

By order of Congress a new monument1 has lately been erected upon the site of the old and battered shaft which stood over his grave in that little burying-ground by the road-side, to the left as one goes toward the valley from Jefferson's old home. The new monument bears the inscription copied from the old stone, which has been piously removed to the campus of the University of the State of Missouri, at Columbia: "Here was 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. Born April 2d, 1743, O. S. Died July 4th, 1826."

Here lies a man who gave the best that he had to his country, his State, his friends and neighbors, and to the University which bears not his name but that of Virginia. He sacrificed a large private fortune in expenditures for the public good, in the exercise of generous hospitality, and in meeting obligations incurred by indorsing the notes of a family

Monument over the Grave of Thomas Jefferson. Letter from the Secretary of State (William M. Evarts) to Hon. D. W. Voorhees, chairman of the Committee on the Library, transmitting letter of the Attorney-General in relation to the obstacles in the way of erecting a monument over the grave of Thomas Jefferson, May 11, 1880. 8vo, pp. 4, Forty-sixth Congress, second sess., Senate, Mis. Doc., No. 88.

The Jefferson Monument. Correspondence relating thereto. 1883. Letters from James S. Rollins and Mary B. Randolph concerning "the old Jefferson monument, transplanted from Monticello, Va., to the campus of the University of the State of Missouri, at Columbia."