ee
of the summer months there, as they would now at a fashionable
watering-place. They married the sons of Mr. Jefferson's friends, and then
came with their families."

The immense expense entailed by these hospitalities, added to the debt,
amounting to $20,000, which Mr. Jefferson owed when he left Washington,
crippled him financially. Moreover, Colonel Randolph, who managed his
estate for many years, though a good farmer, was a poor man of business.
It was a common saying in the neighborhood that nobody raised better crops
or got less money for them than Colonel Randolph. The embargo, and the
period of depression which followed the war of 1812, went far to
impoverish the Virginia planters. Monroe died a bankrupt, and Madison's
widow was left almost in want of bread. Jefferson himself wrote in 1814:
"What can we raise for the market? Wheat? we can only give it to our
horses, as we have been doing since harvest. Tobacco? It is not worth the
pipe it is smoked in. Some say whiskey, but all mankind must become
drunkards to consume it." Jefferson, also, was so anxious lest his slaves
should be overworked, that the amount of labor performed upon his
plantation was much less than it should have been. And, to cap the climax
of his financial troubles, he lost $20,000 by indorsing to that amount for
his intimate friend, Governor Nicholas, an honorable but unfortunate man.
It should be added that Mr. Nicholas, in his last hours, "declared with
unspeakable emotion that Mr. Jefferson had never by a word, by a look, or
in any other way, made any allusion to his loss by him."

In 1814, Mr. Jefferson sold his library to Congress for $23,950, about one
half its cost; and in the very year of his death he requested of the
Virginia legislature that a law might be passed permitting him to sell
some of his farms by means of a lottery,--the times being such that they
could be disposed of in no other way. He even published some "Thoughts on
Lotteries,"--by way of advancing this project. The legislature granted his
request, with reluctance; but in the mean time his necessities became
known throughout the country, and subscriptions were made for his relief.
The lottery was suspended, and Jefferson died in the belief that
Monticello would be saved as a home for his family.

In March, 1826, Mr. Jefferson's health began to fail; but so late as June
24 he was well enough to write a long letter in reply to an invitation to
attend the fiftieth cele