lives in horrible captivity.

Mr. Jefferson's self-imposed duties were no less arduous. He kept four
colleges informed of the most valuable new inventions, discoveries, and
books. He had a Yankee talent for mechanical improvements, and he was
always on the alert to obtain anything of this nature which he thought
might be useful at home. Jefferson himself, by the way, invented the
revolving armchair, the buggy-top, and a mould board for a plough. He
bought books for Franklin, Madison, Monroe, Wythe, and himself. He
informed one correspondent about Watt's engine, another about the new
system of canals. He smuggled rice from Turin in his coat pockets; and he
was continually dispatching to agricultural societies in America seeds,
roots, nuts, and plants. Houdin was sent over by him to make the statue of
Washington; and he forwarded designs for the new capitol at Richmond. For
Buffon he procured the skin of an American panther, and also the bones and
hide of a New Hampshire moose, to obtain which Governor Sullivan of that
State organized a hunting-party in the depth of winter and cut a road
through the forest for twenty miles in order to bring out his quarry.

Jefferson was the most indefatigable of men, and he did not relax in
Paris. He had rooms at a Carthusian monastery to which he repaired when he
had some special work on hand. He kept a carriage and horses, but could
not afford a saddle horse. Instead of riding, he took a walk every
afternoon, usually of six or seven miles, occasionally twice as long. It
was while returning with a friend from one of these excursions that he
fell and fractured his right wrist; and the fracture was set so
imperfectly that it troubled him ever afterward. It was characteristic of
Jefferson that he said nothing to his friend as to the injury until they
reached home, though his suffering from it was great; and, also, that he
at once began to write with the other hand, making numerous entries, on
the very night of the accident, in a writing which, though stiff, was, and
remains, perfectly clear.

Mr. Jefferson's two daughters had been placed at a convent school near
Paris, and he was surprised one day to receive a note from Martha, the
elder, asking his permission to remain in the convent for the rest of her
life as a nun. For a day or two she received no answer. Then her father
called in his carriage, and after a short interview with the abbess took
his daughters away; and thenceforth Martha