Bonaparte demanded fifty millions of francs. Mar-
bois, his negotiator, asked a hundred millions, but
dropped to sixty, with the condition that the United
States should assume all just claims upon the ter-
ritory. Thus, for the trivial sum of little more
than $15,000,000, the United States secured the
most important acquisition of territory that was
ever made by purchase. Both parties were satis-
fied with the bargain. " This accession," said the
first consul, "strengthens forever the power of
the United States, and I have just given to Eng-
land a maritime rival that will sooner or later
humble her pride." The popularity of the admin-
istration soon became such that the opposition was
reduced to insignificance, and the president was
re-elected by a greatly increased majority. In the
house of representatives the Federalists shrank
at length to a little band of twenty-seven, and in
the senate to five. Jefferson seriously feared that
there would not be sufficient opposition to furnish
the close and ceaseless criticism that the public
good required. His second term was less peaceful
and less fortunate. During the long contest be-
tween Bonaparte and the allied powers the infrac-
tions of neutral rights were so frequent and so
exasperating that perhaps Jefferson alone, aided
by his fine temper and detestation of war, could have
kept the infant republic out of the brawl. When
the English ship "Leopard," within hearing of
Old Point Comfort, poured broadsides into the
American frigate " Chesapeake," all unprepared
and unsuspecting, killing three men and wounding
eighteen, parties ceased to exist in the United
States, and every voice that was audible clamored
for bloody reprisals. "I had only to open my
hand," wrote Jefferson once, "and let havoc
loose." Thei'e was a period in 1807 when he ex-
pected war both with Spain and Great Britain, and
his confidential correspondence with Madison
shows that he meant to make the contest self-
compensating. He meditated a scheme for remov-
ing the Spanish flag to a more comfortable distance
by the annexation of Florida, Mexico, and Cuba,
and thus obtaining late redress for twenty-five
years of intrigue and injury. A partial reparation
by Great Britian postponed the contest. Yet the
offences were repeated ; no American ship was safe
from violation, and no American sailor from im-
pressment. This state of things induced Jefferson
to recommend congress to suspend commercial
intercourse with the belligerents, his object being
" to introduce between nations another umpire than
arms." The embargo of 1807, which continued to
the end of his second term, imposed upon the
commercial states a test too severe for human na-
ture patiently to endure. It was frequently vio-
lated, and did not accomplish the object proposed.
To the end of his life, Jefferson was of opinion
that, if the whole people had risen to the height of
his endeavor, if the merchants had strictly ob-
served the embargo, and the educated class given
it a cordial support, it would have saved the coun-
try the war of 1812, and extorted, what that war
did not give us, a formal and explicit concession
of neutral rights.
On 4 March, 1809, after a nearly continuous public service of forty-four years, Jefferson retired to private life, so seriously impoverished that he was not sure of being allowed to leave Washington without arrest by his creditors. The embargo, by preventing the exportation of tobacco, had reduced his private income two thirds, and, in the peculiar circumstances of Washington, his official salary was insufficient. " Since I have become sensible of this deficit," he wrote, " I have been under an agony of mortification." A timely loan from a Richmond bank relieved him temporarily from his distress, but he remained to the end of his days more or less embarrassed in his circumstances. Leaving the presidency in the hands of James Madison, with whom he was in the most complete sympathy and with whom he continued to be in active correspondence, he was still a power in the nation. Madison and Monroe were his neighbors and friends, and both of them administered the government on principles that he cordially ap- proved. As has been frequently remarked, they were three men and one system. On retiring to Monticello in 1809, Jefferson was sixty-six years of age, and had seventeen years to live. His daughter Martha and her husband resided with him, they and their numerous brood of children, six daugh- ters and five sons, to whom was now added Francis Eppes, the son of his daughter Maria, who had died in 1804. Surrounded thus by children and grandchildren, he spent the leisure of his declin- ing years in endeavoring to establish in Virginia a system of education to embrace all the chil- dren of his native state. In this he was most zealously and ably assisted by his friend, Joseph C. Cabell, a member of the Virginia senate. What he planned in the study, Cabell supported in the legislature ; and then in turn Jefferson would ad- vocate Cabell's bill by one of his ingenious and ex- haustive letters, which would go the rounds of the Virginia press. The correspondence of these two patriots on the subject of education in Virginia was afterward published in an octavo of 528 J ages, a noble monument to the character of both, efferson appealed to every motive, including self- interest, urging his scheme upon the voter as a " provision for his family to the remotest posterity." He did not live long enough to see his system of common schools established in Virginia, but the university, which was to crown that system, a darling dream of his heart for forty years, he be- held in successful operation. His friend Cabell, with infinite difficulty, induced the legislature to expend $300,000 in the work of construction, and to appropriate $15,000 a year toward the support of the institution. Jefferson personally superin- tended every detail of the construction. He en- gaged workmen, bought bricks, and selected the trees to be felled for timber. In March, 1825, the institution was opened with forty students, a num- ber which was increased to 177 at the beginning of the second year. The institution has continued its beneficent work to the present day, and still bears the imprint of Jefferson's mind. It has no president, except that one of the professors is elected chairman of the faculty. The university bestows no rewards and no honors, and attend- ance upon all religious services is voluntary. His intention was to hold every student to his respon- sibility as a man and a citizen, and to permit him to enjoy all the liberty of other citizens in the same community. Toward the close of his life Jefferson became distressingly embarrassed in his circum- stances. In 1814 he sold his library to congress for $23,000 — about one fourth of its value. A few years afterward he endorsed a twenty-thousand- dollar note for a friend and neighbor whom he could not refuse, and who soon became bankrupt. This loss, which added $1,200 a year to his ex- penses, completed his ruin, and he was in danger of being compelled to surrender Monticello and seek shelter for his last days in another abode. Philip Hone, mayor of New York, raised for him, in 1826, $8,500, to which Philadelphia added $5,000 and Baltimore $3,000. He was deeply touched
