A Guest at the Ludlow, and Other Stories

by Bill Nye

  A GREAT CEREBRATOR

  III

  Being at large in Virginia, along in the latter part of last season, Ivisited Monticello, the former home of Thomas Jefferson, also his grave.Monticello is about an hour's ride from Charlottesville, by diligence.One rides over a road constructed of rip-raps and broken stone. It iscalled a macadamized road, and twenty miles of it will make the pelvisof a long-waisted man chafe against his ears. I have decided that thesite for my grave shall be at the end of a trunk line somewhere, and Iwill endow a droska to carry passengers to and from said grave.

  Whatever my life may have been, and however short I may have fallen inmy great struggle for a generous recognition by the American people, Ipropose to place my grave within reach of all.

  Monticello is reached by a circuitous route to the top of a beautifulhill, on the crest of which rests the brick house where Mr. Jeffersonlived. You enter a lodge gate in charge of a venerable negro, to whomyou pay two bits apiece for admission. This sum goes towards repairingthe roads, according to the ticket which you get. It just goes towardit, however; it don't quite get there, I judge, for the roads are stillappealing for aid. Perhaps the negro can tell how far it gets. Upthrough a neglected thicket of Virginia shrubs and ill-kempt trees youdrive to the house. It is a house that would readily command $750, withqueer porches to it, and large, airy windows. The top of the whole hillwas graded level, or terraced, and an enormous quantity of work musthave been required to do it, but Jefferson did not care. He did not carefor fatigue. With two hundred slaves of his own, and a dowry of threehundred more which was poured into his coffers by his marriage, Jeff didnot care how much toil it took to polish off the top of a bluff or howmuch the sweat stood out on the brow of a hill.

  Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence. He sent it to one ofthe magazines, but it was returned as not available, so he used it inCongress and afterward got it printed in the _Record_.

  I saw the chair he wrote it in. It is a plain, old-fashioned woodenchair, with a kind of bosom-board on the right arm, upon which Jeffersonused to rest his Declaration of Independence whenever he wanted to writeit.

  There is also an old gig stored in the house. In this gig Jefferson usedto ride from Monticello to Washington in a day. This is untrue, but itgoes with the place. It takes from 8:30 A. M. until noon to ride thisdistance on a fast train, and in a much more direct line than the oldwagon road ran.

  Mr. Jefferson was the father of the University of Virginia, one of themost historic piles I have ever clapped eyes on. It is now under themanagement of a classical janitor, who has a tinge of negro blood in hisveins, mixed with the rich Castilian blood of somebody else.

  He has been at the head of the University of Virginia for over fortyyears, bringing in the coals and exercising a general oversight over thecurriculum and other furniture. He is a modest man, with a tendencytoward the classical in his researches. He took us up on the roof,showed us the outlying country, and jarred our ear-drums with the bigbell. Mr. Estes, who has general charge of Monticello--calledMontechello--said that Mr. Jefferson used to sit on his front porch witha powerful glass, and watch the progress of the work on the University,and if the workmen undertook to smuggle in a soft brick, Mr. Jefferson,five or six miles away, detected it, and bounding lightly into hissaddle, he rode down there to Charlottesville, and clubbed thebricklayers until they were glad to pull down the wall to that brick andtake it out again.

  This story is what made me speak of that section a few minutes ago as anoutlying country.

  The other day Charles L. Seigel told us the Confederate version of anattack on Fort Moultrie during the early days of the war, which hasnever been printed. Mr. Seigel was a German Confederate, and early inthe fight was quartered, in company with others, at the Moultrie House,a seaside hotel, the guests having deserted the building.

  Although large soft beds with curled hair mattresses were in each room,the department issued ticks or sacks to be filled with straw for the useof the soldiers, so that they would not forget that war was a seriousmatter. Nobody used them, but they were there all the same.

  Attached to the Moultrie House, and wandering about the back-yard, therewas a small orphan jackass, a sorrowful little light blue mammal, with atinge of bitter melancholy in his voice. He used to dwell on the past agood deal, and at night he would refer to it in tones that were chokedwith emotion.

  The boys caught him one evening as the gloaming began to arrange itself,and threw him down on the green grass. They next pulled a straw bed overhis head, and inserted him in it completely, cutting holes for hislegs. Then they tied a string of sleighbells to his tail, and hit him asmart, stinging blow with a black snake.

  _Then they tied a string of sleighbells to his tail, andhit him a smart, stinging blow with a black snake_ (Page 27)]

  Probably that was what suggested to him the idea of strolling down thebeach, past the sentry, and on toward the fort. The darkness of thenight, the rattle of hoofs, the clash of the bells, the quick challengeof the guard, the failure to give the countersign, the sharp volley ofthe sentinels, and the wild cry, "to arms," followed in rapidsuccession. The tocsin sounded, also the slogan. The culverin, ukase,and door-tender were all fired. Huge beacons of fat pine were lightedalong the beach. The whole slumbering host sprang to arms, and the crackof the musket was heard through the intense darkness.

  In the morning the enemy was found intrenched in a mud-hole, south ofthe fort, with his clean new straw tick spattered with clay, and awildly disheveled tail.

  On board the Richmond train not long ago a man lost his hat as we pulledout of Petersburg, and it fell by the side of the track. The train wasjust moving slowly away from the station, so he had a chance to jump offand run back after it. He got the hat, but not till we had placed sevenor eight miles between us and him. We could not help feeling sorry forhim, because very likely his hat had an embroidered hat band in it,presented by one dearer to him than life itself, and so we worked upquite a feeling for him, though of course he was very foolish to losehis train just for a hat, even if it did have the needle-work of hisheart's idol in it.

  Later I was surprised to see the same man in Columbia, South Carolina,and he then told me this sad story:

  "I started out a month ago to take a little trip of a few weeks, and thefirst day was very, very happily spent in scrutinizing nature andscanning the faces of those I saw. On the second day out, I ran across ayoung man whom I had known slightly before, and who is engaged in thebusiness of being a companionable fellow and the life of the party. Thatis about all the business he has. He knows a great many people, and hiscircle of acquaintances is getting larger all the time. He is proud ofthe enormous quantity of friendship he has acquired. He says he can'tget on a train or visit any town in the Union that he doesn't find afriend.

  "He is full of stories and witticisms, and explains the plays to theaterparties. He has seen a great deal of life and is a keen critic. He wouldhave enjoyed criticising the Apostle Paul and his elocutionary style ifhe had been one of the Ephesians. He would have criticised Paul'sgestures, and said, 'Paul, I like your Epistles a heap better than I doyour appearance on the platform. You express yourself well enough withyour pen, but when you spoke for the Ephesian Y. M. C. A., we weredisappointed in you and we lost money on you.'

  "Well, he joined me, and finding out where I was going, he decided to goalso. He went along to explain things to me, and talk to me when Iwanted to sleep or read the newspaper. He introduced me to large numbersof people whom I did not want to meet, took me to see things I didn'twant to see, read things to me that I didn't want to hear, andintroduced to me people who didn't want to meet me. He multiplied miseryby throwing uncongenial people together and then said: 'Wasn't it luckythat I could go along with you and make it pleasant for you?'

  "Everywhere he met more new people with whom he had an acquaintance. Heshook hands with them, and called them by their first names, and felt intheir pockets for cigars. He was just bubbling over with mirth, a
ndlaughed all the time, being so offensively joyous, in fact, that when hewent into a car, he attracted general attention, which suited himfirst-rate. He regarded himself as a universal favorite and all-roundsunbeam.

  "When we got to Washington, he took me up to see the President. He knewthe President well--claimed to know lots of things about the Presidentthat made him more or less feared by the administration. He wasacquainted with a thousand little vices of all our public men, whichvirtually placed them in his power. He knew how the President conductedhimself at home, and was 'on to everything' in public life.

  "Well, he shook hands with the President, and introduced me. I could seethat the President was thinking about something else, though, and so Icame away without really feeling that I knew him very well.

  "Then we visited the departments, and I can see now that I hurt myselfby being towed around by this man. He was so free, and so joyous, and sobubbling, that wherever we went I could hear the key grate in the lockafter we passed out of the door.

  "He started south with me. He was going to show me all thebattle-fields, and introduce me into society. I bought some strychninein Washington, and put it in his buckwheat cakes; but they got cold, andhe sent them back. I did not know what to do, and was almost wild, for Iwas traveling entirely for pleasure, and not especially for his pleasureeither.

  "At Petersburg I was told that the train going the other way would meetus. As we started out, I dropped my hat from the window while lookingat something. It was a desperate move, but I did it. Then I jumped offthe train, and went back after it. As soon as I got around the curve Iran for Petersburg, where I took the other train. I presume you all feltsorry for me, but if you'd seen me fold myself in a long, passionateembrace after I had climbed on the other train, you would have changedyour minds."

  He then passed gently from my sight.