He drew the plans of the buildings, and made the working drafts. Early in the morning he would mount his horse, and canter down the mountain and across the country, and spend the day directing the building. And so there arose a university, new in courses of study and new in rules, where for the first time in America, a young man had his own choice of his studies, was free from religious restrictions, and entrusted to his own honor and conscience. It was as Jefferson had wished-a university so "broad and liberal and modern, as to be a temptation to the youth of other states to come and drink of the cup of knowledge and fraternize with us." The founding of such a university was a fitting close to his life. The political liberties of his country had been won. Only knowledge was now needed to make democracy forever secure. It was in fulfillment of an oath taken many years before: "I have sworn eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man!"

His eager work continued until the very end. He rode his fiery horse until he was so feeble that he had to be lifted into the saddle. His mental activity never failed. He followed closely what was done, said and thought in the world. The very last year of his life, when he was eighty-three years old, he reread in their original tongue the great Greek dramatists. He was happy in his family, he rejoiced in his friends. He loved his garden and his flowers, and, like Washington, the great joy of his evenings was found in the children who studied at his knee.

His end was as the coming of sleep, a gradual sinking to rest. The last week of June of the year 1826 he was still able to write long letters. One of them was a reply to an invitation to attend a Fourth of July celebration in Washington.

"With a trembling hand, but with a buoyant heart, he wrote: 'All eyes are open or opening to the rights of man. The mass of mankind have not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred ready to ride them legitimately, by the Grace of God!" "

But now his strength slowly failed, and it was seen that death was near. It was the third of July. He roused himself again and again, greatly desiring to live until the Fourth. As the night wore on, from time to time he eagerly whispered: "This is the Fourth?" Those who sat by his bedside kept watching the clock, fearing that his spirit would pass before midnight. The hour struck, and once more he stirred restlessly and asked: "This is the Fourth?" At the nod, with a happy sigh of relief, he breathed: "Ah!" And the old smile lit up his features. Not until noon of the great anniversary did he sink into the endless slumber. Exactly fifty years had gone since the Declaration of Independence was given to the world. On the afternoon of that same day at Quincy in Massachusetts, the great John Adams, his friend and supporter in the Continental Congress, passed away. The last words on his lips were: "Thomas Jefferson still lives."

THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LENOX

TILDEN FOUNDATIONS

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

THE SAVIOR OF HIS COUNTRY

"His heart was as great as the world, but there was no room in it to hold the memory of a wrong."-RALPH WALDO EMERSON.

Americans have often thought of their nation as a mighty ship, that was carrying them and all that they held dear, now over tranquil waters, now through the perils and the tempests of an unknown sea. Washington had guided our "Ship of State" safely through the storms of her first voyage. Jefferson stood at the helm when Abraham Lincoln was born-that great captain who saved our noble vessel from shipwreck on the rocks of slavery and brought her safe to harbor, only to lie himself silent and lifeless on her deck.

In the century that had passed since Franklin's birth, the narrow strip of weak and divided English colonies along the Atlantic shore had grown to a united nation of eighteen strong states, that spread beyond the Allegheny Mountains to the broad Mississippi; and now Jefferson's Louisiana Purchase had moved its boundary even farther west, to the heights of the Rockies. Slavery had grown with the country. At the very beginning of our national life, Franklin, with almost his last breath protested against it to Congress and called it "a crime." Washington wished to see it ended by the free act of the people