Mason was of a retiring disposition, and he would have preferred to remain at home. But he was forced into the councils of the Virginia Convention, and during his service there he prepared the marvellous Bill of Rights which was later made a part of the Constitution of that State and was the model for similar documents in many other States. He was also the author of the Constitution of Virginia, and the designer of the State seal. He was a member of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, where he proved himself "the champion of the State and the author of the doctrine of State Rights." Because the Constitution as finally drafted by the convention contained so many provisions that he felt were dangerous, he refused to sign the document, "declaring that he would sooner chop off his right hand than put it to the Constitution" whose provisions he could not approve.

After the Constitutional Convention for more than four years the statesman lived quietly at Gunston Hall. When he died in October, 1792, he asked to be buried by the side of his first wife, whose death in 1773 had been a grievous blow to him. Over her tomb he had inscribed:

No monument was ever raised over his own grave. A grandson planned to set a stone inscribed to "The Author of the Bill of Rights and the Constitution of Virginia," but he was unable to do as he wished.

Gunston Hall still stands, though it has passed through many hands since the death of him whom George Esten Cooke called "one of the most remarkable men, not only of his Country, and of his epoch, but of all Countries and all time."

In 1785 Patrick Henry, Governor of Virginia, wrote to Washington that the General Assembly of the State had voted to give him one hundred shares in the James River Company, "it being their wish, in particular, that those great works of improvement, which, both as springing from the liberty which he has been so instrumental in establishing, and as encouraged by his patronage, will be durable monuments of his glory, may be made monuments also of the gratitude of his country."

Washington replied that he could not accept money for his services to his country. Then he added: "But if it should please the General Assembly to permit me to turn the destination of the fund vested in me, from my private emolument, to objects of a public nature, it will be my study in selecting these to prove the sincerity of my gratitude for the honor conferred on me, by preferring such as may appear most subservient to the enlightened and patriotic views of the legislature."

Of course the legislature granted the desired permission, indicating that the gifts might be made either during Washington's life, or by bequest.

Some years passed before Washington fixed on a proper recipient for the canal shares. In 1798, however, he gave them to the trustees of Liberty Academy, at Lexington, Virginia, which had been incorporated in 1782. In recognition of the gift the trustees asked the legislature to change the name of the school to Washington Academy. In 1813 the name was once more changed to Washington College.

This, the first large gift received by the institution, is still yielding an income of three thousand dollars. During many times of crisis the income provided in this way has been of signal use to the institution, notably in 1824, when the Washington College building was begun. This structure is two hundred and fifty feet long, is built of brick, and each of its three porticoes is supported by white colonial columns.

For more than seventy-five years after Washington turned over the canal shares, the institution's sole endowment amounted to only about one hundred and twenty thousand dollars. The seventy thousand dollars added to the canal shares came from sources that were influenced by Washington's confidence in the institution.

The beginning of the larger life of the college was the election of General Robert E. Lee as president. The keynote of his five years of service was sounded in the letter which he wrote to the trustees on receiving notification of his election. He feared that, in view of his military history, he might cause harm to the college. He was never greater than when he said:

Following the death of General Lee, which came after five years of remarkable development under his leadership, the name of Washington College was changed to Washington and Lee University, that it might continue forever a memorial to its two greatest benefactors.

LXIV

BRUTON PARISH CHURCH, WILLIAMSBURG,
VIRGINIA

"THE COURT CHURCH OF COLONIAL VIRGINIA"

Jamestown was the capital of Virginia until 1699. Then Williamsburg became the seat of government. Six years earlier the latter town had taken on some importance because of the founding there of William and Mary College, and for more than sixty years efforts had been made to persuade the people to make their homes in the place. The records of the Colony show that in 1632 rewards were offered to those who would locate in what seemed a promising situation for a town.

The date of the building of the first church in Williamsburg is not known. The first entry in the vestry book of Bruton parish was made in April, 1674, but the parish dates from 1658. In that year Harrop and Middle Plantation parishes were united, though the new parish was not called Bruton for some time. The name was given because Sir James Ludwell, who afterward left a legacy of twenty pounds to the parish, was born in Bruton, England.

A building (that it was not the first is shown by the mention in the records of the Old Church) was completed in 1683, and the first service was held on January 6, 1684. The cost was "£150 sterling and sixty thousand pounds of good sound, marketable sweet, scented Tobacco." The minister, "Mr. Rowland Jones," was "paid annually y^e sum of sixteen thousand, six hundred and sixty pounds of Tobacco and Caske."

The removal of the capital to Williamsburg brought so many new people to town that the church became too small for the congregation. In 1701 the parish records show that there was talk of a new building.

On October 1, 1706, the vestry decided to levy a tax of twenty thousand pounds of Tobacco as a beginning of the building fund. Four years later the members of the vestry made known their hope that the House of Burgesses would assist in the expense, which, they thought, would be about five hundred pounds. To the Burgesses a message was sent indicating that the vestry "do not doubt in the least but the House of Burgesses would show their Pious and Generous Spirits by their Liberall Donation towards soe Necessary and good a worke and that they would assure them to the best of their Judgment they would appropriate the same according to the true Intent thereof."

The Burgesses offered "to take Care of the wings and intervening parts," if the vestry would build the ends of the church. They also agreed to build the pews for the Governor, the Council, and themselves. With their help, the building was completed and occupied in 1715. The tower was added in 1769.

Rev. James Blair, who was minister of Bruton parish at the time of the erection of the new building, had been instrumental in organizing William and Mary College. The early history of that institution is bound up with that of the church. Some of the most notable conflicts between Church and State in the old Colony took place during the years of Mr. Blair's activity. He died in 1743, after serving the church as minister for thirty-three years, William and Mary College as President for fifty years, and the Colony as Commissioner for fifty-three years.

Among the famous names on the vestry rolls are those of Henry Tyler, great-great-grandfather of President Tyler, who was first mentioned on "The Seaventh day of April, 1694," and George Wythe, one of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence. Patrick Henry, and George Washington later worshipped with the congregation.

When Virginia was about to go to war with Great Britain, the House of Burgesses, on May 24, 1774, ordered that "the members of the House do attend in their places, at the hour of ten in the morning, on the first day of June next, in order to proceed with the Speaker and the mace, to the church," for fasting, humiliation, and prayer. During the Revolution the members of the church were noted for their loyalty to the Colonies.

To-day the building is about as it was during the troubled days of the war. No change has been made in the exterior, but in 1839 the interior was changed in many important particulars. In 1905, however, it was restored as before. The pulpit was put in the old place. The canopy and curtain which had long stood above the pew of Governor Spotswood, were found and again put in position. King Edward VII gave the new pulpit Bible, and President Roosevelt provided the lectern.

LXV

WILLIAM AND MARY COLLEGE, WILLIAMSBURG, VIRGINIA

THE ALMA MATER OF THOMAS JEFFERSON, JAMES
MONROE, AND JOHN TYLER

Three years before John Harvard left a legacy for the founding of the college that bears his name, the first bequest for public education made by a resident of Virginia was recorded, though this was used for a secondary school, rather than for a college.

The project of a college, proposed in 1617 and 1618 by the London Company, and in 1619 at the first session of the General Assembly, languished until 1685, when Rev. James Blair came to the Colony as a missionary and settled in Henrico County, where it had been proposed to found the college sixty-eight years earlier. For five years he brooded over the need of a college and in 1690 he made to a convention at Jamestown "Severall Propositions for a free school and college, to be humbly presented to the consideration of the next general assembly." Later, by authority of the Assembly, Dr. Blair appealed to the Merchants of London, "especially such as traffick with Virginia," and three thousand pounds were pledged.

On the occasion of Dr. Blair's visit to England in 1691, he had an audience with King William, at which he presented the petition for "a charter to erect a free school and college." The king replied, "Sir, I am glad that the Colony is upon so good a design, and will promote it to the best of my power." Queen Mary also showed her interest in the college.

To the endowment in lands and taxes provided by royal order, Dr. Blair secured an appreciable addition in an ingenious manner. Learning that, some time before his arrival, the authorities had promised forgiveness to pirates who, before a set day, should confess their crimes and give up a portion of their booty, and that three famous pirates had come in after the appointed day, so that they were arrested, he visited them in jail and offered to use his influence in their behalf, if they would consent to give to the college a portion of their booty. They gladly agreed; Dr. Blair's efforts were successful, and they were given their liberty together with their treasure, minus the promised gift to the Virginia College. Another much larger gift was secured from the executor of an estate which held money devised indefinitely for "pious and charitable uses." The income from this portion of the endowment was to be used "to keep as many Indian children in meat, drink, washing, clothes, medicine, books and education, from the first beginning of letters till they should be ready to receive orders and be sent abroad to convert the Indians."

In connection with the charter for "the College of William and Mary," which was dated February 8, 1693, authority was given to use the seal described as follows: "On a green field a college building of silver, with a golden sun, showing half its orb, rising above it." This is said to be the sole instance of a college, either English or American, which has a seal of such high origin.

Sir Christopher Wren, the designer of St. Paul's Cathedral, made the plan for the original building, which was to be two stories and a half high, one hundred and thirty-six feet long, and forty feet wide, and with two wings sixty feet long and twenty-five feet wide. In 1697 it was reported to the governor of the province that the front and north side of the proposed rectangle had been completed at Williamsburg, and that funds were exhausted. The walls were more than three feet thick at the base, and contained 840,000 bricks, the product of a brickyard nearby.

For some years subscriptions were paid slowly, and interest in the college languished, but conditions improved when King William sent to Governor Nicholson a proclamation urging him "Y^t you call upon y^e persons y^t have promised to contribute towards y^e maintenance of y^e s^d college, to pay in full the severall Contributions."

The first of the disasters that have visited the main building came in 1705, when the interior was burned. The college was rebuilt on the old walls, as was the case after the fire of 1859. Thus, after much more than two hundred years, the venerable building looks almost as it did when the first students entered its doors. A number of other structures have been erected since, including the Brafferton building in 1723, the house now occupied by the president, which dates from 1732, and the chapel, begun in 1729. Interest must always centre about the central structure, however.

During the Revolution the president was James Madison, second cousin of the future President of the United States. The president's house was occupied by Cornwallis in 1781. After his surrender French officers lived there. During their occupancy the house was badly damaged by fire, but it was repaired at the expense of the French Army.

Three events of the years of the war are of special moment in the history of higher education in America. On December 5, 1776, the Phi Beta Kappa Society, the first intercollegiate fraternity in the United States, was organized. On December 4, 1779, the college was made a university, the first in the country, and the same year marked the beginning of the Honor System of college government which worked such a revolution in other colleges more than a century later. When Thomas Jefferson, who was a student at William and Mary in 1760-62, founded the University of Virginia, the Honor System was successfully inaugurated in the new institution.

Other famous men who have been connected with William and Mary included George Washington, who was chancellor in 1794; Chief Justice John Marshall, student in 1779; Secretary of State Edmund Randolph, student in 1766; James Monroe, student in 1775. John Tyler was also educated there. It is a remarkable fact that the presidents who are responsible for adding to the original territory of the country Louisiana, Florida, Texas, and most of the western territory, were products of William and Mary.

This story the editor of the Richmond (Virginia) American Standard told in the columns of his paper on Friday, December 27, 1811. He added the fact that among those who perished were the Governor of the State, as well as many of the leaders in the business and social life of the city.

By order of the city council the remains of the victims were buried on the site of the burned building, which was bought for the purpose. At the same time it was ordered that "no person or persons should be permitted for and during the time of four months ... to exhibit any public show or spectacle ... within the city."

By ordinance it was also decreed that a monument should be erected on the site. Later it was suggested that there should be built there, by public subscription, "an edifice to be set apart and consecrated for the worship of God," and that this should be the monument.

Accordingly, on August 1, 1812, the corner stone of the Monumental Church was laid, the lot having been purchased by the city for $5,000. The building was consecrated as a Protestant Episcopal church in May, 1814. In April, 1815, the subscribers to the fund for the building, who had organized under the title, "The Association for building a Church on Shockoe Hill," were notified that one-half of their subscription money would be returned to them on application at the Bank of Virginia.

In the middle of the front or main porch of the church a white marble monument was erected to the memory of the victims of the fire.

To the General Convention of the Protestant Episcopal church, which assembled in Philadelphia on May 18, 1814, report was made that "a magnificent church has sprung up in Richmond from the ashes of the Theatre; it has the patronage and support of men of the greatest talents and highest rank in Virginia."

Among the communicants of the Monumental Church have been numbered many of the most prominent men in the Virginia capital, and men famous in the early history of the country were attendants from time to time. In February, 1824, General Lafayette worshipped in the building.

LXVII

MONTPELIER, ORANGE COUNTY, VIRGINIA

THE LIFELONG HOME OF JAMES MADISON

James Madison was born at the residence of his mother's parents, at Port Conway, Prince George County, Virginia, but before long he was taken to his father's house, Montpelier, which was the first brick house built in Orange County. And Montpelier continued to be his home to the day of his death. Much of his life was spent in Washington, but his heart was always turning to the old Virginia plantation where he had spent his boyhood, and he took advantage of every possible opportunity to go there for a longer or shorter visit.

The distance to Shadwell, where Thomas Jefferson lived as a boy, was only thirty miles, but these two who were to have such a large place in the early history of America, did not meet until Madison was seventeen years old. Then lost time was made up. For many years the road between Montpelier and the home of Jefferson became quite familiar to the friends.

In the years before he went to college Madison roamed at will over the twenty-five hundred acres of the Montpelier estate. He walked and rode, he hunted and fished, he learned to take delight in the quiet scenery of that beautiful Blue Ridge country. His tutor, who lived on the estate, was his companion on his expeditions.

It was probably due to this outdoor life that his health was so much better in Virginia than it was at the College of New Jersey (Princeton College). Soon after he graduated in 1771 he returned to Montpelier, somewhat broken by reason of overwork and lack of exercise. To a college friend in Philadelphia he wrote rather pessimistically:

He was right in thinking that he was not to have a healthy life, but he was wrong in thinking it was to be neither long nor eventful. For more than sixty years after he wrote the letter from which quotation has been made, he was energetic and devoted in the service of his country. In May, 1776, he entered the Virginia Convention, thus beginning the career that led him to eight years in the White House. And after he retired from the Presidency much of his time and thought was given to the affairs of the nation. During all these years the thought of his Virginia home gave him new strength in the midst of his tasks.

That home meant more to him than ever when, in September, 1794, he entered the doors of Montpelier with his bride, Dorothy Todd, the young Philadelphia widow whom he had married at Harewood, Virginia.

The estate was still the property of Mr. Madison's father, and both his father and mother continued to live there. Before long the house was enlarged. The rooms so long occupied by the old people were made a part of the new mansion.

The two families lived together in perfect harmony. The father lived to see his son President of the United States, and the mother was ninety-eight when she died. William O. Stoddard, in his "Life of James Madison," says that "she kept up the old-fashioned ways of housekeeping; waited upon by her servants who grew old and faded away with her. She divided her time between her Bible and her knitting, all undisturbed by the modern hours, the changed customs, or the elegant hospitality of the mansion house itself. She was a central point in the life of her distinguished son, and the object of his most devoted care to the end of her days."

For Mr. and Mrs. Madison, real life at Montpelier began in 1817, after the close of the stirring period in the White House. They did not have much opportunity to be alone, for guests delighted to come to them, and they liked to have others with them, yet they managed to secure a wonderful amount of joy out of the years spent "within a squirrel's jump of heaven," to use Dolly Madison's expressive phrase.

Among the guests were intimate friends like Jefferson, who was almost a member of the family. Lafayette, too, found his way to the estate, while Harriet Martineau told in her "Recollections" of her pleasant sojourn there. Frequently strangers who were on the way to the Virginia Hot Springs took the five-mile detour merely to reach Montpelier, and they were always made welcome.

The dining-room was large, but there were sometimes so many guests that the table had to be set out of doors. Mr. Madison wrote in 1820 of one such occasion: "Yesterday we had ninety persons to dine with us at our table, fixed on the lawn, under a large arbor.... Half a dozen only staid all night."

After a visit to her parents that was broken into by the presence of guests, a daughter of the house complained to her husband that she had not been able to pass one sociable moment with her father. His reply was sympathetic: "Nobody can ever have felt so severely as myself the prostration of family society from the circumstances you mention.... But there is no remedy. The present manners and ways of our country are laws we cannot repeal. They are altering by degrees, and you will live to see the hospitality of the country reduced to the visiting hours of the day, and the family left to tranquillity in the evening."

When the steward saw that Madison would not curb these guests, he began to cut down on the fodder for the horses, but when the hospitable host learned of this he gave orders that there should be no further attempts of this sort. He realized that he was living beyond his income, but he saw no help for it. He longed for more time in his library or for riding or walking about the estate.

The time came when walks had to be taken on the veranda; health was failing rapidly. He was not able to oversee the farm as he had long been accustomed to do, but depended on others. In 1835 Mrs. Madison wrote to her daughter: "My days are devoted to nursing and comforting my sick patient, who walks only from the bed in which he breakfasts to another." Still later she wrote: "I never leave my husband more than a few minutes at a time, and have not left the enclosure around our house for the last eight months."

When the owner of Montpelier died, on June 28, 1836, he was buried in the cemetery on the estate. Mrs. Madison spent a few lonely years in the old home, but the property was finally sold to satisfy the debts of her wayward son, Payne Todd. She was sometimes in actual want before she died, but Congress provided for her relief by buying for twenty-five thousand dollars the Madison letters and other papers.

She lived until July 12, 1849, and her body was finally laid by the side of that of her husband.

William Dupont, the present owner of Montpelier, has enlarged the house by the addition of a second story to the wings. So the house that was built in 1760 by James Madison, Sr., and was enlarged by James Madison, Jr., has entered on a new era of hospitality.

LXVIII

OAK HILL, LOUDOUN COUNTY, VIRGINIA

THE HOME OF JAMES MONROE'S OLD AGE

James Monroe, at twenty-eight, wrote from New York to Thomas Jefferson, with whom he had studied law:

The "connection" of which the future President wrote was his marriage to Miss Eliza Kortwright of New York. Of this he had spoken in an earlier letter to Jefferson:

Monroe was not permitted to practice law long. As United States Senator, diplomat, Governor, Cabinet officer, and President, his time was so fully occupied that no one but a man of his fine physique and endurance could have stood the strain. Once, during the War of 1812, according to his friend, Judge E. R. Watson, when the burden of three of the departments of the government rested on him—State, Treasury, and War—he did not undress himself for ten days and nights, and was in the saddle the greater part of the time.

After some years he bought an estate in Loudoun County, Virginia, to which he retired for a brief rest whenever this was possible. For a time the old dormer-windowed house on the property satisfied him, but during his presidential term he built Oak Hill, the house for which Jefferson had prepared the plans. It is said that the nails used in its construction were manufactured on the Jefferson estate.

The house—which was named Oak Hill because of the oaks on the lawn, planted by the owner himself, one for each State of the Union—has been described by Major R. W. N. Noland as follows:

After the expiration of his second term as President Monroe made Oak Hill his permanent home, though sometimes he was with his daughter, Mrs. Gouverneur, in New York.

One who was a member of the household during a part of the six years of the life in Virginia said that he "looked perhaps older than he was, his face being strongly marked with the lines of anxiety and care."

There were many guests at Oak Hill, among these being Madison and Jefferson. Monroe, in turn, was frequently at Monticello and Montpelier. His office as Regent of the University of Virginia also brought him into frequent touch with his two predecessors in the presidency, for they were fellow-members on the Board.

Whenever weather and guests permitted he was accustomed to ride about the estate and through the countryside both morning and evening. One day, when he was seventy-two, his horse fell on him, and his right wrist was sprained so badly that for a time he could not write to his friends, as he had delighted to do. Thus he was able to sympathize with Madison when a letter came from Montpelier a few months later:

Monroe's last years of life were saddened by financial difficulties, though even these brought gleams of joy, because of the fidelity of his friends. Lafayette, who visited Oak Hill in 1825, wrote later to his friend a most delicately worded offer of assistance, indicating that he felt it was his right to offer this, since Monroe, when minister to France, had exerted himself to bring about the release of Lafayette, then a prisoner at Olmütz, and had ministered to the wants of Madame Lafayette.

A measure of relief came when Congress voted to repay, in part, the extraordinary expense incurred by the statesman during his diplomatic career, but not before he had advertised Oak Hill for sale and had planned to go to New York to live near his daughter. The estate was later withdrawn from the market, but the plan to go to New York was carried out: he did not see how he could remain after the death of Mrs. Monroe, which took place in 1830.

He did not stay long in New York. On July 4, 1831, he died. Twenty-seven years later, on the one hundredth anniversary of his birth, his body was taken to Richmond for burial. There, in his native State, rest the remains of him of whom Thomas Jefferson said, "He is a man whose soul might be turned inside out without discovering a blemish to the world."

LXIX

RED HILL, CHARLOTTE COUNTY, VIRGINIA

WHERE PATRICK HENRY SPENT HIS LAST YEARS

Patrick Henry was only fifty-eight years old when he retired for rest and the enjoyment of family life to his 2,920-acre estate, Red Hill, in the Staunton Valley, thirty-eight miles southeast of Lynchburg. Just before he made this move he wrote to his daughter Betsy, "I must give out the law, and plague myself no more with business, sitting down with what I have. For it will be sufficient employment to see after my little flock."

He had served his country well for thirty years, as member of the House of Burgesses, as Speaker of the first Continental Congress in Philadelphia in 1774, in the Virginia Convention of 1775 where he made his most famous speech, and as Governor of Virginia from 1776 to 1779 and again from 1784 to 1786. He had well earned the rest he hoped to find. Washington asked him to become Secretary of State and, later, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. John Adams nominated him as minister to France. But he resisted all these efforts to draw him from his retirement.

The house at Red Hill was a simple story and a half structure, to which the owner soon added a shed kitchen, solely because he "wished to hear the patter of the rain on the roof." This original portion of the house has been retained intact by later occupants, who have made additions with rare appreciation of what is fitting. The central portion was built by the son of the orator, John Henry. The box hedges in which the sage of Red Hill took such delight have been retained and extended.

George Morgan, in "The True Patrick Henry," says that this life in retirement "might be designated as a patriarchal life, if it were not for the fact that the cradle was still rocking at Red Hill." Henry's letters were full of references to his children. Once he wrote to his daughter Betsy, "I have the satisfaction to inform you that we are well, except Johnny, Christian, and Patrick, and they are recovering fast now." And again, "I have great cause of thankfulness for the health I enjoy, and for that of your mamma and all the children.... We have another son, named Winston."

William Wirt, in his "Life of Patrick Henry," written in 1817, said, "His visitors have not infrequently caught him lying on the floor, with a group of these little ones, climbing over him in every direction, or dancing around him with obstreperous mirth to the tune of his violin, while the only contest seemed to be who should make the most noise."

That there were many visitors who had the opportunity to see such contests as these is evident from a paragraph in "Homes of American Statesmen":

Not only was he a total abstainer, but as he grew older he came to detest the odor of tobacco; so there were certain refreshments that were never offered to the guests at Red Hill.

During the closing years of his life he spent hours over the Bible. Every morning he would take his seat in the dining-room, with the big family Bible open before him. Once he said to a visitor, "This book is worth all the books that ever were printed, and it has been my misfortune that I never found time to read it with the proper attention and feeling till lately. I trust in the mercy of heaven that it is not too late."

To Betsy, a daughter by his first marriage, he wrote in 1796:

As, one by one, the older children grew up and went out from Red Hill to homes of their own, they were urged to read the Bible. Dorothea was the first to be married. Then came Martha Catherine, who, at seventeen, fell in love with the hero who rescued her when she fell from a boat into the water. Sarah married Robert, the brother of the poet Thomas Campbell. It is said that at one time the poet was engaged to come to Red Hill as tutor for the younger children of the family, but was unable to keep his promise.

Because of the constant pleas that were made that he give up his quiet life and reënter politics, Henry Clay wrote, in 1796:

He kept his resolution. A few months after writing this message, when notified that he had been elected Governor of Virginia, for a third term, he wrote, "My declining years warn me of my inability."

But in January, 1799, came an appeal from Washington himself that he would present himself as a candidate "if not for Congress, which you may think would take you too long from home, as a candidate for Representative in the General Assembly of the Commonwealth." The reasons were given: "Your insight of character and influence in the House of Representatives would be a bulwark against such dangerous sentiments as are delivered there at present. It would be a rallying point for the timid, and an attraction of the wavering. In a word, I conceive it to be of immense importance at this crisis that you should be there, and I would fain hope that all minor considerations will be made to yield to the measure."

Though Henry knew that he had little strength left, he responded to the appeal. On County Court day, the first Monday in March, he presented himself before the people at Charlotte as a candidate for Representative. How they flocked about him!

A Hampdon-Sidney student, Henry Miller, who heard him that day, said afterward:

Near the close of this effective address he said:

After the conclusion of the oration, Henry went back to Red Hill, and never left it again. In April he was triumphantly elected, but he was unable to take his seat.

On June 6, 1799, he was near death. When the physician offered him a vial of mercury, at the same time telling him that the remedy might prolong his life a little while, or it might be fatal, he drew over his eyes a silken cap which he usually wore, and, holding the vial in his hands, made "a simple childlike prayer for his family, for his country, and for his own soul. Afterwards in perfect calm he swallowed the medicine."

His last word was to his physician, commending the Christian religion, which was so real a benefit to a man about to die.

Patrick Henry and his wife lie side by side in the rear garden of Red Hill. "His fame his best epitaph" is the simple inscription on the stone above the patriot.