proper firmness and decision." For a time, this conduct only stimulated the British to increased severity against our unfortunate countrymen who fell into their hands; but a perseverance in the system adopted by Jefferson, eventually succeeded, and corrected a procedure at variance with every principle, feeling and practice of civilised nations. In a letter which he addressed to one of the American prisoners, he thus exhorts them to fortitude and philosophy. "There is nothing, you may be assured, consistent with the honour of your country, which we shall not, at all times, be ready to do for the relief of yourself and companions in captivity. We know that ardent spirit and hatred for tyranny, which brought you into your present situation, will enable you to bear against it with the firmness which has distinguished you as a soldier, and to look forward with pleasure to the day when events shall take place, against which the wounded pride of your enemies will find no comfort, even from reflections on the most refined of the cruelties with which they have glutted themselves."

The administration of Mr. Jefferson was now rendered memorable, by the sudden invasion of Virginia by the British, headed by the daring Tarleton, tracking his way with barbarity and blood, as the van of Cornwallis's army, and shaking Virginia to the centre, by the sudden and terrible shock of war.

This was a new era in the life of Jefferson. The philosopher, the sage and the statesman, was called to buckle on his armour, and array the militia of his State against the formidable invasion of a fierce and disciplined foe. Virginia with her wonted chivalry roused herself to action; and Jefferson bent all the energies of his powerful intellect to the efficient discharge of his military functions; and put in requisition every means of defence and precaution, which his foresight and resources enabled him to apply. On the 11th of June, he wrote to Washington in the following style of energy, decision, and activity." Our intelligence from the southward is most lamentably defective. Though Charleston has now been in the hands of the enemy a month, we hear nothing of their movements which can be relied upon. Rumours say that they are penetrating northward. To remedy this defect, I shall immediately establish a line of expresses from hence to the neighbourhood of their army, and send thither a sensible, judicious person, to give us

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information of their movements. This intelligence will, I hope, be conveyed at the rate of one hundred and twenty miles in the twenty-four hours. They set out to their stations to-morrow. I wish it were possible that a like speedy line of communication could be formed from hence to your excellency's head quarters. Perfect and speedy information of what is passing in the south, might put it in your power perhaps to frame your measures by theirs. There is really nothing to oppose the enemy northward, but the cautious principle of the military art. North Carolina is without arms. They do not abound with us. have are freely imparted to them; but such is the state of their resources that they have not been able to move a single musket from this State to theirs. All the wagons we can collect here, have been furnished to the Baron De Kalb, and are assembled for the march of 2500 men under General Stevens, of Culpepper, who will move on the 19th inst. I have written to Congress to hasten supplies of arms and military stores for the southern States, and particularly to aid us with cartridge paper and boxes, the want of which articles, small as they are, renders our stores useless. The want of money cramps every effort. This will be supplied by the most unpalatable of all substitutes, force. Your excellency will readily conceive that, after the loss of one army, our eyes are turned towards the other, and that we comfort ourselves with the hope that, if any aids can be furnished by you, without defeating the operations more beneficial to the Union, they will be furnished. same time, I am happy to find that the wishes of the people go no further, as far as I have an opportunity of hearing their sentiments. Could arms be furnished, I think this State and North Carolina, would embody from ten to fifteen thousand militia immediately, and more if necessary. I hope ere long to be able to give you a more certain statement of the enemy's as well as our own situation."

At the

The Legislature of Virginia acted with a vigour and promptitude commensurate to the occasion, and clothed the Governor with extraordinary powers, not exactly consistent with republican ideas; but Jefferson rose to the critical nature of the emergency, and did not disappoint public expectation in this solemn crisis.

I italicise this title to show that even Jefferson could not-preserve, in practice, his STRICT REPUBLICAN SIMPLICITY!

An attack, however, now burst upon them from another and unexpected quarter. General Arnold, the traitor of West Point, always daring, and now become reckless and ferocious, suddenly landed below Richmond, at the head of 1500 men. This was a complete surprise, for which the Governor was unprepared; the available militia having beenplaced under the command of General Nelson, and stationed at Williamsburg. In this juncture, Jefferson, having hastily summoned two hundred militia, under the command of Baron Steuben, with which force he superintended in person the records and military stores that were deposited in the capital, across the river, until he saw them safe from the gripe of the enemy. On this occasion Jefferson mani

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fested that coolness and displayed that undaunted courage which might have been justly expected from his character; and continued to issue his orders until the very appearance of the light horse of the enemy made it prudent to withdraw his person from the scene of embarkation. Arnold having laid waste and plundered the surrounding country, Mr. Jefferson, to rid the State of his further annoyance, conceived a laudable plan for his capture, which he thought might be attended with success; and which he thus explained in a letter to General Muhlenberg, dated 31st January, 1780, Sir, Acquainted as you are with the treasons of Arnold, I need say nothing for your information, or to give you a proper sentiment of them. You will readily suppose that it is above all things desirable to drag him from those under whose wing he is now sheltered. On his march to and from this place, I am certain it might have been done with facility, by men of enterprise and firmness. I think it may still be done, though perhaps not quite so easily. Having peculiar confidence in the men from the western side of the mountains, I meant, as soon as they should come down, to get the enterprize proposed to a chosen number of them, such whose courage and whose fidelity would be above all doubt. Your perfect knowledge of those men personally, and my confidence in your discretion, induce me to ask you to seek from among them proper characters, in such numbers as you think best; to reveal to them our desire; and engage them to undertake to seize and bring off this greatest of all traitors. Whether this may be best effected by their going in as friends, and awaiting their opportunity, or otherwise, is left to themselves. The smaller the num

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ber the better, so that they may be sufficient to manage him. Every necessary caution must be used on their part, to preI will unvent a discovery of their design by the enemy. dertake, if they are successful in bringing him off alive, that they shall receive five thousand guineas reward among them; and to men formed for such an enterprise, it must be a great incitement to know that their names will be recorded with glory in history, with those of Vanwert, Paulding and Williams."

The plan thus suggested by Jefferson was carried into effect; but it proved abortive, Arnold being not less cautious and circumspect, than he was daring and unprincipled.

Failing in this scheme, he now projected another, in which he was to receive the co-operation of General Washington, and the French fleet. In a letter of the 8th of March, he thus addressed the former personage, upon the subject: "We have made, on our part, every preparation which we were able to make. The militia, proposed to operate, will be upwards of 4000 from this State, and 1000 or 1200 from Carolina, said to be under General Gregory. The enemy are at this time, in a great measure, blockaded by land, there being a force on the east side of Elizabeth river. They suffer for provisions, as they are afraid to venture far, lest the French squadron should be in the neighbourhood, and come upon them. Were it possible to block up the river, a little time would suffice to reduce them by want and desertions; and would be more sure in its events than any attempt by storm." But Arnold again escaped; the arrival of a British squadron of superior force having driven the French fleet from the Chesapeake.

Arnold having effected a retreat from Virginia, Cornwallis now penetrated the State from the south. Exhausted of most of her slender resources for the common defence, and the succour of her southern sisters, Jefferson saw, and deplored, that his native state had been left naked to the sword of the enemy. But his was not a spirit to despair, or shrink in times of danger. Again he rose with the pressure of the emergency; and having rallied every remaining resource of the commonwealth, he placed her in the best attitude of defence which his limited means permitted.

The Legislature convened at Charlotteville on the 28th of May; and thus took from the Governor some of the weight of the heavy responsibility which had been thrown

upon him by a concurrence of adverse events and disastrous circumstances. His letter to General Washington, of that date, will supercede any description of ours, relating to the embarrassments and difficulties that pressed upon him.

"I have just been advised, he says, that the British have evacuated Petersburg, been joined by a considerable reinforcement from New York, and crossed James river at Westover. They were, on the 26th instant, three miles advanced towards Richmond, at which place, Major General, the Marquis Fayette, lay with three thousand men, regulars and militia, that being the whole number we could arm, until the arrival of the 1100 stand of arms from Rhode Island, which are about this time at the place where our public stores are deposited. The whole force of the enemy within this State, from the best intelligence I have been able to get, is, I think, about 7000 men, including the gar rison left at Portsmouth. A number of privateers, which are constantly ravaging the shores of our rivers, prevent us from receiving any aid from the counties lying on navigable waters; and powerful operations meditated against our western frontier, by a joint force of British and Indian savages, have, as your excellency before knew, obliged us to embody between two and three thousand men in that quarter. Your excellency will judge from this state of things, and from what you know of your own country, what it may probably suffer during the present campaign. Should the enemy be able to obtain no opportunity of annihilatng the Marquis's army, a small proportion of their force may yet restrain his movements effectually, while the greater part is employed in detachments to waste an unarmed country, and lead the minds of the people to acquiesce under those events, which they see no human power prepared to ward off. We are too far removed from the other scenes of war, to say whether the main force of the enemy be within this state; but I suppose they cannot any where spare so great an army for the operations of the field. Were it possible for this circumstance to justify, in your excellency, a determination to lend us your personal aid, it is evident from the universal voice, that the presence of their beloved countryman, whose talents have so long been successfully employin establishing the freedom of kindred States,* to whose

* I cannot avoid calling the attention of the reader, in an em phatic manner, to the terms here used 'KINDRED STATES,' addressed