The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1870-07-08
Correspondence
LETTERS FROM VIRGINIA.
MonticeIlo--the Residence of Thomas
jefferson.

MEssRs EDITORS When I wrote you
last week from Staunton, / was so impressed
with visit to Monticello day or two be-
fore, that foolishly imagined | would be
able to get up pretty good letter, but
have deferred it till | have lost, to great
degree, the inspiration impaired by the
place and the associations connected with
it. l regret | did not put my impressions
| upon paper at the time, instead of writing
out that silly deer-hunt, but like some 9TH
ers | have met with in my time, my fore
sight is not quite as good as my hindsight.
However, anybody that writes and gables
as much as | do, must necessarily, write
and gable vast deal of nonsense But !
must tell you what can about Monticello
and how got there, and to do it intelli-
gently, must begin at the beginning
left Abingdon on the night ofthe goth of
June, to visit some warm hearted and val
ued friends at Stanton 300 miles away
and to attend the Commencement Exercises
of the Wesleyan Female Institute in that
place, which belongs to the Baltimore Con-
ference of the Methodist Episcopal Church
South, and is under the Presidency of one
of the best friends have on the face of
this green earth. Owing to an accident to
the westward bound train which we were
meeting, we had the pleasure of trying to
amuse ourselves as best we could upon a
barren and unpicturesque summit from 10
at night till next morning, which threw us
six hours behind time at Lynchburg, and of
course missed connection with the Orange &
Alexandria train. had my choice between
waiting for the passenger train till 8 next
morning and taking the freight train just
before shutdown and going on to Charlottes-
vile that night | chose the latter, and
slowing myself among bales and boxes and
a crowd of Fifteenth Amendments" in the
conductors caboose, had the satisfaction
of joltting into Charlottesville about an hour
after midnight, sought hotel and after
sundry thumps and volley ofmid impre-
cations, succeeded in arousing stupid
Senagambian of the male persuasion, who
struck light and conducted me to room
about as far from "the low grounds of
sorrow" as the equestrian statue on the
Baltimore Monument, where soon forgot
all my troubles. 1t seemed to me that |
hadn't been asleep more than an hour when
began to dream of hurricanes and earth
quakes, and on being aroused to conscious
ness, discovered that my dreams had been
based upon the whanging and deafening
clamor of the breakfast gong, which a
stumpy niger was banging with as much
blood thirsty earnestness as if he had been
John Chinaman in the van of Celestial
army. After bestowing blessing upon him
in particular, and the long tailed barbara
ans in general, who invented that noisiest
and most diabolical of all musical iIstru-
ments, descended the quarter-o annie of
stairway and instinctively found the way
to the breakfast table. After doing my
duty to the dollars worth of coffee, hot
rolls and mutton-chop, / sauntered out in
search of any stray zephyr that might
find its way into the funace-like borough
from the neighboring hills
| was So miles nearer my journeys end
than would have been at Lynchburg, but
could reach it no sooner than if had laid
over in the latter city, and had to wait till
P. M. for the train that was to take me
to Stanton. Casting about for something
of interest to occupy the tedious hours of
that long sweltering day, with the mercury
up to the very top of the thermometer
and it would have been higher had the in
strument been longer-a strange gentleman,
also on probation, proposed walk to
Monticello, three miles distant. This ex-
actly suited my notions of economizing
time and Of gratifying a mania for ancient
relics and memories, and off we started
All the way along that serpentine and as
cending road, my thoughts were busy with
the immortal man who had so often walked
it in the better days of the Republic, and
not rock or tree did we pass that did
not imagine that the great statesman and
philosopher had sat upon and rested under,
and could not resist the inclination to take
seat upon every eligible rock, and to rest
a moment under every accessible tree, for
the simple reason that Mr.. Jefferson may
have done so in his frequent walks to and
from the village
Everybody knows, or ought to know,
that Monticello, as the first syllable of the