A Christmas Guest
Shadwell Farm was a good farm to grow up on. Thomas Jefferson and his noisy crowd of schoolfellows hunted on a mountain near by, which abounded in deer, turkeys, foxes, and other game. Jefferson was a keen hunter, eager for a fox, swift of foot and sound of wind, coming in fresh and alert after a long day’s clambering hunt.
He studied hard, for he liked books as much as fox-hunting. Soon he began to be impatient to enter college. Then, too, he had never seen a town nor even a village of twenty houses, and he was curious to know something of the great world. His guardian consenting, he bade farewell to his mother and sisters, and set off for Williamsburg, a five days’ long ride from his home.
But just before he started for college, he stayed over the holidays at a merry house in Hanover County, where he met, for the first time, a jovial blade named Patrick Henry, noted then only for fiddling, dancing, mimicry, and practical jokes.
Jefferson and Henry became great friends. Jefferson had not a suspicion of the wonderful talent that lay undeveloped in the prime mover of all the fun of that merry company. While as little, doubtless, did Patrick Henry see in this slender sandy-haired lad, a political leader and associate.
Yet only a few years later, in May 1765, Patrick Henry was elected a member of the House of Burgesses, and Jefferson was become a brilliant law student.
In 1775, Jefferson was elected a delegate to the Continental Congress, that declared the Independence of the United States of America.
James Parton (Arranged)