Page 453 [453]
OCR
MONTICELLO =ILIE home of Thomas Jefferson is situated on a high | (@ee¥]) hill four miles southeast of Charlottesville. It is A skh] called Monticello (Little Mountain) and is apLf) proached by a winding macadam road which clings to the side of Carter’s Mountain, the adjoining peak to Monticello and one of the Southwest range. The steep drive offers many sources of interest to the lover of nature. The trickling of the mountain streams was music to the traveller in the old days, for soon one came upon a moss-covered rocky basin, or spring, embowered in ferns, which was welcomed as refreshment for man and beast. Native shrubs and trees frame with artistic beauty the vistas of the valley below, where lies the town of Charlottesville; the view extending a mile to the west embraces the classic buildings of the University of Virginia, behind which stretch in undulating lines the Blue Ridge Mountains, one spur of which, the Ragged Mountains, was made famous in the > writings of Edgar Allan Poe, one time student of this great seat of learning. At the crest of the mountain and at the point at which the county road begins to fall to the other side into the eastern valley, there is a gate at one’s left which is the outer entrance to Jefferson's estate. A lodge has recently been built there by the present owner. . The drive to the house through the woods is enchanting in early spring, and the luxuriant growth of Scotch. broom, with its pendant yellow blossoms, carpets the ground beneath, forming a veritable cloth of gold. On the right, one passes a sacred spot, the family graveyard. Here lies interred the mortal remains of Thomas Jefferson, his beloved wife, his children and grandchildren. A monument is inscribed with the epitaph written by Jefterson [280]
