Everyone has read the story of how, on the day of his
inauguration, he rode on horseback to the capitol, clad in studiously
plain clothes and without attendants, tied his horse to the fence, and
walked unannounced into the Senate chamber. This careful avoidance of
display marked his whole official career, running sometimes, indeed,
into an ostentation of simplicity whose good taste might be questioned.
But of Jefferson's entire sincerity there can be no doubt. Inconsistent
as he sometimes was--as every man is--his purposes and policies all
tended steadily toward the betterment of humanity; and the great mass of
the people who to this day revere his memory, "pay a just debt of
gratitude to a friend who not only served them, as many have done, but
who honored and respected them, as very few have done."
Perhaps the greatest single act of his administration was the purchase
from France of the vast territory known as Louisiana, which included the
state now bearing that name, and the wide, untrodden, wilderness west of
the Mississippi, paying for it the sum of fifteen million dollars--a
rate of a fraction of a cent an acre. The purchase aroused the bitterest
opposition, but Jefferson seems to have had a clearer vision than most
men of what the future of America was to be. He served for two terms,
refusing a third nomination which he was besought to accept, and
retiring to private life on March 4, 1809, after a nearly continuous
public service of forty-four years.
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