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_) THE AUTHOR OF THE DECLARATION The English settlers of Virginia, brought with them English rights and liberties. The settlers and their descendants were “forever to enjoy all liberties, franchises, and immunities enjoyed by Englishmen in England.” They received from England the right to make their own laws, if not contrary to the laws of England. It was a Governor of Virginia who summoned the first representative Assembly that ever met in America, the first American Colonial Legislature. This happened about a year before the Pilgrim Fathers reached the New World, and drew up the Mayflower Compact. It was not strange, therefore, that Thomas Jefferson, born and reared in the atmosphere of Virginia Freedom, should have been a Patriot who fearlessly defended American Liberty. He was also a man of unusual intellectual power and a writer of elegant prose. So when Congress appointed a Committee to draft the Declaration of Independence, he was made a member of that Committee. When the Committee met, the other members asked Thomas Jefferson to compose the draft. He did so. The Committee admired his draft so much, that with but few changes, they submitted it to Congress. After a fiery debate, some alterations being made, Congress adopted Thomas Jefferson’s draft, as the Declaration of Independence of the United States of America. PROCLAIM LIBERTY _July 4, 1776_ The Declaration was signed! America was free!