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AMES MONROE was of Scotch descent, having come from a family of Scotch cavaliers, who were descendants from Hector Monroe, an officer of Charles I. He was born April 28, 1758. Coming from such a stock, he started life with an amount of brain and blood force that was quite likely to make itself felt in the new country in which it had taken form. Spence Monroe, of Westmoreland county, Virginia, was his father, and Eliza Jones, of King George county, was his mother. She was sister of Joseph Jones, who served Virginia twice in the Continental Congress, and as district judge in his own county. The measure of her force may be known somewhat by her brother and her son. It has passed into a common remark that great men are the sons of strong mothers. His father and mother were both Virginia born. So he was well born as to parentage, the best fortune that can befall one at the beginning of life.

The locality where he was born and reared was Westmorland county, between the Potomac and Rappahannock rivers, a region of great fertility, finely watered, of varied and beautiful scenery, which had attracted the attention of the most intelligent settlers from England, on account of its many advantages. It was between two grand rivers; but little above tide-water; originally

heavy-timbered; bearing a great variety of natural products; in a mild climate; with rock and mineral in abundance. So he was well born as to place.

This county and vicinity was settled by some of the best comers from England. Lord Fairfax and his brother and fine family made their wilderness home here. Lawrence and George Washington and the other Washingtons grew up here. Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Patrick Henry, Peyton and John Randolph, Richard Henry Lee and Henry Lee (Light Horse Harry, as he was called), John Marshall, Pendleton, Wythe, Nicolas, Dabney Carr, and many more worthy to be their associates, were the products of this vicinity. So numerous were its great and patriotic men, that some of their biographers have called it "The Athens of America." It is not without reason that Virginians of this region, so fruitful of historic men, have had a pride in Virginia society. In this society, in its best days, James Monroe was born and reared. So, as to society, he was well born.

At Williamsburg, in this vicinity, the seat of the colonial government, was founded and flourished William and Mary college, which at this time had an annual income of some twenty thousand dollars, and had been in operation over a hundred years; next in age to Harvard college. It had had a good history as to professors, classes and work, and had done much to fill that community with a class of educated men. Albemarle academy was located at Charlotteville, a village in this vicinity, which was converted into Central college and then into the University of Virginia, of famous history. Other academies and private schools did good work for education in all this region.

The Phi-Beta-Kappa society, so noted among college men, the chapters of which are connected with so many modern colleges, was formed at William and Mary college, December 5, 1776. Its first meeting is said to have been held in Apollo hall of the old Raleigh tavern, which was a kind of Virginia "cradle of liberty," like Faneuil Hall of Boston. The names of John Marshall and Bushrod Washington appear in the list of the first

members. Many excellent libraries were founded here; books abounded; classical literature was common. So James Monroe was well born as to education and its influence in the community.

Nearly this entire vicinity was occupied by families who held large estates, and who came here with means to establish themselves in good old English fashion. They were large agriculturists who made their calling independent and honorable. It was a community of few dangers to young men. The church of England held its strong influence over all. So as to the moral tone of the community, James Monroe was well born.

Little has come down to us of the boyhood of James Monroe. No early biography was written of him. He has gone into history as lacking brilliancy of character action, and so has had no biographical limner to draw carefully the outlines of his early life. Fifty years efficient public service; fifty years intimate association with and confidence of many of the greatest men of his time; eight years of the conduct of the chief magistracy of the nation in such a way as to destroy all enemies, all opposing parties, and bring in "the era of good feeling," as his administration was called; it would seem ought to bring for a man some appreciative biographers, but in his case it did not; so the details of his early life are left in that obscurity which shrouds "the simple annals of the poor."

A SOLDIER.

The third Virginia regiment, under Colonel Hugh Mercer, appeared at Washington's headquarters at Harlem, New York, in 1776. James Monroe, eighteen years of age, was a lieutenant in that regiment. He was a student in William and Mary college when the war broke out. As a youth he had heard all about the British oppressions of the colonists; the taxation without representation; the "Stamp act;" the Bostonians pitching the tea into the sea; the British possession of Boston; the Lexington, Concord and Bunker Hill fights; the calling of a Continental Congress; the appointment of Washington commander-in-chief; the declaration of independence; the pushing forward the war, and now, as the call for soldiers came, he shut

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