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[Footnote: Collins, Domestic Slave Trade, 26.]
It was in this period that Thomas Jefferson fell into such financial
embarrassments that he was obliged to request of the legislature of
Virginia permission to dispose of property by lottery to pay his
debts, and that a subscription was taken up to relieve his distress.
[Footnote: Randall, Jefferson, III., 527, 561.] At the same time,
Madison, having vainly tried to get a loan from the United States
Bank, was forced to dispose of some of his lands and stocks;
[Footnote: Hunt, Madison, 380.] and Monroe, at the close of his term
of office, found himself financially ruined. He gave up Oak Hill and
spent his declining years with his son-in-law in New York City. The
old-time tide-water mansions, where, in an earlier day, everybody
kept open house, gradually fell into decay.
Sad indeed was the spectacle of Virginia's ancient aristocracy. It
had never been a luxurious society. The very wealthy planters, with
vast cultivated estates and pretentious homes, were in the minority.


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