who were in the minority, held one end of the porch; the more prominent Republicans the other, while the steps were free to both, and the space below was given over to a rabble almost entirely Republican.  Rand, with several associates, lawyers or planters, stood near the head of the steps;—­all waited for the sorting and distribution of the mail.  The sun was low over the Ragged Mountains, and after the breathless heat of the day, a wind had arisen that refreshed like wine.

Rand, his back to the light, and paying grave attention to a colleague’s low-voiced exposition of a point in law, did not at first observe a movement of the throng, coupled with the utterance of a well-known name, but presently, as though an unseen hand had tapped him on the shoulder, he turned abruptly, and looked with all the rest.  Mr. Jefferson was coming up the street, riding slowly on a big, black horse and followed by a negro groom.  The tall, spare form sat very upright, the reins loosely held in the sinewy hand.  Above the lawn neckcloth the face, sanguine in complexion and with deep-set eyes, looking smilingly from side to side of the village street.  He came on to the post-office amid a buzz of voices, and the more prominent men of his party started down the steps to greet him.  The few Federalists stiffly held their places, but they, too, as he rode up, lifted their hats to their ancient neighbour and the country’s Chief Magistrate.  A dozen hands were ready to help him dismount, but he shook his head with a smile.  “Thank you, gentlemen, but I will keep my seat.  I have but ridden down to get my mail.—­Mr. Coles, if you will be so good!—­It is a pity, is it not, to see this drouth?  There has been nothing like it these fifty years.—­Mr. Holliday, I have news of Meriwether Lewis.  He has seen the Pacific.

“Tiphysque novos
Detegat orbes; nec sit terris
Ultima Thule.

“Mr. Massie, I want some apples from Spring Valley for my guest, the Abbe Correa.—­Mr. Cocke, my Merinos are prospering despite the burned pastures.”

Mr. Coles came down the steps with a great handful of letters and newspapers.  The President took them from him, and, without running them over, deposited all together in a small cotton bag which hung from his saddle-bow.  This done, he raised his head and let his glance travel from one end to the other of the porch above him.  Of the men standing there many were his bitter political enemies, but also they were his old neighbours, lovers, like himself, of Albemarle and Virginia, and once, in the old days when all were English, as in the later time when all were patriots, his friends and comrades.  He bowed to them, and they returned his salute, not genially, but with the respect due to his fame and office.  His eye travelled on.  “Mr. Rand, may I have a word with you?”