It was in exactly this conjuncture that the American colonies, breaking the fetters of colonial servitude, asserted the new principle of the equality of man, and their capacity, and their right to subvert, and establish, and control governments at their own absolute pleasure, and exclusively for their own welfare.

What wonder was it, then, that the political philosophers and philanthropists, and even the generous soldiers of Europe, hailed the new republic with enthusiasm and with exultation? What wonder that the exiled Pulaski, and the outlawed Kosciusko, as well as the ardent Steuben and De Kalb, hastened to defend it with their arms; or that it kindled the flame of sympathy in the breast of Rousseau, dying at Ermeronville, and called forth new efforts for the emancipation of mankind, from the genius of Voltaire, blazing its last and most brilliant fires in the philosophic shades of Ferney.

Paris hailed the great event with an enthusiasm that penetrated and swayed even the despotic court of Louis XVI. But the monarch and the court, equally hating and fearing the British nation, were timid and reserved. The friends of liberty and of man gathered themselves into the saloons of Franklin, at once a representative of science and of liberty. At this day we can reproduce no full idea of the veneration then inspired by Franklin on the continent of Europe. Whoever shall visit Ferney, long since rendered desolate by the death of its extraordinary tenant, will find the chamber of Voltaire still embellished with a portrait of the great American. And among the family pictures of the house of Orleans, none is more conspicuously placed, or carefully preserved, than that in which the artist has commemorated the reception of Franklin at the Palais Royale.

Among those who presented themselves every day in the thronged apartments of the American minister, was one tall in stature, fair in complexion, and of elastic step, not yet twenty years old, distinguished by rank and connections of the highest class, and by wealth almost unlimited. He had become a disciple, and he soon learned to love and venerate, not only Franklin whom he saw, but Washington whom he had not seen, and who then was maintaining the cause of the new republic in the field with unsurpassed moral grandeur. Lafayette burned to aid the cause of America, and to share the fortunes and the fame of Washington. He tendered his service to Franklin, and it was

accepted at a moment when hopes for the success of the contest were high and enthusiasm was universal.

But he had scarcely began his preparation for departure when a change came over the prospects of the American cause. The British government had sent new military and naval forces so vast, that the reduction of the insurgents was deemed inevitable.

The confidence of success which the colonies had derived from the expulsion of the invaders from Boston, was lost now in the double disaster of the surrender of New York, and the retreat of Washington with his exhausted and demoralized army through the Jerseys. The court of Versailles became deaf to the entrea ties of the American ministers, and the votaries of liberty ceased to crowd their saloons. One only among them all remained constant, and that was the young nobleman to whom, while America offered only dangers, France offered, together with safety, only less than regal honors. He still persisted in the teuder of his services; but the American ministers, now without credit at home or in Europe, without hope from the French court, and desponding over the sad prospects of the cause, pitied the young enthusiast, and with a just and noble delicacy, attempted to dissuade him from his purpose. He persisted, and so they were at last compelled to confess that the American army was reduced so low that they could not guaranty him the command of a brigade as they had before stipulated. "I will go, then, as a volunteer," was his prompt reply. The ministers, pushed to still more humiliating confession, now declared that they had not funds enough to procure and equip a vessel to convey him to America, which was necessary, since his departure had been interdicted by the king. Then said he, "I will go without. Hitherto I have done no more than wish success to your cause, I go now to serve it. The more it has fallen in public favor, the greater will be the benefit of my departure to sustain it. I will buy the vessel, and will equip it at my own expense."

He executed this noble purpose with secrecy and caution, and happily, avoiding the police of France, and the cruisers of England, landed at Charleston in the spring of 1777. The court and all Paris were amazed by the rash and visionary enthusiasm manifested by the young nobleman, in leaving his newly-married wife and all the pleasures and honors of the French capital, to embark, at such a time, in a cause so distant and so desperate.

Had he resigned nothing but the dignified ease and repose of his ancestral home at La Grange, and the pleasures of society in the fashionable circles of the metropolis, and had he resigned these to join a standard then victorious, and so to share an assured triumph, yet even then, where in our own land, or in any other, could we have found a parallel to an action so noble and so disinterested? We honor our Washington, our Adamses, our Hancock, our Franklin, our Carroll, our Greene, our Warren, and our Putnam, and we honor them justly. But this, nevertheless, was their own land, not a foreign one; the cause was their own, not a foreign one. Had they dared or done less, what claim could they have had to our remembrance, and had they withheld their support from that cause, should we not now have even cursed their memories? Let the infamy which still to the third generation hangs over the names of the misguided loyalists of the Revolution answer.

There were indeed other and heroic volunteers from European countries, but they were either exiles who had no homes, or they were soldiers by profession, who followed the sword wherever a harvest was to be reaped with it. Æneas left Troy to plant another state, but not until his native city was in ashes; and Byron went to the aid of Greece only when he needed a refuge from domestic disappointments, and social disgust. Lafayette's first act in America gave new evidence of disinterestedness and magnanimity. He found the small patriot army rent asunder by jealous feuds growing out of ambition for preferment. What revolution, however holy, has not suffered by such evils. How many a revolution has been lost by them. Schuyler, the brave, the high-spirited, and wise, now the victim of an intrigue, was hesitating whether to submit to a privation of rank justly due him, or to resign. Putnam's recent promotion produced bitter complaints; and Gates was laboring night and day, aided by a powerful faction, to displace Washington from the chief command. The correspondence of the father of his country, now first published, reveals the fact that the compensation attached to military rank was by no means an unimportant object of the universal rage for perferment, which then threatened to break up the army. Lafayette set a noble example to the republican chiefs. He declined the tender of a commission as major-general with its emoluments; and stipulated, on the contrary, for leave to serve

without reward, and even without a command, until he should have made a title to it by actual achievements. He won his commission by the blood he gave to his adopted country in the battle of the Brandy wine, by rallying the troops in the retreat at Chester Bridge, and by his brave resistance and capture, with the aid of militia-men, of a superior force of British and Hessian regulars; and thus without exciting murmurs among his compatriots, and with the thanks of Congress, he rose to the command of a division in the army of the United States. Lavish of gold as he had already shown that he was lavish of blood, he clothed and equipped these troops, numbering two thousand, at his own expense, and they soon became, under his exact but affectionate discipline, the favorite corps of the whole army.

And now an hour of trial arrived. He was as yet only twentyone years old, but his manly bravery, his proved valor, his generous enthusiasm, and his precocious prudence, had secured to him the esteem and confidence, not only of Washington, but of the army and of the country also. It seems now as if it must have happened through a propitious fortune, that the duty which fell to each of the Revolutionary generals, was the very one best fitted to his own peculiar talent and temper. To Lafayette, ardent, generous, and fascinating, oftenest fell the task of rallying discomfited and disheartened detachments. To the intrepid and impetuous Gates was reserved the battle with the perfect legions of Burgoyne, rendered desperate by the exposure of their position. at Saratoga. While it devolved upon Washington alone to perform the more painful and less brilliant service of delay, of sieges, and of long and wearisome retreats. Cotemporaries judge the hero always by the brilliancy and success of his achievements, and so it had happened that Washington, even while lying at Charleston, had not only suffered reproaches for imbecility, but had also incurred suspicion of cowardice. Nevertheless, sustained by those who had sufficient greatness to discover his wonderful sagacity and prudence, and sufficient magnanimity to confess them, Washington had stood unshaken in his high place until the winter of 1778. But a new and bold intrigue was now plotted in the army and in Congress, and this intrigue aimed at nothing less than deposing the commander-in-chief, through the popularity of of the young and favorite French general. The design flourished for a time. A new campaign in the north was projected upon a

scale so grand and so well filled up with the necessary forces and supplies, as was thought to put success beyond casualty, and Lafayette was invested with the command of the expedition, independently of Washington, and responsible to Congress alone. Lafayette declined to accept it on terms so tempting, yet so unwise; and now, when we look back at the transaction, free from the influences of the passions and jealousies of that trying period, it seems not too much to say of Lafayette, that by this crowning act of magnanimity, he saved not only the army but the American Revolution.

Fortunately for that cause, Lafayette had the docility to be convinced by Washington that, the projected capture of Canada, even with such a force was impossible, and the enterprise was abandoned.

I may not dwell here on the gallant conduct and great services of Lafayette in the campaign of 1778, for his highest claims to our homage rest on merits more rare than even personal bravery and high military conduct. The fame of the young general had now reached his native land. France had enough of virtue to exult in the glory which her youthful refugee had won in the cause of freedom. That pride co-operating with the enthusiasm awakened there by the announcement of the capture of Burgoyne, enabled the American commissioners at the court of Versailles to obtain the long withheld acknowledgment of the independence of the new republic, together with the often promised, but long deferred aid of a squadron, which was now despatched under the command of D'Estaing. In acknowledgment of the influence of Lafayette in bringing about this indispensable and effective interposition by the French king, the American ministers, immediately after they had been for the first time presented at court, proceeded through the streets of Paris, attended by all their countrymen then in that capital, to the house of Lafayette, and paid their salutations to the youthful marchioness, whose hours were divided between sad apprehensions for his safety, and irrepressible delight in the praises everywhere bestowed upon her chivalrous lord. It was a delicate and yet generous confession of the debt of the country to its noble and heroic benefactor.

After the memorable battles of Valley Forge and Monmouth Lafayette obtained permission to revisit France. He was received there with acclamations as the first man of the age.