E 207 
 ■L2 fi24 
 Copy 2 
 
i j > t 
 
 LIFE 
 
 GENE 
 
 BY J4HC* QLfNCY ADAMS 
 
 AFAYETTE. 
 
 IS ADDED 
 
 
 'V 
 
 ABY * 
 
 NAFIS, f^RNI^H & CO. 
 
 1847. 
 
 
Entered according to an ActrtJj Cc 
 
 the year 1847, bj£ 
 
 NAFIS & CORlteH 1 
 
 in the Clerk's Office of the Djfty t fgfert of 
 
 the Southern District of Ne"w York. 
 
 KwJ St. Cu'miiiglianrt. Printers, 
 No. 9 Spruce Street. N T . Y. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 Among the eminent foreign gene- 
 rals who served in the cause of 
 American independence in the war 
 of the revolution, Lafayette and Kos- 
 ciusko are justly regarded as the 
 most eminent. They are the heroes 
 of two worlds, having laid claim to 
 the lasting gratitude of their own com- 
 patriots, as well as of the American 
 people, by services and sacrifices of 
 the noblest kind. Both of these emi- 
 nent men enjoyed the esteem and 
 confidence of our immortal Wash- 
 ington in the highest degree, and 
 both are considered by the American 
 people as having earned their highest 
 approbation and gratitude. 
 
 The following memoirs of these 
 
. PREFACE. 
 
 eminent men are founded on the best 
 authorities, and may be regarded as 
 strictly accurate with respect to facts 
 and dates. Of the literary character 
 of the memoir of Lafayette by Mr. 
 Adams it is superfluous to speak. 
 
 The editor commends these me- 
 moirs to his countrymen with confi- 
 dence. The perusal of such biogra- 
 phies is one of the best means of 
 preserving the national spirit, and 
 awakening the emulation of the rising 
 generation in virtue and patriotism. 
 
LIFE OF 
 GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 
 
 In order to form a just estimate 
 of the life and character of Lafay- 
 ette, it may be necessary to advert, 
 not only to the circumstances con- 
 nected with his birth, education, 
 and lineage, but to the political 
 condition of his country and of 
 Great Britain, her national rival 
 and adversary, at the time of his 
 birth, and during his years of child- 
 hood. 
 
 On the sixth day of September, 
 one thousand seven hundred and 
 fifty-seven, the hereditary monarch 
 
LIFE OF 
 
 of the British Islands was a native 
 of Germany. A rude, illiterate old 
 soldier of the wars for the Spanish 
 succession; little versed even in 
 the language of the nations over 
 which he ruled; educated to the 
 maxims and principles of the feudal 
 law ; of openly licentious life, and 
 of moral character far from credit- 
 able : — he styled himself, by the 
 grace of God, of Great Britain, 
 France, and Ireland, king: but 
 there was another and real King 
 of France, no better, perhaps worse, 
 than himself, and with whom he 
 was then at war. This was Louis, 
 the fifteenth of the name, great- 
 grandson of his immediate prede- 
 cessor, Louis the Fourteenth, some- 
 times denominated the Great. 
 These two kings held their thrones 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 7 
 
 by the law of hereditary succession, 
 variously modified, in France by 
 the Roman Catholic, and in Britain 
 by Protestant Reformed Chris- 
 tianity. 
 
 They were at war — chiefly for 
 conflicting claims to the possession 
 of the western wilderness of North 
 America — a prize, the capabilities 
 of which are now unfolding them- 
 selves with a grandeur and magni- 
 ficence unexampled in the history 
 of the world ; but of which, if the 
 nominal possession had remained 
 in either of. the two princes, who 
 were staking their kingdoms upon 
 the issue of the strife, the buffalo 
 and the beaver, with their hunter, 
 the Indian savage, would, at this 
 day, have been, as they then were, 
 the only inhabitants.- 
 
8 LIFE OF 
 
 In this war, George Washington, 
 then at the age of twenty-four, was 
 on the side of the British German 
 king, a youthful, but heroic com- 
 batant ; and, in the same war, the 
 father of Lafayette was on the 
 opposite side, exposing his life in 
 the heart of Germany, for the 
 cause of the King of France. 
 
 On that day, the sixth of Sep- 
 tember, one thousand seven hun- 
 dred and fifty-seven, was born 
 Gilbert Mottier. De Lafay- 
 ette, at the castle of Chavaniac, 
 in Auvergne, and a few months 
 after his birth, his father fell in 
 battle at Minden. 
 
 Let us here observe the influence 
 of political institutions over the 
 destinies and the characters of 
 men. George the Second was a 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. i) 
 
 German prince ; he had been made 
 King of the British Islands by the 
 accident of his birth : that is to 
 say, because his great-grandmother 
 had been the daughter of James 
 the First; that great-grandmother 
 had been married to the King of 
 Bohemia, and her youngest daughter 
 had been married to the Elector of 
 Hanover. George the Second's 
 father was her son, and, when 
 James the Second had been ex- 
 pelled from his throne and his 
 country by the indignation of his 
 people, revolted against his tyran- 
 ny, and when his two daughters, 
 who succeeded him, had died with- 
 out issue, George the First, the 
 son of the Electress of Hanover, 
 became King of Great Britain, by 
 the settlement of an act of parlia- 
 
10 
 
 ment, blending together the princi- 
 ple of hereditary succession with 
 that of Reformed Protestant Chris- 
 tianity, and the rites of the Church 
 of England. 
 
 The throne of France was occu- 
 pied by virtue of the same principle 
 of hereditary succession, differently 
 modified, and blended with the 
 Christianity of the Church of Rome. 
 From this line of succession all 
 females were inflexibly excluded. 
 Louis the Fifteenth, at the age of 
 six years, had become the absojbte 
 sovereign of France, because He' 
 was the great-grandson of his im- 
 mediate predecessor. He was of 
 the third generation in descent 
 from the preceding king, and, by 
 the law of primogeniture ingrafted 
 upon that of lineal succession, did, 
 
v %v^ T0Nl o^ 
 
 I MlMgllH**"* 2 
 
 GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 11 
 
 by the death of his ancestor, forth- 
 with succeed, though in childhood, 
 to an absolute throne, in preference 
 to numerous descendants from that 
 same ancestor, then in full vigour 
 of manhood. 
 
 The first reflection that must re- 
 cur to a rational being, in contem- 
 plating these two results of the 
 principle of hereditary succession, 
 as resorted to for designating the 
 rulers of nations, is, that two per- 
 sons more unfit to occupy the 
 thrones of Britain and of France, 
 at the time of their respective ac- 
 cessions, could scarcely have been 
 found upon the face of the globe — 
 George the Second, a foreigner, 
 the son and grandson of foreigners, 
 born beyond the seas, educated in 
 uncongenial manners, ignorant of 
 
 
12 LIFE OF 
 
 the constitution, of the laws, even 
 of the language of the people over 
 whom he was to rule ; and Louis 
 the Fifteenth, an infant, incapable 
 of discerning his right hand from 
 his left. Yet, strange as it may- 
 sound to the ear of unsophisticated 
 reason, the British nation were 
 wedded to the belief that this act of 
 settlement, fixing their crown upon 
 the heads of this succession of total 
 strangers, was the brightest and 
 most glorious exemplification of 
 their national freedom ; and not 
 less strange, if aught in the imper- 
 fection of human reason could 
 seem strange, was that deep con- 
 viction of the French people, at the 
 same period, that their chief glory 
 and happiness consisted in the ve- 
 hemence of their affection for their 
 
g 
 
 GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 13 
 
 king, because he was descended in 
 an unbroken male line of genealo- 
 gy from St. Louis. 
 
 One of the fruits of this line of 
 hereditary succession, modified by 
 sectarian principles of religion, was 
 to make the peace and war, the 
 happiness or misery of the people 
 of the British empire, dependent 
 upon the fortunes of the Electorate 
 of Planover — the personal domain 
 of their imported king. This was 
 a result calamitous alike to the 
 people of Hanover, of Britain, and 
 of France ; for it was one of the 
 two causes of that dreadful war 
 then waging between them ; and 
 as the cause, so was this a princi- 
 pal theatre of that disastrous war. 
 It was at Minden, in the heart of 
 
14 LIFE OF 
 
 father of Lafayette fell, and left him 
 an orphan, a victim to that war, and 
 to the principle of hereditary suc- 
 cession from which it emanated. 
 
 Thus, then, it was on the 6th of 
 September, 1757, the day when 
 Lafayette was born. The kings 
 of France and Great Britain were 
 seated upon their thrones by virtue 
 of the principle of hereditary suc- 
 cession, variously modified and 
 blended with different forms of 
 religious faith, and they were 
 waging war against each other, 
 and exhausting the blood and trea- 
 sure of their people, for causes in 
 which neither of the nations had 
 any beneficial or lawful interest. 
 
 In this war the father of Lafay- 
 ette fell in the cause of his king, 
 but not of his country. He was an 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 15 
 
 officer of an invading army, the 
 instrument of his sovereign's wan- 
 ton ambition and lust of conquest. 
 The people of the Electorate of 
 Hanover had done no wrong to 
 him or to his country. When his 
 son came to an age capable of un- 
 derstanding the irreparable loss 
 that he had suffered, and to reflect 
 upon the causes of his father's fate, 
 there was no drop of consolation 
 mingled in the cup, from the con- 
 sideration that he had died for his 
 country. And when the youthful 
 mind was awakened to meditation 
 upon the rights of mankind, the 
 principles of freedom, and theories 
 of government, it cannot be difficult 
 to perceive, in the illustrations of 
 his own family records, the source 
 of that aversion to hereditary rule, 
 
16 LIFE OF 
 
 perhaps the most distinguishing 
 feature of his political opinions, 
 and to which he adhered through 
 all the vicissitudes of his life. 
 
 In the same war, and at the 
 same time, George Washington 
 was armed, a loyal subject, in 
 support of his king; but to him 
 that was also the cause of his 
 country. His commission was not 
 in the army of George the Second, 
 but issued under the authority of 
 the colony of Virginia, the province 
 in which he received his birth. 
 On the borders of that province, 
 the war in its most horrid forms 
 was waged — not a war of mercy 
 and of courtesy, • like that of the 
 civilized embattled legions of Eu- 
 rope, but war to the knife — the 
 war of Indian savages, terrible to 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. lH 
 
 man, but more terrible to the ten- 
 der sex, and most terrible to help- 
 less infancy. In defence of his 
 country against the ravages of 
 such a war, Washington, in the 
 dawn of manhood, had drawn his 
 sword, as if Providence, with de* 
 liberate purpose, had sanctified for 
 him the practice of war, all-detest* 
 able and unhallowed as it is, that 
 he might, in a cause virtuous and 
 exalted by its motive and its end, 
 be trained and fitted in a congenial 
 school to march in after times the 
 leader of heroes in the war of his 
 country's independence. 
 
 At the time of the birth of La- 
 fayette, this War, which was to 
 make him a fatherless child, and 
 in which Washington was laying 
 broad and deep, in the defence and 
 
18 LIFE OF 
 
 protection of his native land, the 
 foundations of his unrivalled re- 
 nown, was but in its early stage. 
 It was to continue five years long- 
 er, and was to close with the total 
 extinguishment of the colonial do- 
 minion of France on the continent 
 of North America. The deep hu- 
 miliation of France, and the tri- 
 umphant ascendency on this conti- 
 nent of her rival, were the first re- 
 sults of this great national conflict. 
 The complete expulsion of France 
 from North America seemed, to 
 the superficial vision of men, to fix 
 the British power over these ex- 
 tensive regions on foundations im- 
 moveable as the everlasting hills. 
 
 Let us pass in imagination a pe- 
 riod of only twenty years, and 
 alight upon the borders of the river 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 19 
 
 Brandy wine. Washington is com- 
 mander-in-chief of the armies of 
 the United States of America — war 
 is again raging m the heart of his 
 native land — hostile armies of one 
 and the same name, blood, and 
 language, are arrayed for battle on 
 the banks of the stream ; and Phi- 
 ladelphia, where the United States 
 are in Congress assembled, and 
 whence their decree of independ- 
 ence has gone forth, is the destined 
 prize to the conflict of the day. 
 Who is that tall, slender youth, of 
 foreign air and aspect, scarcely 
 emerged from the years of boy- 
 hood, and fresh from the walls of 
 a college ; fighting, a volunteer, at 
 the side of Washington, bleeding, 
 unconsciously to himself, and ral- 
 lying his men to secure the retreat 
 
20 LIFE OF 
 
 of the scattered American ranks ? 
 It is Gilbert Mottier de La- 
 fayette — the son of the victim of 
 Minden ; and he is bleeding in the 
 cause of North American inde- 
 pendence, and of freedom. 
 
 We pause one moment to in- 
 quire what was this cause of North 
 American independence, and what 
 were the motives and inducements 
 to the youthful stranger to devote 
 himself, his life, and fortune, to it. 
 
 The people of the British colo- 
 nies in North America, after a con- 
 troversy of ten years' duration with 
 their sovereign beyond the seas, 
 upon an attempt by him and his 
 parliament to tax them without 
 their consent, had been constrained 
 by necessity to declare themselves 
 independent — to dissolve the tie of 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 ~\KM 
 
 Hi^»^K^fc2 
 
 P '''"Slttl 
 
 
 
 mm 
 
 
 '-v-j '^^fflH 
 
 
 
 %§m 
 
 
 T* 1 
 
 
 p 
 
 > 
 
 'ill 
 
 •mm 
 
 
 P 
 
 
 H 
 
 F&$r^K7 v 
 
 i iw ■'•■"'' ' ''^''' ""' 
 
 
 
 H 
 
 IfottMrj,',,-;, , 
 
 
 
 
 H 
 
 J. 1 jj 'ji^'.'MfA; 
 
 Itw 
 
 
 
 3 
 
 O 
 
 d 
 
 Wfc-'tmPW 1 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 J] ^ t/ 
 
 ■fe-' 
 
 lip im 
 
 o 
 
 
 W:H#1 
 
 lǤ id 
 
 ■ ' 
 
 
 
 
 - ^ :;ik ^1>*Y>M 
 
 r ■ 
 
 
 
 M 
 
 
 
 y7 
 
 Z 
 
 
 
 ..■dfflMiif^s 
 
 pip 
 
 ^,-T/i 
 
 -*M 
 
 
 *3 
 
 WwJ : '' ! 'l 
 
 "'-- --^^~ 
 
 r '-* ^ v^f 
 
 
 
 3 
 
 ' M ^ '*i*> 
 
 
 SfA 
 
 
 
 5 
 
 \- -",- 
 
 ^r^M^rfil lilll 
 
 ..,*\*PfcJ 
 
 
 
 M 
 
 wSswMviBMi 11'"' 
 
 
 
 
 ' HP 
 
 ^!' : j,;^^*^Hkc^i 
 
 BILi •#!! 
 
 
 ISglgfEr c < *¥ 
 
 
 
 
 ) 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 23 
 
 their allegiance to him — to re- 
 nounce their right to his protection, 
 and to assume their station among 
 the independent civilized nations of 
 the earth. This had been done 
 with a deliberation and solemnity 
 unexampled in the history of the 
 world — done in the midst of a civil 
 war, differing in character from 
 any of those which for centuries 
 before had desolated Europe. The 
 war had arisen upon a question 
 between the rights of the people 
 and the powers of their govern- 
 ment. The discussion, in the pro- 
 gress of the controversy, had open- 
 ed to the contemplations of men, 
 the first foundations of civil society 
 and of government. The war of 
 independence began by litigation 
 upon a petty stamp on paper, and 
 
24 LIFE OF 
 
 a tax of three pence a pound upon 
 tea ; but these broke up the foun- 
 tains of the great deep, and the de- 
 luge ensued. Had the British Par- 
 liament the right to tax the people 
 of the colonies in another hemi- 
 sphere, not represented in the impe- 
 rial legislature 1 They affirmed 
 they had : the people of the colo- 
 nies insisted they had not. There 
 were ten years of pleading before 
 they came to an issue ; and all the 
 legitimate sources of power, and all 
 the primitive elements of freedom, 
 were scrutinized, debated, ana- 
 lyzed, and elucidated, before the 
 lightning of the torch of Ate, and 
 her cry of havoc upon letting slip 
 the dogs of war. 
 
 When the day of conflict came, 
 the issue of the contest was neces- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 25 
 
 sarily changed. The people of the 
 colonies had maintained the contest 
 on the principle of resisting the in- 
 vasion of chartered rights — first by 
 argument and remonstrance, and 
 finally by appeal to the sword. 
 But with the war came the neces- 
 sary exercise of sovereign powers. 
 The Declaration of Independence 
 justified itself as the only possible 
 remedy for insufferable wrongs. 
 It seated itself upon the first foun- 
 dations of the law of nature, and 
 the incontestable doctrine of human 
 rights. There was no longer any 
 question of the constitutional pow- 
 ers of the British Parliament, or of 
 violated colonial charters. Thence- 
 forward the American nation sup- 
 ported its existence by war ; and 
 the British nation, by war, was 
 
26 LIFE OF 
 
 contending for conquest. As, be- 
 tween the two parties, the single 
 question at issue was Independence 
 — but in the confederate existence 
 of the North American Union 
 Liberty — not only their own li- 
 berty, but the vital principle of 
 liberty to the whole race of civilized 
 man, was involved. 
 
 It was at this stage of the con- 
 flict, and immediately after the 
 Declaration of Independence, that 
 it drew the attention, and called 
 into action the moral sensibilities 
 and the intellectual faculties of La- 
 fayette, then in his nineteenth year. 
 
 The war was revolutionary. It 
 began by the dissolution of the 
 British government in the colonies ; 
 the people of which were, by that 
 operation, left without any govern- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 27 
 
 ment whatever. They were then 
 at one and the same time main- 
 taining their independent national 
 existence by war, and forming new 
 social compacts for their own go- 
 vernment thenceforward. The 
 construction of civil society ; the 
 extent and the limitations of organ- 
 ized power ; the establishment of a 
 system of government combining 
 the greatest enlargement of indi- 
 vidual liberty with the most perfect 
 preservation of public order, were 
 the continual occupations of every 
 mind. The consequences of this 
 state of things to the history of 
 mankind, and especially of Europe, 
 were foreseen by none. Europe 
 saw nothing but the war ; a people 
 struggling for liberty, and against 
 oppression ; and the people in every 
 
28 LIFE OF 
 
 part of Europe sympathized with 
 the people of the American colonies. 
 With their governments it was 
 not so. The people of the American 
 colonies were insurgents ; all go- 
 vernments abhor insurrection ; they 
 were revolted colonists. The great 
 maritime powers of Europe had 
 colonies of their own, to which the 
 example of resistance against op- 
 pression might be contagious. The 
 American colonies were stigma- 
 tized in all the official acts of the 
 British government as rebels ; and 
 rebellion to the governing part of 
 mankind is as the sin of witchcraft. 
 The governments of Europe, there- 
 fore, were, at heart, on the side of 
 the British government in this war, 
 and the people of Europe were on 
 the side of the American people. 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 
 
 Lafayette, by his position and 
 condition in life, was one of those 
 who, governed by the ordinary 
 impulses which influence and con- 
 trol the conduct of men, would 
 have sided in sentiment with the 
 British or Royal cause. 
 
 Lafayette was born a subject of 
 the most absolute and most splen- 
 did monarchy of Europe, and in 
 the highest rank of her proud and 
 chivalrous nobility. He had been 
 educated at a college of the Uni- 
 versity of Paris, founded by the 
 royal munificence of Louis the 
 Fourteenth, or of his minister, 
 Cardinal Richelieu. Left an or- 
 phan in early childhood, with the 
 inheritance of a princely fortune, 
 he had been married, at sixteen 
 years of age, to a daughter of the 
 
30 LIFE OF 
 
 house of Noailles, the most distin- 
 guished family of the kingdom, 
 scarcely deemed in public consider- 
 ation inferior to that which wore 
 the crown. He came into active 
 life, at the change from boy to 
 man, a husband and a father, in 
 the full enjoyment of everything 
 that avarice could covet, with a 
 certain prospect before him of all 
 that ambition could crave. Happy 
 in his domestic affections, incapa- 
 ble, from the benignity of his na- 
 ture, of envy, hatred, or revenge, 
 a life of " ignoble ease and indolent 
 repose" seemed to be that which 
 nature and fortune had combined 
 to prepare before him. To men 
 of ordinary mould this condition 
 would have led to a life of luxu- 
 rious apathy and sensual indul- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 31 
 
 gence. Such was the life into 
 which, from the operation of the 
 same causes, Louis the Fifteenth 
 had sunk, with his household and 
 court, while Lafayette was rising 
 to manhood, surrounded by the 
 contamination of their example* 
 Had his natural endowments been 
 even of the higher and nobler or- 
 der of such as adhere to virtue, 
 even in the lap of prosperity, and 
 in the bosom of temptation, he 
 might have lived and died a pattern 
 of the nobility of France, to be class- 
 ed, in after times, with the Turennes 
 and the Montausiers of the age of 
 Louis the Fourteenth, or with the 
 Villars or the Lamoignons of the 
 age immediately preceding his own. 
 But as, in the firmament of hea- 
 ven that rolls over our heads, there 
 
32 LIFE OF 
 
 is, among the stars of the first mag- 
 nitude, one so pre-eminent in splen- 
 dour, as, in the opinion of astrono- 
 mers, to constitute a class by itself, 
 so, in the fourteen hundred years 
 of the French monarchy, among 
 the multitudes of great and mighty 
 men which it has evolved, the name 
 of Lafayette stands unrivalled in 
 the solitude of glory. 
 
 In entering upon the threshold 
 of life, a career was to open before 
 him. He had the option of the 
 court and the camp. An office 
 was tendered to him in the house- 
 hold of the king's brother, the 
 Count de Provence, since success- 
 ively a royal exile and a reinstated 
 king. The servitude and inaction 
 of a court had no charms for him ; 
 he preferred a commission in the 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 33 
 
 army ; and, at the time of the De- 
 claration of Independence, was a 
 captain of dragoons in garrison at 
 Metz. 
 
 There, at an entertainment given 
 by his relative, the Marechal de 
 Broglie, the commandant of the 
 place, to the Duke of Gloucester, 
 brother to the British king, and 
 then a transient traveller through 
 that part of France, he learns, as 
 an incident of intelligence received 
 that morning by the English prince 
 from London, that the Congress of 
 Rebels, at Philadelphia, had issued 
 a Declaration of Independence. A 
 conversation ensues upon the causes 
 which have contributed to produce 
 this event, and upon the conse- 
 quences which may be expected to 
 flow from it. The imagination of 
 
34 LIFE OF 
 
 Lafayette has caught across the At» 
 lantic tide the spark emitted from 
 the Declaration of Independence s 
 his heart has kindled at the shock, 
 and, before he slumbers upon his 
 pillow, he has resolved to devote 
 his life and fortune to the cause. 
 
 You have before you the cause 
 and the man. The self-devotion of 
 Lafayette was twofold. First, to 
 the people, maintaining a bold and 
 seemingly desperate struggle against 
 oppression, and for national exist* 
 ence. Secondly, and chiefly, to 
 the principles of their declaration, 
 which then first unfurled before his 
 eyes the consecrated standard of 
 human rights. To that standard, 
 without an instant of hesitation, he 
 repaired. Where it would lead 
 him, it is scarcely probable that he 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 35 
 
 himself then foresaw. It was then 
 identical with the stars and stripes 
 of the American Union, floating to 
 the breeze from the Hall of Inde- 
 pendence, at Philadelphia. Nor 
 sordid avarice, nor vulgar ambition, 
 could point . his footsteps to the 
 pathway leading to that banner. 
 To the love of ease or pleasure 
 nothing could be more repulsive. 
 Something may be allowed to the 
 beatings of the youthful breast, 
 which make ambition virtue, and 
 something to the spirit of military 
 adventure, imbibed from his pro- 
 fession, and which he felt in com- 
 mon with many others. France, 
 Germany, Poland, furnished to the 
 armies of this union, in our revo- 
 h\ onary struggle, no inconsi lora- 
 bie number of officers of hi«h rank 
 
36 LIFE OF 
 
 and distinguished merit. The names 
 of Pulaski and De Kalb are num- 
 bered among the martyrs of our 
 freedom, and their ashes repose in 
 our soil side by side with the ca- 
 nonized bones of Warren and of 
 Montgomery. To the virtues of 
 Lafayette, a more protracted career 
 and happier earthly destinies were 
 reserved. To the moral principle 
 of political action, the sacrifices of 
 no other man were comparable to 
 his. Youth, health, fortune ; the 
 favour of his king ; the enjoyment 
 of ease and pleasure ; even the 
 choicest blessings of domestic feli- 
 city — he gave them all for toil and 
 danger in a distant land, and an al- 
 most hopeless cause ; but it was 
 the cause of justice, and of the 
 rights of human kind. 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 37 
 
 The resolve is firmly fixed, and 
 it now remains to be carried into 
 execution. On the 7th of Decem- 
 ber, 1776, Silas Deane, then a se- 
 cret agent of the American Con- 
 gress at Paris, stipulates with the 
 Marquis de Lafayette that he shall 
 receive a commission, to date from 
 that day, of major-general in the 
 army of the United States ; and the 
 marquis stipulates, in return, to de- 
 part when and how Mr. Deane 
 shall judge proper, to serve the 
 United States with all possible zeal, 
 without pay or emolument, reserv- 
 ing to himself only the liberty of 
 returning to Europe, if his family 
 or his king should recall him. 
 
 Neither his family nor his king 
 were willing that he should depart; 
 nor had Mr. Deane the power, ei- 
 
38 LIFE OF 
 
 ther to conclude this contract, or to 
 furnish the means of his convey- 
 ance to America. Difficulties rise 
 up before him only to be dispersed, 
 and obstacles thicken only to be 
 surmounted. The day after the 
 signature of the contract, Mr. 
 Deane's agency was superseded by 
 the arrival of Doctor Benjamin 
 Franklin and Arthur Lee, as his 
 colleagues in commission ; nor did 
 they think themselves authorized 
 to confirm his engagement. La- 
 fayette is not to be discouraged. 
 The commissioners extenuate no- 
 thing of the unpromising condition 
 of their cause. Mr. Deane avows 
 his inability to furnish him with a 
 passage to the United States. " The 
 more desperate the cause," says 
 Lafayette, " the greater need has 
 
Mr— i— 
 
 H 
 
 mi 
 
 
 'il'S't « 
 
 
 !i : fc 
 
 ■[___- ^B';'^;-_ i'i;;|||. 
 
 i ill IIHH IHkH 
 
 
 1 . Q 
 
 Hi' 
 
 
 ■llllilll^ feBl jl ■ 
 
 11 o 
 
 ^^Bp== " rn^' -*-= ;'j ' . ' -% -','■:■ ? ' — — .j-'t'^L^ 
 
 ii/ : !i ' ii h ^ 
 
 =========OTW*ift>Sai*'^ipft' " : ^~ 1S1 1 - r^JT 
 
 l! ■ ■' I M 
 
 ^^^^~~3"^^L^ijajI> ^iii^SilFl 
 
 ll | | wM\ ||! ' g 
 
 I^^^SSHMIii^ifte*^ 
 
 -J3i liflliji^r'iii > 
 
 
 1 i ''',' ! ,(:•' 'jl I. Pi 
 
 
 
 
 
 sps 
 
 ''! c5 i 
 
 
 ^ 
 
 Jl£fclSliB 
 
 ipi '' '■'■>] . s 
 
 c?J ^, 
 
 (JK^-JI,.^ „=-** 
 
 HR {!.!'. ii; £ 
 
 
 BlPfll 
 
 
 
 =fl P It i'llll ^ 
 
 
 =sj III ! II I ^ 
 
 
 I J II Nil ^ 
 
 F 
 
 lilliillr ffl' I 
 
 ■Hr->- 
 
 lilflf! 
 
 r 
 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 41 
 
 it of my services; and, if Mr. 
 Deane has no vessel for my pas- 
 sage, I shall purchase one myself, 
 and will traverse the ocean with a 
 selected company of my own." 
 
 Other impediments arise. His 
 design becomes known to the Bri- 
 tish ambassador at the court of 
 Versailles, who remonstrates to the 
 French government against it. At 
 his instance, orders are issued for 
 the detention of the vessel pur- 
 chased by the marquis, and fitted 
 out at Bordeaux, and for the arrest 
 of his person. To elude the first 
 of these orders, the vessel is re- 
 moved from Bordeaux to the neigh- 
 bouring port of passage, within the 
 dominion of Spain. The order for 
 his own arrest is executed ; but, by 
 stratagem and disguise, he escapes 
 
42 LIFE OF 
 
 from the custody of those who have 
 him in charge, and, before a second 
 order can reach him, he is safe on 
 the ocean wave, bound to the land 
 of independence and of freedom. 
 
 It had been necessary to clear 
 out the vessel for an island of the 
 West Indies ; but, once at sea, he 
 avails himself of his right as owner 
 of the ship, .and cornels his cap- 
 tain to steer for the shores of eman- 
 cipated North America. He lands, 
 with his companions, on the 25th 
 of April, 1777, in South Carolina, 
 not far from Charleston, and finds 
 a most cordial reception and hos- 
 pitable welcome in the house of 
 Major Huger. 
 
 Every detail of this adventurous 
 expedition, full of incidents, com- 
 bining with the simplicity of his- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 45 
 
 toricai truth all the interest of 
 romance, is so well known, and so 
 familiar to the memory of all, that 
 I pass them over without further 
 notice. 
 
 From Charleston he proceeded 
 to Philadelphia, where the Congress 
 of the Revolution were in session, 
 and where he offered his services 
 in the cause. Here, again, he was 
 met with difficulties, which, to men 
 of ordinary minds, would have been 
 insurmountable. Mr. Deane's con- 
 tracts were so numerous, and for 
 offices of rank so high, that it was 
 impossible they should be ratified 
 by the Congress. He had stipu- 
 lated for the appointment of other 
 major-generals ; and, in the same 
 contract with that of Lafayette, for 
 eleven other officers, from the rank 
 
46 LIFE OF 
 
 of colonel to that of lieutenant. To 
 introduce these officers, strangers, 
 scarcely one of whom could speak 
 the language of the country, into 
 the American army, to take rank 
 and precedence over the native 
 citizens whose ardent patriotism 
 had pointed them to the standard 
 of their country, could not, without 
 great injustice, nor without exciting 
 the most fatal dissensions, have 
 been done ; and this answer was 
 necessarily given as well to Lafay- 
 ette as to the other officers who 
 had accompanied him from Europe. 
 His reply was an offer to serve as 
 a volunteer, and without pay. 
 Magnanimity, thus disinterested, 
 could not be resisted, nor could 
 the sense of it be worthily mani- 
 fested by a mere acceptance of the 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 47 
 
 offer. On the 31st of July, 1777, 
 therefore, the following resolution 
 and preamble are recorded upon 
 the journals of Congress : 
 
 " Whereas, the Marquis de La- 
 fayette, out of his great zeal to the 
 cause of liberty, in which the 
 United States are engaged, has left 
 his family and connexions, and, at 
 his own expense, come over to 
 offer his service to the United 
 Stales, without pension, or particu- 
 lar allowance, and is anxious to 
 risk his life in our cause : 
 
 " Resolved, That his service be 
 accepted, and that, in consideration 
 of his zeal, illustrious family, and 
 connexions, he have the rank and 
 commission of major-general in the 
 army of the United States." 
 
 He had the rank and commis- 
 
48 LIFE OF 
 
 sion, but no command as a major- 
 general. With this, all personal 
 ambition was gratified ; and what- 
 ever services he might perform, he 
 could attain no higher rank in the 
 American army. The discontents 
 of officers already in the service, 
 at being superseded in command 
 by a stripling foreigner, were dis- 
 armed; nor was the prudence of 
 Congress, perhaps without its influ- 
 ence in withholding a command, 
 which, but for a judgment prema- 
 ture " beyond the slow advance of 
 years," might have hazarded some- 
 thing of the sacred cause itself, by 
 confidence too hastily bestowed. 
 
 The day after the date of his 
 commission, he was introduced to 
 Washington, commander-in-chief 
 of the armies of the confederation. 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 49 
 
 It was the the critical period of the 
 campaign of 1777. The British 
 army, commanded by Lord Howe, 
 was advancing from the head of 
 Elk, to which they had been trans- 
 ported by sea from New York, 
 upon Philadelphia. Washington, 
 by a counteracting movement, had 
 been approaching from his line of 
 defence, in the Jerseys, towards the 
 city, and arrived there on the 1st 
 of August. It was a meeting of 
 congenial souls. At the close of 
 it, Washington gave the youthful 
 stranger an invitation to make the 
 head-quarters of the commander-in- 
 chief his home : that he should es- 
 tablish himself there at his own 
 time, and consider himself at all 
 times as one of his own family. It 
 was natural that, in giving this in- 
 
50 LIFE OF 
 
 vitation, he should remark the con- 
 trast of the situation in which it 
 would place him with that of ease, 
 and comfort, and luxurious enjoy- 
 ment, which he had left, at the 
 splendid court of Louis the Six- 
 teenth, and of his beautiful and ac- 
 complished, but ill-fated queen, 
 then at the very summit of all 
 which constitutes the common esti- 
 mate of felicity. How deep and 
 solemn was this contrast ! No na- 
 tive American had undergone the 
 trial of the same alternative. None 
 of them, save Lafayette, had 
 brought the same tribute of his life, 
 his fortune, and his honour, to a 
 cause of a country foreign to his 
 own. To Lafayette the soil of 
 freedom was his country. His 
 post of honour was the post of 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 51 
 
 danger. His fire-side was the 
 field of battle. He accepted with 
 joy the invitation of Washington, 
 and repaired forthwith to the camp. 
 The bond of indissoluble friendship 
 — the friendship of heroes, was 
 sealed from the first hour of their 
 meeting, to last through their lives, 
 and to live in the memory of man- 
 kind for ever. 
 
 It was, perhaps, at the sugges- 
 tion of the American commission- 
 ers in France, that this invitation 
 was given by Washington. In a 
 letter from them, of the 25th of 
 May, 1777, to the committee of 
 foreign affairs, they announce that 
 the marquis had departed for the 
 United States in a ship of his own, 
 accompanied by some officers of 
 distinction, in order to serve in 
 
52 LIFE OF 
 
 our armies. They observe that he 
 is exceedingly beloved, and that 
 everybody's good wishes attend 
 him. They cannot but hope that 
 he will meet with such a reception 
 as will make the country and his 
 expedition agreeable to him. They 
 further say that those who censure 
 it as imprudent in him, do never- 
 theless applaud his spirit ; and they 
 are satisfied that civilities and re- 
 spect shown to him will be ser- 
 viceable to our cause in France, as 
 pleasing not only to his powerful 
 relations and to the court, but to 
 the whole French nation. They 
 finally add, that he had left a beau- 
 tiful young wife, and for her sake, 
 particularly, they hoped that his 
 bravery and ardent desire to dis- 
 tinguish himself would be a little 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 53 
 
 restrained by the general's (Wash- 
 ington's) prudence, so as not to 
 permit his being hazarded much, 
 but upon some important occasion. 
 The head-quarters of Washing- 
 ton, serving as a volunteer, with 
 the rank and commission of a ma- 
 jor-general without command, was 
 precisely the station adapted to the 
 developement of his character, to 
 his own honour, and that of the 
 army, and to the prudent manage- 
 ment of the country's cause. To 
 him it was at once a severe school 
 of experience, and a rigorous test 
 of merit. But it was not the place 
 to restrain him from exposure to 
 danger. The time at which he 
 joined the camp was one of pre- 
 eminent peril. The British govern- 
 ment, and the commander-in-chief 
 
1 
 
 54 LIFE OF 
 
 of the British forces, had imagined 
 that the possession of Philadelphia, 
 combined with that of the line along 
 the Hudson river, from the Cana- 
 dian frontier to the city of New 
 York, would be fatal to the Ameri- 
 can cause. By the capture of Bur- 
 go yne and his army, that portion 
 of the project sustained a total de- 
 feat. The final issue of the war 
 was indeed sealed, with the capitu- 
 lation of the 17th of October, 1777, 
 at Saratoga — sealed, not with the 
 subjugation, but with the inde- 
 pendence of the North American 
 Union. 
 
 In the southern campaign the 
 British commander was more suc- 
 cessful. The fall of Philadelphia 
 was the result of the battle of 
 Brandy wine, on the 11th of Sep- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 55 
 
 tember. This was the first action 
 in which Lafayette was engaged, 
 and the first lesson of his practical 
 military school was a lesson of 
 misfortune. In the attempt to rally 
 the American troops in their re- 
 treat, he received a musket-ball in 
 the leg. He was scarcely con- 
 scious of the wound till made sensi- 
 ble of it by the loss of blood, and 
 even then ceased not his exertions 
 in the field till he had secured and 
 covered the retreat. 
 
 This casualty confined him for 
 some time to his bed at Philadel- 
 phia, and afterwards detained him 
 some days at Bethlehem ; but 
 within six weeks he rejoined the 
 head-quarters of Washington, near 
 Whitemarsh. He soon became 
 anxious to obtain a command equal 
 
56 LIFE OF 
 
 to his rank, and in the short space 
 of time that he had been with the 
 commander-in-chief, had so tho- 
 roughly obtained his confidence as 
 to secure an earnest solicitation 
 from him to Congress, in his fa- 
 vour. In a letter to Congress of 
 the 1st of November, 1777, he says, 
 " The Marquis de Lafayette is ex- 
 tremely solicitous of having a com- 
 mand equal to his rank. I do not 
 know in what light Congress will 
 view the matter ; but it appears to 
 me, from a consideration of his 
 illustrious and important connex- 
 ions, the attachment which he has 
 manifested for our cause, and the 
 consequences which his return in 
 disgust might produce, that it will 
 be advisable to gratify him in his 
 wishes ; and the more so, as seve- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 57 
 
 ral gentlemen from France, who 
 came over under some assurances, 
 have gone back disappointed in 
 their expectations. His . conduct 
 with respect to them, stands in a 
 favourable point of view; having 
 interested himself to remove their 
 uneasiness, and urged the impro- 
 priety of their making any unfa- 
 vourable representations upon their 
 arrival at home; and in all his 
 letters he has placed our affairs in 
 the best situation he could. Be- 
 sides, he is sensible ; discreet in his 
 manners ; has made great profi- 
 ciency in our language ; and, from 
 the disposition he discovered at the 
 battle of Brandy wine, possesses a 
 large share of bravery and military 
 ardour." 
 
 Perhaps one of the highest en- 
 
58 LIFE OF 
 
 comiums ever pronounced of a man 
 in public life, is that of an histo- 
 rian eminent for his profound ac- 
 quaintance with mankind, who, in 
 painting a great character by a 
 single line, says that he was just 
 equal to all the duties of the high- 
 est offices which he attained, and 
 never above them. There are in 
 some men qualities which dazzle 
 and consume, to little or no valuable 
 purpose. They seldom belong to 
 the great benefactors of mankind. 
 They were not the qualities of 
 Washington or Lafayette. The 
 testimonial offered by the Ameri- 
 can commander to his young 
 friend, after a probation of several 
 months, and after the severe test of 
 the disastrous day of Brandywine, 
 was precisely adapted to the man 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 59 
 
 in whose favour it was given, and 
 to the object which it. was to ac- 
 complish. What earnestness of 
 purpose ! what sincerity of convic- 
 tion ! what energetic simplicity of 
 expression ! what thorough deline- 
 ation of character ! The merits 
 of Lafayette, to the eye of Wash- 
 ington, are the candour and gene- 
 rosity of his disposition — the inde- 
 fatigable industry of application, 
 which, in the course of a few 
 months, has already given him the 
 mastery of a foreign language — 
 good sense — discretion of manners, 
 an attribute not only unusual in 
 early years, but doubly rare in 
 alliance with that enthusiasm so 
 signally marked by his self-devo- 
 tion to the American cause ; and, 
 to crown all the rest, the bravery 
 
60 LIFE OF 
 
 and military ardour so brilliantly 
 manifested at the Brandy wine. 
 Here is no random praise ; no 
 unmeaning panegyric. The clus- 
 ter of qualities, all plain and sim- 
 ple, but so seldom found in union 
 together, so generally incompatible 
 with one another, these are the 
 properties eminently trustworthy, 
 in the judgment of Washington ; 
 and these are the properties which 
 his discernment has found in La- 
 fayette, and which urge him thus 
 earnestly to advise the gratification 
 of his wish by the assignment of a 
 command equal to the rank which 
 had been granted to his zeal and 
 his illustrious name. 
 
 The recommendation of Wash- 
 ington had its immediate effect; 
 and on the 1st of December, 1777, 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 61 
 
 it was resolved by Congress, that 
 he should be informed it was high- 
 ly agreeable to Congress, that the 
 Marquis de Lafayette should be 
 appointed to the command of a 
 division in the continental army. 
 
 He received, accordingly, such 
 an appointment ; and a plan was 
 organized in Congress for a second 
 invasion of Canada, at the head of 
 which he was placed. This expe- 
 dition, originally projected without 
 consultation with the commander- 
 in-chief, might be connected with 
 the temporary dissatisfaction, in 
 the community and in Congress, at 
 the ill-success of his endeavours to 
 defend Philadelphia, which rival 
 and unfriendly partisans were too 
 ready to compare with the splendid 
 termination, by the capture of Bur- 
 
62 LIFE OF 
 
 goyne and his army, of the north- 
 ern campaign, under the command 
 of General Gates. To foreclose 
 all suspicion of participation in 
 these views, Lafayette proceeded 
 to the seat of Congress, and, ac- 
 cepting the important charge which 
 it was proposed to assign to him, 
 obtained, at his particular request, 
 that he should be considered as an 
 officer detached from the army of 
 Washington, and to remain under 
 his orders. He then repaired in 
 person to Albany, to take com- 
 mand of the troops who were to 
 assemble at that place, in order to 
 cross the lakes on the ice, and at- 
 tack Montreal ; but, on arriving at 
 Albany, he found none of the pro- 
 mised preparations in readiness — 
 they were never effected. Con- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 65 
 
 gress some time after relinquished 
 the design, and the marquis was 
 ordered to rejoin the army of 
 Washington. 
 
 In the succeeding month of May, 
 his military talent was displayed by 
 the masterly retreat effected in the 
 presence of an overwhelming supe- 
 riority of the enemy's force from 
 the position at Barren Hill. 
 
 He was soon after distinguished 
 at the battle of Monmouth ; and in 
 September, 1778, a resolution of 
 Congress declared their high sense 
 of his services, not only in the 
 field, but in his exertions to con- 
 ciliate and heal dissensions between 
 the officers of the French fleet un- 
 der the command of the Count 
 d'Estaing and some of the native 
 officers of our army. These dis- 
 
66 LIFE OF 
 
 sensions had arisen in the first 
 moments of co-operation in the 
 service, and had threatened perni- 
 cious consequences. 
 
 In the month of April, 1776, the 
 combined wisdom of the Count de 
 Vergennes and of Mr. Turgot, the 
 prime minister, and the financier 
 of Louis the Sixteenth, had brought 
 him to the conclusion that the 
 event most desirable to France, 
 with regard to the controversy be- 
 tween Great Britain and her Ameri- 
 can colonies, was, that the insur- 
 rection should be suppressed. This 
 judgment, evincing only the total 
 absence of all moral considerations, 
 in the estimate, by these eminent 
 statesmen, of what was desirable 
 to France, had undergone a great 
 change by the close of the year 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 67 
 
 1777. The Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence had changed the question 
 between the parties. The popular 
 feeling of France was all on the 
 side of the Americans. The dar- 
 ing and romantic movement of La- 
 fayette, in defiance of the govern- 
 ment itself, then highly favoured 
 by public opinion, was followed by 
 universal admiration. The spon- 
 taneous spirit of the people gradu- 
 ally spread itself even over the 
 rank corruption of the court ; a 
 suspicious and deceptive neutrality 
 succeeded to an ostensible exclu- 
 sion of the insurgents from the 
 ports of France, till the capitulation 
 of Burgoyne satisfied the casuists 
 of international law at Versailles, 
 that the suppression of the insur- 
 rection was no longer the most 
 
88 Life of 
 
 desirable of events ; but that the 
 United States were, de facto, sove- 
 reign and independent, and that 
 France might conclude a treaty of 
 commerce with them, without giv- 
 ing just cause of offence to the 
 step-mother country. On the 6th 
 of February, 1778, a treaty W 
 commerce between France and the 
 United States was concluded, and 
 with it, on the same day, a treaty 
 of eventual defensive alliance, to 
 take effect only in the event of 
 Great Britain's resenting, by war 
 against France, the consummation 
 of the commercial treaty. The 
 war immediately ensued, and in 
 the summer of 1778, a French 
 fleet, under the command of Count 
 d'Estaing, was sent to co-operate 
 with the forces of the United States 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 69 
 
 sen 
 
 ■I 
 ,ffe 
 roi 
 
 for the maintenance of their inde- 
 pendence. 
 
 By these events the position of 
 the Marquis de Lafayette was es- 
 sentially changed. It became ne- 
 sary for him to reinstate himself 
 the good graces of his sovereign, 
 ended at his absenting himself 
 rom his country without permis- 
 sion, but gratified with the distinc- 
 tion which he had acquired by gal- 
 lant deeds in a service now become 
 that of France herself. At the 
 close of the campaign of 1778, 
 with the approbation of his friend 
 and patron, the commander-in- 
 chief, he addressed a letter to the 
 president of Congress, representing 
 his then present circumstances with 
 the confidence of affection and gra- 
 titude, observing that the senti- 
 
70 LIFE OF 
 
 ments which bound him to his 
 country could never be more pro- 
 perly spoken of than in the pre- 
 sence of men who had done so 
 much for their own. " As Ion 
 continued he, " as I thought I c 
 dispose of myself, I made it 
 pride and pleasure to fight uncf 
 American colours, in defence of a 
 cause which I dare more particu- 
 larly call ours, because I had the 
 good fortune of bleeding for her. 
 Now, sir, that France is involved 
 in a war, I am urged, by a sense 
 of my duty, as well as by the love 
 of my country, to present myself 
 before the king, and know in what 
 manner he judges proper to employ 
 my services. The most agreeable 
 of all will always be such as may 
 enable me to serve the common 
 
 i SO 
 
 ijg," 
 
 nder 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 71 
 
 cause among those whose friend- 
 ship I had the happiness to obtain, 
 and whose fortune I had the honour 
 to follow in less smiling times. 
 That reason, and others, which I 
 leave to the feelings of Congress, 
 engage me to beg from them the 
 liberty of going home for the next 
 winter. 
 
 "As long as there were any 
 hopes of an active campaign, I did 
 not think of leaving the field ; now, 
 that I see a very peaceable and un- 
 disturbed moment, I take this op- 
 portunity of waiting on Congress." 
 
 In the remainder of the letter he 
 solicited that, in the event of his 
 request being granted, he might be 
 considered as a soldier on furlough, 
 heartily wishing to regain his co- 
 lours and his esteemed and beloved 
 
72 LIFE OF 
 
 fellow-soldiers. And he closes 
 with a tender of any services which 
 he might be enabled to render to 
 the American cause in his own 
 country. 
 
 On the receipt of this letter,^^i 
 companied by one from General 
 Washington, recommending to 
 Congress, in terms most honou^^ 
 able to the marquis, a compliance 
 with his request, that body imme- 
 diately passed resolutions granting 
 him an unlimited leave of absence, 
 with permission to return to the 
 United States at his own most con- 
 venient time ; that the president of 
 Congress should write him a letter 
 returning him the thanks of Con- 
 gress for that disinterested zeal 
 which had led him to America, and 
 for the services he had rendered to 
 
m 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 75 
 
 the United States by the exertion 
 of his courage and abilities on 
 many signal occasions ; and that 
 the minister plenipotentiary of the 
 United States at the Court of Ver- 
 sailles should be directed to cause 
 an elegant sword, with proper de- 
 vices, to be made, and presented to 
 him in the name of the United 
 States. These resolutions were 
 communicated to him in a letter 
 expressive of the sensibility con- 
 genial to them, from the president 
 of Congress, Henry Laurens. 
 
 He embarked in January, 1779, 
 in the frigate Alliance, at Boston, 
 and on the succeeding 12th day of 
 February, presented himself at Ver- 
 sailles. Twelve months had already 
 elapsed since the conclusion of the 
 treaties of commerce and of event- 
 
76 LIFE OF 
 
 ual alliance between France and 
 the United States. They had, du- 
 ring the greater part of that time, 
 been deeply engaged in war with a 
 common cause against Great Bri- 
 tain, and it was the cause in which 
 Lafayette had been shedding his 
 blood ; yet, instead of receiving 
 him with open arms, as the pride 
 and ornament of his country, a cold 
 and hollow-hearted order was issued 
 to him, not to present himself at 
 court, but to consider himself under 
 arrest, with permission to receive 
 visits only from his relations. This 
 ostensible mark of the royal dis- 
 pleasure was to last eight days, and 
 Lafayette manifested his sense of it 
 only by a letter to the Count de 
 Vergennes, inquiring whether the 
 interdiction upori^ him to receive 
 
 «^ 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE, 77 
 
 visits was to be considered as ex- 
 tending to that of Doctor Franklin. 
 The sentiment of universal admi- 
 ration which had followed him at 
 his first departure, greatly increased 
 by his splendid career of service 
 during the two years of his absence, 
 indemnified him for the indignity of 
 the courtly rebuke. 
 
 He remained in France through 
 the year 1779, and returned to the 
 scene of action early in the en- 
 suing year. He continued in the 
 French service, and was appointed 
 to command the king's own regi- 
 ment of dragoons, stationed during 
 the year, in Various parts of the 
 kingdom, and holding an incessant 
 correspondence with the ministers 
 of foreign affairs, and of war, 
 urging the employment of a land 
 
is 
 
 and naval force in aid of the Ame- 
 rican cause. "The Marquis de 
 Lafayette," says Doctor Franklin, 
 in a letter of the 4th of March, 
 1780, to the president of Congress, 
 " who during his residence in 
 France, has been extremely zealous 
 in supporting our cause on all oc- 
 casions, returns again to fight for 
 it. He is infinitely esteemed and 
 beloved here, and I am persuaded 
 will do everything in his power to 
 merit a continuance of the same 
 affection from America." 
 
 Immediately after his arrival in 
 the United States, it was, on the 
 16th of May, 1780, resolved in 
 Congress, that they considered his 
 return to America to resume his 
 command, as a fresh proof of the 
 disinterested zeal and persevering 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 79 
 
 attachmrnt which have justly re- 
 commended him to the public con- 
 fidence and applause, and that they 
 received with pleasure a tender of 
 the further services of so gallant 
 and meritorious an officer. 
 
 From this time until the termina- 
 tion of the campaign of 1781, by 
 the surrender of Lord Cornwallis 
 and his army at Yorktown, his 
 service was of incessant activity, 
 always signalized by military talents 
 unsurpassed, and by a spirit never 
 to be subdued. At the time of the 
 treason of Arnold, Lafayette was 
 accompanying his commander-in- 
 chief to an important conference 
 and consultation with the French 
 general, Rochambeau ; and then, 
 as in every stage of the war, it 
 seemed as if the position which he oc- 
 
80 LIFE OF 
 
 cupied, his personal character, his in- 
 dividual relations with Washington, 
 with the officers of both the allied 
 armies, and with the armies them- 
 selves, had been specially ordered 
 to promote and secure that harmony 
 and mutual good understanding in- 
 dispensable to the ultimate success 
 of the common cause. His position, 
 too, as a foreigner by birth, a Eu- 
 ropean, a volunteer in the American 
 service, and a person of high rank 
 in his native country, pointed him 
 out as peculiarly suited to the 
 painful duty of deciding upon the 
 character of the crime, and upon 
 the fate of the British officer, the 
 accomplice and victim of the de- 
 tested traitor, Arnold. 
 
 In the early part of the campaign 
 of 1781, when Cornwallis, with 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 81 
 
 an overwhelming force, was spread- 
 ing ruin and devastation over the 
 southern portion of the union, we 
 find Lafayette, with means alto- 
 gether inadequate, charged with the 
 defence of the territory of Virginia. 
 Always equal to the emergencies 
 in which circumstances placed him, 
 his expedients for encountering and 
 surmounting the obstacles which 
 they cast in his way are invariably 
 stamped with the peculiarities of 
 his character. The troops placed 
 under his command for the defence 
 of Virginia, were chiefly taken from 
 the eastern regiments, unseasoned 
 to the climate of the south, and 
 prejudiced against it as unfavourable 
 to the health of the natives of the 
 more rigorous regions of the north. 
 Desertions became frequent, till 
 
 6 
 
82 LIFE OF 
 
 they threatened the very dissolution 
 of the corps. Instead of resorting 
 to military execution to retain his 
 men, he appeals to the sympathies 
 of honour. He states, in general 
 orders, the great danger and diffi- 
 culty of the enterprise upon which 
 he is about to embark ; represents 
 the only possibility by which it 
 can promise success, the faithful 
 adherence of the soldiers to their 
 chief, and his confidence that they 
 will not abandon him. He then 
 adds, that if, however, any indi- 
 vidual of the detachment was un- 
 willing to follow him, a passport to 
 return to his home should be forth- 
 with granted him upon his applica- 
 tion. It is to a cause like that of 
 American independence that re- 
 sources like this are congenial. 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 83 
 
 After these general orders, nothing 
 more was heard of desertion. The 
 very cripples of the army preferred 
 paying for their own transportation, 
 to follow the corps, rather than to 
 ask for the dismission which had 
 been made so easily accessible to all. 
 But how shall the deficiencies of 
 the military chest be supplied? 
 The want of money was heavily 
 pressing upon the service in every 
 direction. Where are the sinews 
 of war 1 How are the troops to 
 march without shoes, linen, clothing 
 of all descriptions, and other ne- 
 cessaries of life? Lafayette has 
 found them all. From the patriotic 
 merchants of Baltimore he obtains, 
 on the pledge of his own personal 
 credit, a loan of money, adequate 
 to the purchase of the materials ; 
 
84 LIFE OF 
 
 and from the fair hands ofthe 
 daughters of the monumental city, 
 even then worthy so to be called, 
 he obtains the toil of making up 
 the needed garments. 
 
 The details of the campaign, 
 from its unpromising outset, when 
 Cornwallis, the British commander, 
 exulted in anticipation that the boy 
 could not escape him, till the 
 storming of the twin redoubts, in 
 emulation of gallantry by the val- 
 iant Frenchmen of Viomesnil, and 
 the American fellow-soldiers of La- 
 fayette, led by him to victory at 
 Yorktown, must be left to the re- 
 cording pen of history. Both re- 
 doubts were carried at the point of 
 the sword, and Cornwallis, with 
 averted face, surrendered his sword 
 to Washington. 
 
!■» 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 87 
 
 This was the last vital struggle 
 of the war, which, however, lin- 
 gered through another year rather 
 of negotiation than of action. Im- 
 mediately after the capitulation at 
 Yorktown, Lafayette asked and ob- 
 tained again a leave of absence to 
 visit his family and his country, 
 and with this closed his military ser- 
 vice in the field, during the revolu- 
 tionary war. But it wag not for the 
 individual enjoyment of his renown 
 that he returned to France. The 
 resolutions of Congress accompa- 
 nying that which gave him a dis- 
 cretionary leave of absence, while 
 honorary in the highest degree to 
 him, were equally marked by a 
 grant of virtual credentials for ne- 
 gotiation, and by the trust of confi- 
 dential powers, together with a 
 
88 LIFE OF 
 
 letter of the warmest commendation 
 of the gallant soldier to the favour 
 of his king. The ensuing year 
 was consumed in preparations for a 
 formidable combined French and 
 Spanish expedition against the Bri- 
 tish Islands in the West Indies, and 
 particularly the Island of Jamaica ; 
 thence to recoil upon New York, 
 and to pursue the offensive war 
 into Canada. The fleet destined 
 for this gigantic undertaking was 
 already assembled at Cadiz ; and 
 Lafayette, appointed the chief of 
 the staff, was there ready to embark 
 upon this perilous adventure, when, 
 on the 30th of November, 1782, 
 the preliminary treaties of peace were 
 concluded between his Britannic 
 Majesty on one part, and the allied 
 powers of France, Spain, and the 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 89 
 
 United States of America, on the 
 other. The first intelligence of 
 this event received by the American 
 Congress was in the communication 
 of a letter from Lafayette. 
 
 The war of American Indepen- 
 dence is closed. The people of the 
 North American confederation are 
 in union, sovereign and indepen- 
 dent. Lafayette, at twenty-five 
 years of age, has lived the life of a 
 patriarch, and illustrated the career 
 of a hero. Had his days upon 
 earth been then numbered, and had 
 he then slept with his fathers, illus- 
 trious as for centuries their names 
 had been, his name, to the end of 
 time, would have transcended them 
 all. Fortunate youth ! fortunate 
 beyond even the measure of his 
 companions in arms with whom he 
 
90 LIFE OF 
 
 had achieved the glorious consum- 
 mation of American independence. 
 His fame was all his own ; not 
 cheaply earned ; not ignobly won. 
 His fellow-soldiers had been the 
 champions and defenders of their 
 country. They reaped for them- 
 selves, for their wives, their chil- 
 dren, their posterity to the latest 
 time, the rewards of their dangers 
 and their toils. Lafayette had 
 watched, and laboured, and fought, 
 and bled, not for himself, not for 
 his family, not, in the first instance, 
 even for his country. In the legend- 
 ary tales of chivalry, we read of 
 tournaments at which a foreign and 
 unknown knight suddenly presents 
 himself, armed in complete steel, 
 and, with the vizor down, enters the 
 v'mv to contend with the assembled 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 91 
 
 flower of knighthood for the prize 
 of honour, to be awarded by the 
 hand of beauty ; bears it in triumph 
 away, and disappears from the as- 
 tonished multitude of competitors 
 and spectators of the feats of arms. 
 But where, in the rolls of history, 
 where in the fictions of romance, 
 where, but in the life of Lafayette, 
 has been seen the noble stranger, 
 flying, with the tribute of his name, 
 his rank, his affluence, his ease, his 
 domestic bliss, his treasure, his 
 blood, to the relief of a suffering 
 and distant land, in the hour of her 
 deepest calamity — baring his bo- 
 som to her foes ; and not at the 
 transient pageantry of a tourna- 
 ment, but for a succession of five 
 years sharing all the vicissitudes of 
 her fortunes ; always eager to ap- 
 
92 LIFE OF 
 
 pear at the post of danger — tern* 
 pering the glow of youthful ardour 
 with the cold caution of a veteran 
 commander ; bold and daring in 
 action ; prompt in execution ; rapid 
 in pursuit ; fertile in expedients ; 
 unattainable in retreat ; often ex- 
 posed, but never surprised, never 
 disconcerted ; eluding his enemy 
 when within his fancied grasp ; 
 bearing upon him with irresistible 
 sway when of force to cope with 
 him in the conflict of arms ? And 
 what is this but the diary of La- 
 fayette, from the day of his rally- 
 ing the scattered fugitives of the 
 Brandy wine, insensible of the blood 
 flowing from his wound, to the 
 storming of the redoubt at York- 
 town ? 
 
 Henceforth, as a public man. 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 93 
 
 Lafayette is to be considered as a 
 Frenchman, always active and ar- 
 dent to serve the United States, but 
 no longer in their service as an 
 officer. So transcendent had been 
 his merits in the common cause, 
 that, to reward them, the rule of 
 progressive advancement in the 
 armies of France was set aside for 
 him. He received from the minister 
 of war a notification that from the 
 day of his retirement from the ser- 
 vice of the United States as a ma- 
 jor-general, at the close of the war, 
 he should hold the same rank in 
 the armies of France, to date from 
 the day of the capitulation of Corn- 
 wall is. 
 
 Henceforth he is a Frenchman, 
 destined to perform in the history 
 of his country a part, as peculiarly 
 
94 
 
 his own, and not less glorious than 
 that which he had performed in the 
 war of independence. A short pe- 
 riod of profound peace followed the 
 great triumph of freedom. The 
 desire of Lafayette once more to 
 see the land of his adoption and the 
 associates of his glory, the fellow- 
 soldiers who had become to him as 
 brothers, and the friend and patron 
 of his youth, who had become to 
 him as a father ; sympathizing with 
 their desire once more to see him — 
 to see in their prosperity him who 
 had first come to them in their af- 
 fliction, induced him, in the year 
 1784, to pay a visit to the United 
 States. 
 
 On the 4th of August, of that 
 year, he landed at New York, and, 
 in the space of five months from 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 95 
 
 that time, visited his venerable 
 friend at Mount Vernon, where he 
 was then living in retirement, and 
 traversed ten states of the union, 
 receiving everywhere, from their 
 legislative assemblies, from the mu- 
 nicipal bodies of the cities and 
 towns through which he passed, 
 from the officers of the army, his 
 late associates, now restored to the 
 virtues and occupations of private 
 life, and even from the recent emi- 
 grants from Ireland, who had come 
 to adopt for their country the self- 
 emancipated land, addresses of 
 gratulation and of joy, the effusions 
 of hearts grateful in the enjoyment 
 of the blessings for the possession 
 of which they had been so largely 
 indebted to his exertions — and 
 finally, from the United States of 
 
96 LIFE OF 
 
 America in Congress assembled at 
 Trenton. 
 
 On the 9th of December it was 
 resolved by that body that a com- 
 mittee, to consist of one member 
 from each state, should be appoint- 
 ed to receive, and in the name of 
 Congress take leave of the marquis. 
 That they should be instructed to 
 assure him that Congress continued 
 to entertain the same high sense of 
 his abilities and zeal to promote the 
 welfare of America, both here and 
 in Europe, which they had fre- 
 quently expressed and manifested 
 on former occasions, and which the 
 recent marks of his attention to 
 their commercial and other inte- 
 rests had perfectly confirmed. 
 " That, as his uniform and unceas- 
 ing attachment to this country has 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 9? 
 
 resembled that of a patriotic citizen, 
 the United States regard him with 
 particular affection, and will not 
 cease to feel an interest in whatever 
 may concern his honour and pros- 
 perity, and that their best and 
 kindest wishes will always attend 
 him." 
 
 And it was further resolved, that 
 a letter be written to his Most Chris- 
 tian Majesty, to be signed by his 
 Excellency the President of Con- 
 gress, expressive of the high sense 
 which the United States in Congress 
 assembled entertain of the zeal, 
 talents, and meritorious services of 
 the Marquis de Lafayette, and re- 
 commending him to the favour and 
 patronage of his Majesty* 
 
 The first of these resolutions 
 was, on the next day, carried into 
 
98 LIFE OF 
 
 execution. At a solemn interview 
 with the committee of Congress, 
 received in their hall, and addressed 
 by the chairman of their commit* 
 tee, John Jay, the purport of these 
 resolutions was communicated to 
 him. He replied in terms of fer- 
 vent sensibility for the kindness 
 manifested personally to himself; 
 and, with allusions to the situation, 
 the prospects, and the duties of the 
 people of this country, he pointed 
 out the great interests which he be- 
 lieved it indispensable to their wel- 
 fare that they should cultivate and 
 cherish. In the following memo- 
 rable sentences, the ultimate objects 
 of his solicitude are disclosed in a 
 tone deeply solemn and impressive: 
 " May this immense temple of 
 freedom," said he, " ever stand, a 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 99 
 
 lesson to oppressors, an example to 
 the oppressed, a sanctuary for the 
 rights of mankind ! and may these 
 happy United States attain that 
 complete splendour and prosperity 
 which will illustrate the blessings 
 of their government, and for ages 
 to come rejoice the departed souls 
 of its founders." 
 
 Fellow-citizens ! Ages have pass- 
 ed away since these words were 
 spoken ; but ages are the years of 
 the existence of nations. The 
 founders of this immense temple of 
 freedom have all departed, save 
 here and there a solitary exception, 
 even while I speak, at the point of 
 taking wing, The prayer of La- 
 fayette is not yet consummated. 
 Ages upon ages are still to pass 
 away before it can have its full ac- 
 
100 LIFE OF 
 
 complishment ; and, for its full ac- 
 complishment, his spirit, hovering 
 over our heads, in more than echoes 
 talks around these walls. It repeats 
 the prayer which from his lips fifty 
 years ago was at once a parting 
 blessing and a prophecy ; for, were it 
 possible for the whole human race, 
 now breathing the breath of life, to 
 be assembled within this hall, your 
 orator would, in your name and in 
 that of your constituents, appeal to 
 them to testify for your fathers of 
 the last generation, that, so far as 
 has depended upon them, the bless- 
 ing of Lafayette has been prophecy. 
 Yes ! this immense temple of free- 
 dom still stands, a lesson to oppres- 
 sors, an example to the oppressed, 
 and a sanctuary for the rights of 
 mankind. Yes ! with the smiles 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 101 
 
 of a benignant providence, the 
 splendour and prosperity of these 
 happy United States have illustra- 
 ted the blessings of their govern- 
 ment, and, we may humbly hope, 
 have rejoiced the departed souls of 
 its founders. For the past your 
 fathers and you have been respon- 
 sible. The charge of the future 
 devolves upon you and upon your 
 children. The vestal fire of free- 
 dom is in your custody. May the 
 souls of its departed founders never 
 be called to witness its extinction 
 by neglect, noi' a soil upon the pu- 
 rity of its keepers ! 
 
 With this valedictory, Lafayette 
 took, as he and those who heard 
 him then believed, a final leave of 
 the people of the United States. 
 He returned to France, and arrived 
 
102 LIFE OF 
 
 at Paris on the 25th of January, 
 1785. 
 
 He continued to take a deep in- 
 terest in the concerns of the United 
 States, and exerted his influence 
 with the French government to ob- 
 tain reductions of duties favourable 
 to their commerce and fisheries. 
 In the summer of 1786, he visited 
 several of the German courts, and 
 attended the last great review by- 
 Frederick the Second of his veteran 
 army — a review unusually splen* 
 did, and specially remarkable by 
 the attendance of many of the most 
 distinguished military commanders 
 of Europe. In the same year the 
 legislature of Virginia manifested 
 the continued recollection of his 
 services rendered to the people of 
 that commonwealth, by a compli- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 103 
 
 mentary token of gratitude not less 
 honourable than it was unusual. 
 They resolved that two busts of 
 Lafayette, to be executed by the 
 celebrated sculptor, Houdon, should 
 be procured at their expense ; that 
 one of them should be placed in 
 their own legislative hall, and the 
 other presented, in their name, to 
 the municipal authorities of the city 
 of Paris. It was accordingly pre- 
 sented by Mr. Jefferson, then min- 
 | ister plenipotentiary of the United 
 i States in France, and, by the per- 
 i mission of Louis the Sixteenth, was 
 accepted, and, with appropriate 
 solemnity, placed in one of the 
 halls of the Hotel de Ville of the 
 metropolis of France. 
 
 We have gone through one 
 stage of the life of Lafayette : we 
 
104 LIFE OF 
 
 are now to see him acting upon 
 another theatre — in a cause still 
 essentially the same, but. in the ap- 
 plication of its principles to his 
 own country. 
 
 The immediately originating 
 question which occasioned the 
 French revolution was the same 
 with that from which the Ameri- 
 can revolution had sprung — taxa- 
 tion of the people without their 
 consent. For nearly two centu- 
 ries the kings of France had been 
 accustomed to levy taxes upon the 
 people by royal ordinances. But it 
 was necessary that these ordinances 
 should be registered in the parlia- 
 ments or judicial tribunals ; and 
 these parliaments claimed the right 
 of remonstrating against them, and 
 sometimes refused the registry of 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 105 
 
 them itself. The members of the 
 parliaments held their offices by- 
 purchase, but were appointed by 
 the king, and were subject to ban- 
 ishment or imprisonment, at his 
 pleasure. Louis the Fifteenth, to- 
 wards the close of his reign, had 
 abolished the parliaments, but they 
 had been restored at the accession 
 of his successor. 
 
 The finances of the kingdom 
 were in extreme disorder. The 
 minister, or comptroller general, 
 De Calonne, after attempting va- 
 rious projects for obtaining the sup- 
 plies, the amount and need of which 
 he was with lavish hand daily in- 
 creasing, bethought himself, at last, 
 of calling for the counsel of others. 
 He prevailed upon the king to con- 
 voke, not the states general, but an 
 
106 LIFE OF 
 
 assembly of notables. There was 
 something ridiculous in the very- 
 name by which this meeting was 
 called, but it consisted of a selec- 
 tion from all the grandees and dig- 
 nitaries, of the kingdom. The two 
 brothers of the king — all the princes 
 of the blood, archbishops and bish- 
 ops, dukes and peers — the chan- 
 cellor and presiding members of 
 the parliaments ; distinguished 
 members of the noblesse, and the 
 mayors and chief magistrates of a 
 few of the principal cities of the 
 kingdom, constituted this assembly. 
 It was a representation of every 
 interest but that of the people. 
 They were appointed by the king 
 — were members of the highest 
 aristocracy, and were assembled 
 with the design that their delibera- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 107 
 
 tions should be confined exclusively 
 to the subjects submitted to their 
 consideration by the minister. These 
 were certain plans devised by him 
 for replenishing the insolvent trea- 
 sury, by assessments upon the 
 privileged classes, the very princes, 
 nobles, ecclesiastics, and magis- 
 trates exclusively represented in 
 the assembly itself. 
 
 Of this meeting the Marquis de 
 Lafayette was a member. It was 
 held in February, 1787, and termi- 
 nated in the overthrow and banish- 
 ment of the minister by whom it 
 had been convened. In the fiscal 
 concerns which absorbed the care 
 and attention of others, Lafayette 
 took comparatively little interest. 
 His views were more comprehen- 
 sive. 
 
I 
 
 1 108 LIFE OF 
 
 The assembly consisted of one 
 hundred and thirty-seven persons, 
 and divided itself into seven sec- 
 tions or bureaux, each presided by 
 a prince of the blood. Lafayette 
 was allotted to the division under 
 the presidency of the Count d'Ar- 
 tois, the younger brother of the 
 king, and since known as Charles 
 the Tenth. The propositions made 
 by Lafayette were — 
 
 1 . The suppression of Letters de 
 Cachet, and the abolition of all ar- 
 bitrary imprisonment. 
 
 2. The establishment of religious 
 toleration, and the restoration of 
 the protestants to their civil rights. 
 
 3. The convocation of a nation- 
 al assembly, representing the peo- 
 ple of France — personal liberty — 
 religious liberty — and a represent- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 109 
 
 ative assembly of the people. These 
 were his demands. 
 
 The first and second of them 
 produced, perhaps, at the time, no 
 deep impression upon the assembly, 
 nor upon the public. Arbitrary 
 imprisonment, and the religious 
 persecution of the protestants had 
 become universally odious. They 
 were worn-out instruments, even 
 in the hands of those who wielded 
 them. There was none to defend 
 them. 
 
 But the demand for a national 
 assembly startled the prince at the 
 head of the bureau. " What !" said 
 the Count d'Artois, " do you ask for 
 the states general?" " Yes, sir," was 
 the answer of Lafayette, "and for 
 something yet better." " You desire, 
 then," replied the "prince, "that I 
 
110 LIFE OF 
 
 should take in writing, and report 
 to the king, that the motion to con- 
 voke the states general has been 
 made by the Marquis de Lafayette?" 
 " Yes, sir ;" and the name of La- 
 fayette was accordingly reported to 
 the king. 
 
 The assembly of notables was 
 dissolved — De Calonne was dis- 
 placed and banished, and his suc- 
 cessor undertook to raise the needed 
 funds, by the authority of royal 
 edicts. The war of litigation with 
 the parliaments recommenced, 
 which terminated only with a posi- 
 tive promise that the states general 
 should be convoked. 
 
 From that time a total revolution 
 of government in France was in 
 progress. It has been a solemn, 
 a sublime, often a most painful, 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. Ill 
 
 and yet, in the contemplation of 
 great results, a refreshing and cheer- 
 ing contemplation. I cannot fol- 
 low it in its overwhelming multi- 
 tude of details, even as connected 
 with the life and character of La- 
 fayette. A second assembly of 
 notables succeeded the first ; and 
 then an assembly of the states 
 general, first to deliberate in sepa- 
 rate orders of clergy, nobility, and 
 third estate : but, finally, constitu- 
 ting itself a national assembly, and 
 forming a constitution of limited 
 monarchy, with an hereditary royal 
 executive, and a legislature in a 
 single assembly representing the 
 people. 
 
 Lafayette was a member of the 
 states general first assembled. 
 Their meeting was signalized by a 
 
112 LIFE OF 
 
 struggle between the several order's 
 of which they were composed, 
 which resulted in breaking them 
 all down into one national assem* 
 bly. 
 
 The convocation of the states 
 general had, in one respect, opera- 
 ted, in the progress of the French 
 revolution, like the Declaration of 
 Independence in that of North 
 America. It had changed the ques- 
 tion in controversy. It was, on the 
 part of the king of France, a con- 
 cession that he had no lawful power 
 to tax the people without their con- 
 sent. The states general, there- 
 fore, met with this admission 
 already conceded by the king. In 
 the American conflict the British 
 government never yielded the con- 
 cession. They undertook to main- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 113 
 
 tain their supposed right of arbitrary 
 taxation by force; and then the 
 people of the colonies renounced 
 all community of government, not 
 only with the king and parliament, 
 but with the British nation. They 
 re-constructed the fabric of govern- 
 ment for themselves, and held the 
 people of Britain as foreigners — - 
 friends in peace — enemies in war. 
 The concession by Louis the 
 Sixteenth, implied in the convoca- 
 tion of the states general, was a 
 virtual surrender of absolute power 
 — an acknowledgment that, as ex- 
 ercised by himself and his prede- 
 cessors, it had been usurped. It 
 was, in substance, an abdication of 
 his crown. There was no power 
 which he exercised as king of 
 France, the lawfulness of which 
 
114 LIFE OF 
 
 was not contestable on the same 
 principle which denied him the 
 right of taxation. When the as- 
 sembly of the states general met at 
 Versailles, in May, 1789, there 
 was but a shadow of the royal 
 authority left. They felt that the 
 power of the nation was in their 
 hands, and they were not sparing 
 in the use of it. The representa- 
 tives of the third estates, double 
 in numbers to those of the clergy 
 and nobility, constituted themselves 
 a national assembly, and, as a sig- 
 nal for the demolition of all privi- 
 leged orders, refused to deliberate 
 in separate chambers, and thus 
 compelled the representatives of the 
 clergy and nobility to merge their 
 separate existence in the general 
 mass of the popular representation. 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 115 
 
 Thus the edifice of society was 
 to be re-constructed in France as it 
 had been in America. The king 
 made a feeble attempt to overawe 
 the assembly, by calling regiments 
 of troops to Versailles, and sur- 
 rounding with them, the hall of 
 their meeting. But there was de- 
 fection in the army itself, and even 
 the person of the king soon ceased 
 to be at his own disposal. On the 
 11th of July, 1789, in the midst of 
 the fermentation which had suc- 
 ceeded the fall of the monarchy, 
 and while the assembly was sur- 
 rounded by armed soldiers, La- 
 fayette presented to them his 
 Declaration of Rights — the first de- 
 claration of human rights ever 
 proclaimed in Europe. It was 
 adopted, and became the basis of 
 
116 LIFE OF 
 
 that which the assembly promul- 
 gated with their constitution. 
 
 It was in this hemisphere, and in 
 our own country, that all its prin- 
 ciples had been imbibed. At the 
 very moment when the declaration 
 was presented, the convulsive strug- 
 gle between the expiring monarchy 
 and the new-born but portentous 
 anarchy of the Parisian populace 
 was taking place. The royal palace 
 and the hall of the assembly were 
 surrounded with troops, and insur- 
 rection was kindling at Paris. In 
 the midst of the popular commotion, 
 a deputation of sixty members, with 
 Lafayette at their head,- was sent 
 from the assembly to v <. tranquillize 
 the people of Paris, and that inci- 
 dent was the occasion of the institu- 
 tion of the National Guard through- 
 
" 
 
 
 
 
 
 liiiifii^s 
 
 isgimvi'i-^ : 
 
 
 fsy^ 
 
 fc ^*si"BHk : -^-r' "• 
 
 
 
 ■ ; fS 
 
 !■■ 
 
 o 
 
 
 i iii 
 
 i#§»f^ 
 
 2 
 
 
 1 11 
 
 gTfr^J, ft$BH 
 
 < 
 
 
 it '' -i^p 
 
 gr 5 ^ T ^" 7^)1 a fWsHiSi 
 
 * 
 
 
 
 SOT 
 
 o 
 
 55 
 
 
 
 P<HH&r«IH 
 
 W 
 
 
 l' liBMEHBr^'^ « 'a 
 
 ^\~' SrMRt i M fW ' 1JH 
 
 K 
 
 
 v VillHfcj 
 
 ^pEflMffiS/i ' '/i^aJ'HflWJ 
 
 
 
 c.Twm- »,,, - '■• 
 
 ^^^mS^iJ'^mm 
 
 O 
 
 
 i'lf " ,:■ 
 
 
 N 
 
 
 ■ 
 
 BKoSb 
 
 n 
 to 
 
 < 
 8 
 
 WW VillMIIIIBKS 
 
 .- :.^r:,,4fc2S 
 
 § 
 
 
 
 o 
 
 ■■W. Ill ilim >3iffl 
 
 
 w 
 
 
 
 «*v >:-j«' 
 
 (4 
 
 
 ^^f m 
 
 
 a 
 
 
 <mmm 
 
 ^H l?r 
 
 
 
 Ijjjfc: 
 
 ft| v-r 
 
 
 
 lite"" 
 
 / (ii 
 
 
 
 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 119 
 
 out the realm, and of the appoint- 
 ment, with the approbation of the 
 king, of Lafayette as their general 
 commander-in-chief. 
 
 This event, without vacating his 
 seat in the national assembly, con- 
 nected him at once with the mili- 
 tary and the popular movement of 
 the revolution. The national guard 
 was the armed militia of the whole 
 kingdom, embodied for the preser- 
 vation of order, and the protection 
 of persons and property, as well as 
 for the establishment of the liber- 
 ties of the people. In his double 
 capacity of commander-general of 
 this force, and of a representative 
 in the constituent assembly, his 
 career, for a period of more than 
 three years, was beset with the 
 most imminent dangers, and with 
 
120 LIFE OF 
 
 difficulties beyond all human power 
 to surmount. 
 
 The ancient monarchy of France 
 had crumbled into ruins. A na- 
 tional assembly, formed by an ir- 
 regular representation of clergy, 
 nobles, and third estate, after melt- 
 ing at the fire of a revolution into 
 one body, had transformed itself 
 into a constituent assembly repre- 
 senting the people, had assumed 
 the exercise of all the powers of 
 government extorted from the hands 
 of the king, and undertaken to 
 form a constitution for the French 
 nation, founded at once upon the 
 theory of human rights, and upon 
 the preservation of a royal heredi- 
 tary crown upon the head of Louis 
 the Sixteenth. Lafayette sincere- 
 ly believed that such a system 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 121 
 
 would not be absolutely incompati- 
 ble with the nature of things. 
 
 An hereditary monarchy, sur- 
 rounded by popular institutions, 
 presented itself to his imagination 
 as a practicable form of govern- 
 ment ; nor is it certain that even to 
 his last days he ever abandoned 
 this persuasion. The element of 
 hereditary monarchy in this con- 
 stitution was indeed not congenial 
 to it. The prototype from which 
 the whole fabric had been drawn, 
 had no such element in its compo- 
 sition. A feeling of generosity, of 
 compassion, of commiseration with 
 the unfortunate prince then upon 
 the throne, who had been his sove- 
 reign, and for his ill-fated family, 
 mingled itself, perhaps unconscious- 
 ly to himself, with his well-reason- 
 
122 LIFE OF 
 
 ed faith in the abstract principles 
 of a republican creed. The total 
 abolition of the monarchial feature 
 undoubtedly belonged to his theory, 
 but the family of Bourbon had still 
 a strong hold on the affections of 
 the French people; history had 
 not made up a record favourable to 
 the establishment of elective kings 
 — a strong executive head was ab- 
 solutely necessary to curb the im- 
 petuosities of the people of France ; 
 and the same doctrine which played 
 upon the fancy, and crept upon the 
 kind-hearted benevolence of Lafay- 
 ette, was adopted by a large ma- 
 jority of the national assembly, 
 sanctioned by the suffrages of its 
 most intelligent, virtuous, and pa- 
 triotic members, and was finally 
 embodied in that royal democracy 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 123 
 
 the result of their labours, sent 
 forth to the world, under the guar- 
 anty of numberless oaths, as the 
 constitution of France for all after- 
 time. 
 
 But, during the same period, 
 after the first meeting of the states 
 general, and while they were in 
 actual conflict with the expiring 
 energies of the crown, and with the 
 exclusive privileges of the clergy 
 and nobility, another portentous 
 power had arisen, and entered with 
 terrific activity into the controver- 
 sies of the time. This was the 
 power of popular insurrection, or- 
 ganized by voluntary associations 
 of clubs, and impelled to action by 
 the municipal authorities of the city 
 of Paris. 
 
 The first movements of the peo- 
 
124 LIFE OF 
 
 pie in the state of insurrection took 
 place on the 12th of July, 1789, 
 and issued in the destruction of the 
 Bastile, and in the murder of its 
 governor, and of several other per- 
 sons, hung up at lamp-posts, or 
 torn to pieces by the frenzied mul- 
 titude, without form of trial, and 
 without shadow of guilt. 
 
 The Bastile had long been odious 
 as the place of confinement of per- 
 sons arrested by arbitrary orders 
 for offences against the government, 
 and its destruction was hailed 
 by most of the friends of liberty 
 throughout the world as an act of 
 patriotism and magnanimity on the 
 part of the people. The brutal 
 ferocity of the murders was over- 
 looked or palliated in the glory of 
 the achievement of razing to its 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 127 
 
 foundations the execrated citadel of 
 despotism. But, as the summary- 
 justice of insurrection can manifest 
 itself only by destruction, the ex- 
 ample once set became a precedent 
 for a series of years for scenes so 
 atrocious, and for butcheries so 
 merciless and horrible, that memo- 
 ry revolts at the task of recalling 
 them to the mind. 
 
 It. would be impossible, within our 
 limits to follow the details of the 
 French revolution to the final de- 
 thronement of Louis the Sixteenth, 
 and the extinction of the constitution- 
 al monarchy of France, on the 10th 
 of August, 1792. During that pe- 
 riod, the two distinct powers were 
 in continual operation — sometimes 
 in concert with each other, some- 
 times at irreconcilable opposition. 
 
128 LIFE OF 
 
 Of these powers, one was the peo- 
 ple of France, represented by the 
 Parisian populace in insurrection ; 
 the other was the people of France, 
 represented successively by the 
 constituent assembly, which formed 
 the constitution of 1791, and by 
 the legislative assembly, elected to 
 carry it into execution. 
 
 The movements of the insurgent 
 power were occasionally convulsive 
 and cruel, without mitigation or 
 mercy. 'Guided by secret springs : 
 prompted by vindictive and san- 
 guinary ambition, directed by hands 
 unseen to objects of individual ag- 
 grandizement, its agency fell like 
 the thunderbolt, and swept like the 
 whirlwind. 
 
 The proceedings of the assem- 
 blies were deliberative and intellec- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 129 
 
 tual. They began by grasping at 
 the whole power of the monarchy, 
 and they finished by sinking under 
 the dictation of the Parisian popu- 
 lace. The constituent assembly 
 numbered among its members 
 many individuals of great ability, 
 and of pure principles, but they 
 were overawed and domineered by 
 that other representation of the peo- 
 ple of France, which, through the 
 instrumentality of the jacobin club, 
 and the municipality of Paris, dis- 
 concerted the wisdom of the wise, 
 nnd scattered to the winds the 
 counsels of the prudent. 
 
 It was impossible that, under the 
 perturbations of such a controlling 
 power, a constitution suited to the 
 character and circumstances of the 
 nation should be formed. 
 
130 LIFE OF 
 
 Through the whole of this pe- 
 riod, the part performed by Lafay- 
 ette was without parallel in history. 
 The annals of the human race ex- 
 hibit no other instance of a position 
 comparable for its unintermitted 
 perils, its deep responsibilities, and 
 its providential issues, with that 
 which he occupied as commander- 
 general of the national guard, and as 
 a leading member of the constituent 
 assembly. In the numerous insur- 
 rections of the people, he saved the 
 lives of multitudes devoted as vic- 
 tims, and always at the most im- 
 minent hazard of his own. On the 
 fifth and sixth of October, 1789, he 
 saved the lives of Louis the Six- 
 teenth, and of his queen. He es- 
 caped, time after time, the daggers 
 charged by princely conspiracy on 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 131 
 
 one hand, and by popular frenzy 
 on the other. He witnessed, too, 
 without being able to prevent it, the 
 butchery of Foulon before his eyes; 
 and the reeking heart of Berthier, 
 torn "from his lifeless trunk, was 
 held up in exulting triumph before 
 him. On this occasion, and on 
 another, he threw Up his commis- 
 sion as commander of the national 
 guards ; but who could have suc- 
 ceeded him, even with equal power 
 to restrain these volcanic excesses? 
 At the earnest solicitation of those 
 who well knew that his place could 
 never be supplied, he resumed and 
 continued in the command until the 
 solemn proclamation of the consti- 
 tution, upon which he definitely 
 laid it down, and retired to private 
 life upon his estate in Auvergne. 
 
132 tlFE OF 
 
 As a member of the constituent 
 assembly, it is not in the detailed 
 organization of the government 
 which they prepared^ that his spirit 
 and co-operation is to be traced. It 
 is in the principles which he pro- 
 posed and infused into the system. 
 As, at the first assembly of nota- 
 bles, his voice had been raised for 
 the abolition of arbitrary imprison- 
 ment, for the extinction of religious 
 intolerance*, and for the representa- 
 tion of the people, so, in the nation- 
 al assembly, besides the declaration 
 of rights, which formed the basis 
 of the constitution itself, he made 
 or supported the motions for the es- 
 tablishment of trial by jury, for the 
 gradual emancipation of slaves, for 
 the freedom of the press, for the 
 abolition of all titles of nobility, and 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 133 
 
 for the declaration of equality of 
 all the citizens, and the suppression 
 of all the privileged orders, without 
 exception of the princes of the royal 
 family. Thus while as a legisla- 
 tor he was spreading the principles 
 of universal liberty over the whole 
 surface of the state, as commander- 
 in-chief of the armed force of the 
 nation he was controlling, repress- 
 ing, and mitigating, as far as it 
 could be effected by human power, 
 the excesses of the people. 
 
 The constitution was at length 
 proclaimed, and the constituent na- 
 tional assembly was dissolved. In 
 advance of this event, the sublime 
 spectacle of the federation was ex- 
 hibited on the 14th of July, 1790, 
 the first anniversary of the destruc- 
 tion of the Bastile. There was an 
 
134 LIFE OF 
 
 ingenious and fanciful association 
 of ideas in the selection of that day. 
 The Bastile was a state prison, a 
 massive structure, which had stood 
 four hundred years, every stone of 
 which was saturated with sighs 
 and tears, and echoed the groans 
 of four centuries of oppression. It 
 was the very type and emblem of 
 the despotism which had so long 
 weighed upon France. Demolish- 
 ed from its summit to its founda- 
 tion at the first shout of freedom 
 from the people, what day could be 
 more appropriate than its anniver- 
 j sary for the day of solemn conse- 
 | cration of the new fabric of govern- 
 I ment, founded upon the rights of 
 j man ? 
 
 I shall not describe the magnifi- 
 I cent and melancholy pageant of 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 135 
 
 that day. The religious solemnity 
 of the mass was performed by a 
 prelate, then eminent among the 
 members of the assembly and the 
 dignitaries of the land; still emi- 
 nent, after surviving the whole 
 circle of subsequent revolutions. 
 No longer a father of the church, 
 but among the most distinguished 
 laymen and most celebrated states- 
 men of France, his was the voice 
 to invoke the blessing of heaven 
 upon this new constitution for his 
 liberated country; and he and 
 Louis the Sixteenth, and Lafayette, 
 and thirty thousand delegates from 
 all the confederated national guards 
 of the kingdom, in the presence of 
 Almighty God, and of five hundred 
 thousand of their countrymen, took 
 the oath of fidelity to the nation, to 
 
136 LIFE OF 
 
 the constitution, and all, save the 
 monarch himself, to the king. His 
 corresponding oath was, of fidelity 
 to discharge the duties of his high 
 office, and to the people. 
 
 Alas ! and was it all false and 
 hollow ? had these oaths no more 
 substance than the breath that 
 ushered them to the winds 1 It is 
 impossible to look back upon the 
 short and turbulent existence of 
 this royal democracy, to mark the 
 frequent paroxysms of popular 
 frenzy by which it was assailed, 
 and the catastrophe by which it 
 perished, and to believe that the 
 vows of all who swore to support 
 it were sincere. But as well might 
 the sculptor of a block of marble, 
 after exhausting his genius and his 
 art in giving it a beautiful human 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 137 
 
 form, call God to witness that it 
 shall perform all the functions of 
 animal life, as the constituent as- 
 sembly of France could pledge the 
 faith of its members that their royal 
 democracy should work as a per- 
 manent organized form of govern- 
 ment. The declaration of rights 
 contained all the principles essen- 
 tial to freedom. The frame of go- 
 vernment was radically and irre- 
 parably defective. The hereditary 
 royal executive was itself an incon- 
 sistency with the declaration of 
 rights. The legislative power, all 
 concentrated in a single assembly, 
 was an incongruity still more glar- 
 ing. These were both departures 
 from the system of organization 
 which Lafayette had witnessed in 
 the American constitutions : neither 
 
138 LIFE OF 
 
 of them was approved by Lafay- 
 ette. In deference to the prevail- 
 ing opinions and prejudices of the 
 times, he acquiesced in them, and 
 he was destined to incur the most 
 imminent hazards of his life, and 
 to make the sacrifice of all that 
 gives value to life itself, in faithful 
 adherence to that constitution which 
 he had sworn to support. 
 
 Shortly after his resignation, as 
 commander-general of the national 
 guards, the friends of liberty and 
 order presented him as a candidate 
 for election as mayor of Paris ; but 
 he had a competitor in the person 
 of Pethion, more suited to the party, 
 pursuing with inexorable rancour the 
 abolition of the monarchy and the 
 destruction of the king; and, what 
 may seem scarcely credible, the 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 139 
 
 remnant of the party which still 
 adhered to the king, the king him- 
 self, and above all, the queen, fa- 
 voured the election of the Jacobin, 
 Pethion, in preference to that of 
 Lafayette. They were, too fatally 
 for themselves, successful. 
 
 From the first meeting of the 
 legislative assembly, under the 
 constitution of 1791, the destruc- 
 tion of the king and of the mon- 
 archy, and the establishment of a 
 republic, by means of the popular 
 passions and of popular violence, 
 were the deliberate purposes of its 
 leading members. The spirit with 
 which the revolution had been pur- 
 sued, from the time of the destruc- 
 tion of the Bastile, had caused the 
 emigration of great numbers of the 
 nobility and clergy ; and, among 
 
140 LIFE OF 
 
 them, of the two brothers of Louis 
 the Sixteenth, and of several other 
 princes of his blood. They had 
 applied to all the other great mon- 
 archies of Europe for assistance to 
 uphold or restore the crumbling 
 monarchy of France. The French 
 reformers themselves, in the heat 
 of their political fanaticism avowed, 
 without disguise, the design to re- 
 volutionize all Europe, and had 
 emissaries in every country, openly 
 or secretly preaching the doctrine 
 of insurrection against all establish- 
 ed governments. Louis the Six- 
 teenth, and his queen, an Austrian 
 princess, sister to the Emperor 
 Leopold, were in secret negotiation 
 with the Austrian government for 
 the rescue of the king and royal 
 family of France from the dangers 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 141 
 
 with which they were so incessantly 
 beset. In the Electorate of Treves;, 
 a part of the Germanic empire, the 
 emigrants from France were assent 
 bling, with indications of a design 
 to enter France in hostile array, to 
 effect a counter-revolution ; and 
 the brothers of the king, assuming 
 a position at Coblentz, on the bor* 
 ders of their country, were holding 
 councils, the object of which was 
 to march in arms to Paris, to re- 
 lease the king from captivity, and 
 to restore the ancient monarchy to 
 the dominion of absolute power. 
 
 The king, who even before his 
 forced acceptance of the constitu- 
 tion of 1791, had made an unsuc- 
 cessful attempt to escape from his 
 palace prison, was in April, 1792, 
 reduced to the humiliating necessity 
 
142 LIFE OF 
 
 of declaring war against the very 
 sovereigns who were arming their 
 nations to rescue him from his re- 
 volted subjects. Three armies, each 
 of fifty thousand men, were levied 
 to meet the emergencies of this 
 war, and were placed under the 
 command ofLuckner, Rochambeau, 
 and Lafayette. As he passed 
 through Paris to go and take the 
 command of his army, he appeared 
 before the legislative assembly, 
 the president of which in address- 
 ing him, said that the nation would 
 oppose to their enemies the consti- 
 tution and Lafayette. 
 
 But the enemies to the constitu- 
 tion were within the walls. At this 
 distance of time, when most of the 
 men, and many of the passions of 
 those days, have passed away, 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. i43 
 
 when the French revolution, and 
 its results, should be regarded with 
 the searching eye of philosophical 
 speculation, as lessons of experi- 
 ence to after ages, may it even now 
 be permitted to remark how much 
 the virtues and the crimes of men, 
 in times of political convulsion, are 
 modified and characterized by the 
 circumstances in which they are 
 placed. The great actors of the 
 tremendous scenes of revolution of 
 those times were men educated in 
 schools of high civilization, and in 
 the humane and benevolent precepts 
 of the Christian religion. A small 
 portion of them were vicious and 
 depraved ; but the great majority 
 were wound up to madness by that 
 war of conflicting interests and ab- 
 sorbing passions, unkindled by a 
 
144 LIFE OF 
 
 great convulsion of the social sys- 
 tem. It has been said, by a great 
 master of human nature, — 
 
 a In peace-, there 's nothing so becomesa man 
 As modest stillness and humility ; 
 But when the blast of war blows in your ears, 
 Then imitate the action of the tiger. 5 * 
 
 Too faith fully did the people of 
 France, and the leaders of their 
 factions, in that war of all the po- 
 litical elements, obey that injunction. 
 Who, that lived in that day, can 
 remember? who, since born, can 
 read, or bear to be told, the horrors 
 of the 20th of June, the 10th of 
 August, the 2d and 3d of Septem- 
 ber, 1792, of the 31st of May, 
 1793, and of a multitude of others, 
 during which, in dreadful succes- 
 sion, the murderers of one day 
 were the victims of the next, until 
 tha^ when the insurgent populace 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 145 
 
 themselves were shot down -by 
 thousands, in the very streets of 
 Paris, by the military legions of the 
 convention, and the rising fortune 
 and genius of Napoleon Bonaparte? 
 Who can remember, or read, or 
 hear of all this, without shuddering 
 at the sight of man, his fellow- 
 creature, in the drunkenness of po- 
 litical frenzy, degrading himself 
 beneath the condition of the can- 
 nibal savage ? beneath even the 
 condition of the wild beast of the 
 desert ? and who, but with a feeling 
 of deep mortification, can reflect, 
 that the rational and immortal be- 
 ing, to the race of which he him- 
 self belongs, should, even in his 
 most palmy state of intellectual 
 cultivation, be capable of this self- 
 transformation to brutality ? 
 
 10 
 
146 LIFE OF 
 
 In this dissolution of all the 
 moral elements which regulate the 
 conduct of men in their social condi- 
 tion — in this monstrous, and scarce- 
 ly conceivable spectacle of a king, 
 at the head of a mighty nation, in 
 secret league with the enemies 
 against whom he has proclaimed 
 himself at war, and of a legisla- 
 ture conspiring to destroy the king 
 and constitution to which they have 
 sworn allegiance and support, La- 
 fayette alone is seen to preserve his 
 fidelity to the king, to the constitu- 
 tion, and to his country, 
 
 " Unshaken, unseduced, unterrified, 
 His loyalty he kept, his love, his zeal." 
 
 On the 16th of June, 1792, four 
 days before the first violation of the 
 palace of the Tuilleries by the po- 
 pulace of Paris, at the instigation of 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 147 
 
 the jacobins, Lafayette, in a letter 
 to the legislative assembly, had de- 
 nounced the jacobin clubs, and 
 called upon the assembly to sup- 
 press them. He afterwards re- 
 paired to Paris in person, present- 
 ed himself at the bar of the assem- 
 bly, repeated his denunciation of 
 the clubs, and took measures for 
 suppressing their meetings by force. 
 He proposed also to the king him- 
 self to furnish him with means of 
 withdrawing with his family to 
 Compiegne, where he would have 
 been out of the reach of that fero- 
 j cious and blood-thirsty multitude. 
 The assembly, by a great majority 
 of votes, sustained the principles of 
 his letter, but the king declined his 
 proffered assistance to enable him 
 to withdraw from Paris ; and of 
 
148 LIFE OF 
 
 those upon whom he called to 
 march with him, and shut up the 
 hall where the jacobins held their 
 meetings, not more than thirteen 
 persons presented themselves at the 
 appointed time. 
 
 He returned to his army, and 
 became thenceforth the special ob- 
 ject of jacobin resentment and re- 
 venge. On the 8th of August, on 
 a preliminary measure to the in- 
 tended insurrection of the 10th, 
 the question was taken, after seve- 
 ral days of debate, upon a formal 
 motion that he should be put in 
 accusation and tried. The last 
 remnant of freedom in that assem- 
 bly was then seen by the vote upon 
 nominal appeal, or yeas and nays, 
 in which four hundred and forty- 
 six votes were for rejecting the 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 149 
 
 charge, and only two hundred and 
 twenty-four for sustaining it. Two 
 days after, the Tuilleries were 
 stormed by popular insurrection. 
 The unfortunate king was com- 
 pelled to seek refuge, with his 
 family, in the hall of the legislative 
 assembly, and escaped from being 
 torn to pieces by an infuriated mul- 
 titude, only to pass from his palace 
 to the prison, in his way to the 
 scaffold. 
 
 This revolution, thus accom- 
 plished, annihilated the constitu- 
 tion, the government, and the cause 
 for which Lafayette had contended. 
 The people of France, by their ac- 
 quiescence, a great portion of them 
 by direct approval, confirmed and 
 sanctioned the abolition of the mon- 
 archy. The armies and their 
 
[50 
 
 commanders took the same victo- 
 rious side: not a show of resist- 
 ance was made to the revolutionary- 
 torrent, not an arm was lifted to 
 restore the fallen monarch to his 
 throne, nor even to rescue or pro- 
 tect his person from the fury of his 
 inexorable foes. Lafayette himself 
 would have marched to Paris with 
 his army for the defence of the 
 constitution, but in this disposition 
 he was not seconded by his troops. 
 After ascertaining that the effort 
 would be vain, and after arresting 
 at Sedan the members of the depu- 
 tation from the legislative assem- 
 bly, sent, after their own subjuga- 
 tion, to arrest him, he determined, 
 as the only expedient left him, to 
 save his honour and his principles, 
 to withdraw both from the army 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 151 
 
 and the country ; to pass into a 
 neutral territory, and thence into 
 these United States, the country of 
 his early adoption and his fond par- 
 tiality, where he was sure of finding 
 a safe asylum, and of meeting a 
 cordial welcome. 
 
 But his destiny had reserved 
 him for other and severer trials. 
 We have seen him struggling for 
 the support of principles, against 
 the violence of raging factions, and 
 the fickleness of the multitude ; we 
 are now to behold him in the hands 
 of the hereditary rulers of man- 
 kind, and to witness the nature of 
 their tender mercies to him. 
 
 It was in the neutral territory of 
 Liege that he, together with his 
 companions, Latour Maubourg, Bu- 
 reau de Puzy, and Alexandre La- 
 
152 LIFE OF 
 
 meth, was taken by Austrians, and 
 transferred to Prussian guards. 
 Under the circumstances of the 
 case, he could not, by the princi- 
 ples of the law of nations, be treat- 
 ed even as a prisoner of war. He 
 was treated as a prisoner of state. 
 Prisoners of state in the monarchies 
 of Europe are always presumed 
 guilty, and are treated as if entitled 
 as little to mercy as to justice. 
 Lafayette was immured in dun- 
 geons, first at Wesel, then at 
 Madgeburg, and finally at Olmutz, 
 in Moravia. By what right 1 By 
 none known among men. By 
 what authority ? That has never 
 been avowed. For what cause? 
 None has ever been assigned. 
 Taken by Austrian soldiers upon 
 a neutral territory, handed over to 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 155 
 
 Prussian jailors ; and, when Fred- 
 erick William of Prussia abandon- 
 ed his Austrian ally, and made his 
 separate peace with republican 
 France, he transferred his illustri- 
 ous prisoner to the Austrians, from 
 whom he had received him, that 
 he might be deprived of the bless- 
 ing of regaining his liberty, even 
 from the hands of peace. Five 
 years was the duration of this im- 
 prisonment, aggravated by every 
 indignity that could make oppres- 
 sion bitter. That it was intended 
 as imprisonment for life, was not 
 only freely avowed, but significant- 
 ly made known to him by his jail- 
 ors ; and while, with affected pre- 
 caution, the means of terminating 
 his sufferings by his own act were 
 removed from him, the barbarity 
 
156 LIFE OF 
 
 of ill-usage, of unwholesome food, 
 and of a pestiferous atmosphere, 
 was applied with inexorable rigour, 
 as if to abridge the days which, at 
 the same time, were rendered as 
 far as possible insupportable to 
 himself. 
 
 Neither the generous sympathies 
 of the gallant soldier, General Fitz- 
 patrick, in the British House of 
 Commons, nor the personal solicita- 
 tion of Washington, President of 
 the United States, speaking with 
 the voice of a grateful nation, nor 
 the persuasive accents of domestic 
 and conjugal affection, imploring 
 the monarch of Austria for the re- 
 lease of Lafayette, could avail. The 
 unsophisticated feeling of generous 
 nature in the hearts of men, at this 
 outrage upon justice and humanity, 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 157 
 
 was manifested in another form. 
 Two individuals, private citizens 
 one of the United States of Amerl 
 ca, Francis Huger, the other a na 
 tive of the Electorate of Hanover 
 Doctor Erick Bollmann, undertook 
 at the imminent hazard of their 
 lives, to supply means for his es 
 cape from prison, and their per 
 sonal aid to its accomplishment 
 Their design was formed with Great 
 address, pursued with untiring per 
 severance, and executed with un 
 daunted intrepidity. It was frus- 
 trated by accidents beyond the 
 control of human sagacity. 
 
 To his persecutions, however, the 
 hand of a wise and just Providence 
 had, in its own time, and in its own 
 way, prepared a termination. The 
 hands of the Emperor Francis, tied 
 1 
 
158 LIFE OF 
 
 by mysterious and invisible bands 
 against the indulgence of mercy to 
 the tears of a more than heroic 
 wife, were loosened by the more 
 prevailing eloquence, or rather were 
 severed by the conquering sword 
 of Napoleon Bonaparte, acting un- 
 der instructions from the executive 
 directory, then swaying the desti- 
 nies of France. 
 
 Lafayette and his fellow-sufferers 
 were still under the sentence of pro- 
 scription issued by the faction 
 which had destroyed the constitu- 
 tion of 1791 , and murdered the ill- 
 fated Louis and his queen. But 
 revolution had followed upon revo- 
 lution since the downfall of the 
 monarchy, on the 10th of August, 
 1792. The federative republicans 
 of the Gironde had been butchered 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 159 
 
 by the jacobin republicans of the 
 mountain. The mountain had been 
 subjugated by the municipality of 
 Paris, and the sections of Paris, by a 
 reorganization of parties in the na- 
 tional convention, and with aid from 
 the armies. Brissot and his federal 
 associates, Danton and his party, 
 Robespierre and his subaltern de- 
 mons, had successively perished, 
 each by the measure applied to 
 themselves which they had meted 
 out to others ; and as no experiment 
 of political empiricism was to be 
 omitted in the medley of the French 
 revolutions, the hereditary execu- 
 tive, with a single legislative as- 
 sembly, was succeeded by a consti- 
 tution with a legislature in two 
 branches, and a five-headed execu- 
 tive, eligible, annually one-fifth, by 
 
160 LIFE OF 
 
 their concurrent votes, and bearing 
 the name of a directory. This 
 was the government at whose in- 
 stance Lafayette was finally libera- 
 ted from the dungeon of Olmutz. 
 
 But, while this directory were 
 shaking to their deepest foundations 
 all the monarchies of Europe ; while 
 they were stripping Austria, the 
 most potent of mem all, piecemeal 
 of her territories ; while they were 
 imposing upon her the most hu- 
 miliating conditions of peace, and 
 bursting open her dungeons to re- 
 store their illustrious countrymen 
 to the light of day and the blessing 
 of personal freedom, they were 
 themselves exploding by internal 
 combustion, divided into two fac- 
 tions, each conspiring the destruc- 
 tion of the other. Lafayette re- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 161 
 
 ceived his freedom, only to see the 
 two members of the directory, who 
 had taken the warmest interest in 
 effecting his liberation, outlawed 
 and proscribed by their colleagues : 
 one of them, Carnot, a fugitive from 
 his country, lurking in banishment 
 to escape pursuit; and the other, 
 Barthelemy, deported with fifty 
 members of the legislative assem- 
 bly$ without form of trial or even 
 of legal process, to the pestilential 
 climate of Guiana. All this was 
 done with the approbation, express- 
 ed in the most unqualified terms, 
 of Napoleon, and with co-operation 
 of his army. Upon being informed 
 of the success of this Pride's purge, 
 he wrote to the directory that he 
 had with him one hundred thou- 
 sand men, upon whom they might 
 
 11 
 
162 LIFE OF 
 
 rely to cause to be respected, all 
 the measures that they should take 
 to establish liberty upon solid foun- 
 dations. 
 
 Two years afterwards, another 
 revolution, directly accomplished 
 by Napoleon himself, demolished 
 the directory, the constitution of 
 the two councils, and the solid 
 liberty, to the support of which the 
 hundred thousand men had been 
 pledged, and introduced another 
 constitution, with Bonaparte him- 
 self for its executive head, as the 
 first of three consuls, for five years. 
 
 In the interval between these 
 two revolutions, Lafayette resided 
 for about two years, first in the 
 Danish territory of Holstein, and 
 afterwards at Utrecht, in the Bata- 
 vian republic. Neither of them 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 163 
 
 had been effected by means or in a 
 manner which could possibly meet 
 his approbation. But the consular 
 government commenced with broad 
 professions of republican principles, 
 on the faith of which he returned 
 to France, and for a series of years 
 resided in privacy and retirement 
 upon his estate of La Grange. 
 Here, in the cultivation of his 
 farm, and the enjoyment of do- 
 mestic felicity, embittered only by 
 the loss, in 1807, of that angel 
 upon earth, the partner of all the 
 vicissitudes of his life, he employed 
 his time, and witnessed the up- 
 ward flight and downward fall of 
 the soldier and sport of fortune, 
 Napoleon Bonaparte. He had soon 
 perceived the hollowness of the 
 consular professions of pure repub- 
 
164 LIFE OF 
 
 lican principles, and withheld him- 
 self from all participation in the 
 government. In 1802, he was 
 elected a member of the general 
 council of the department of Upper 
 Loire, and in declining the ap- 
 pointment, took occasion to present 
 a review of his preceding life, and I 
 a pledge of his perseverance in the 
 principles which he had previously 
 sustained. " Far," said he, "from 
 the scene of public affairs, and de- 
 voting myself at last to the repose 
 of private life, my ardent wishes 
 are, that external peace should 
 soon prove the fruit of those mira- 
 cles of glory which are even now 
 surpassing the prodigies of the 
 preceding campaigns, and that in- 
 ternal peace should be consolidated 
 upon the essential and invariable 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 165 
 
 foundations of true liberty. Hap- 
 py that twenty-three years of vicis- 
 situdes in my fortune, and of con- 
 stancy to my principles, authorize 
 me to repeat, that if a nation, to 
 recover its rights, needs only the 
 will, they can only be preserved 
 by inflexible fidelity to its obliga- 
 tions." 
 
 When the first consulate for five 
 years was invented as one of the 
 steps of the ladder of Napoleon's 
 ambition, he suffered Sieyes, the 
 member of the directory whom he 
 had used as an instrument for cast- 
 ing off that worse than worthless 
 institution, to prepare another con- 
 stitution, of which he took as much 
 as suited his purpose, and consigned 
 the rest to oblivion. One of the 
 wheels of this new political engine 
 
166 LIFE OF 
 
 was a conservative senate, forming 
 the peerage to sustain the executive 
 head. This body it was the interest 
 and policy of Napoleon to concili- 
 ate, and he filled it with men, who, 
 through all the previous stages of 
 the revolution, had acquired and 
 maintained the highest respecta- 
 bility of character. Lafayette was 
 urged with great earnestness, by 
 Napoleon himself, to take a seat in 
 this senate ; but, after several con- 
 ferences with the first consul, in 
 which he ascertained the extent of 
 his designs, he peremptorily de- 
 clined. His answer to the minister 
 of war tempered his refusal with a 
 generous and delicate compliment, 
 alluding at the same time to the 
 position which the consistency of 
 his character made it his duty to 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 167 
 
 occupy. To the first consul him- 
 self, in terms equally candid and 
 explicit, he said, " that from the di- 
 rection which public affairs were 
 taking, what he already saw, and 
 what it was easy to foresee, it did 
 not seem suitable to his character 
 to enter into an order of things con- 
 trary to his principles, and in which 
 he would have to contend without 
 success, as without public utility, 
 against a man to whom he was in- 
 debted for great obligations." 
 
 Not long afterwards, when all 
 republican principle was so utterly 
 prostrated that he was summoned 
 to vote on the question whether the 
 citizen Napoleon Bonaparte should 
 be consul for life, Lafayette added 
 to his vote the following comment : 
 " I cannot vote for such a magis- 
 
168 LIFE OF 
 
 tracy until the public liberty shall 
 have been sufficiently guarantied ; 
 and in that event I'vote for Napo- 
 leon Bonaparte." 
 
 He wrote at the same time to the 
 first consul a letter explanatory of 
 his vote, which no republican will 
 now read without recognising the 
 image of inordinate and triumphant 
 ambition cowering under the rebuke 
 of disinterested virtue. 
 
 "The 18th of Brumaire, (said 
 this letter,) saved France ; and I 
 felt myself recalled by the liberal 
 professions to which you had at- 
 tached your honour. Since then, we 
 have seen in the consular power that 
 reparatory dictatorship which, under 
 the auspices of your genius, has 
 achieved so much ; yet not so much 
 as will be the restoration of liberty . 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 169 
 
 It is impossible that you, general, 
 the first of that order of men who, 
 to compare and seat themselves, 
 take in the compass of all ages, 
 that you should wish such a revo- 
 lution — so many victories, so much 
 blood, so many calamities and pro- 
 digies, should have for the world 
 and for you no other result than an 
 arbitrary government. The French 
 people have too well known their 
 rights ultimately to forget them ; 
 but perhaps they are now better 
 prepared, than in the time of their 
 effervescence, to recover them use- 
 fully ; and you, by the force of 
 your character, and of the public 
 confidence, by the superiority of 
 your talents, of your position, of 
 your fortune, may, by the re-estab- 
 lishment of liberty, surmount every 
 
170 LIFE OF 
 
 danger, and relieve every anxiety. 
 I have, then, no other than patri- 
 otic and personal motives for wish- 
 ing you this last addition to your 
 glory — a permanent magistracy ; 
 but it is due to the principles, the en- 
 gagements, and the actions of my 
 whole life, to wait, before giving 
 my vote, until liberty shall have 
 been settled upon foundations worthy 
 of the nation and of you. I hope, 
 general, that you will here find, as 
 heretofore, that with the perse- 
 verance of my political opinions 
 are united sincere good wishes per- 
 sonally to you, and a profound 
 sentiment of my obligations to 
 you." 
 
 The writer of this letter, and he 
 to whom it was addressed, have, 
 each in his appropriate sphere, been 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 171 
 
 instruments of transcendent power, 
 in the hands of Providence, to 
 shape the ends of its wisdom in the 
 wonderful story of the French re- 
 volution. In contemplating the part 
 which each of them had acted up- 
 on that great theatre of human 
 destiny, before the date of the letter, 
 how strange was at that moment 
 the relative position of the two in- 
 dividuals to each other, and to the 
 world ! Lafayette was the founder 
 of the great movement then in pro- 
 gress for the establishment of free- 
 dom in France, and in the Euro- 
 pean world ; but his agency had 
 been all intellectual and moral. He 
 had asserted and proclaimed the 
 principles. He had never violated, 
 never betrayed them. Napoleon, 
 a military adventurer, had vapoured 
 
172 LIFE OF 
 
 in proclamations, and had the froth 
 of jacobinism upon his lips ; but 
 his soul was at the point of his 
 sword. The revolution was to La- 
 fayette the cause of human kind ; 
 to Napoleon it was a mere ladder of 
 ambition. 
 
 Yet, at the time when this letter 
 was written, Lafayette, after a se- 
 ries of immense sacrifices and un- 
 paralleled sufferings, was a private 
 citizen, called to account to the 
 world for declining to vote for pla- 
 cing Napoleon at the head of the 
 French nation, with arbitrary and 
 indefinite power for life ; and Na- 
 poleon, amid professions of un- 
 bounded devotion to liberty, was, in 
 the face of mankind, ascending the 
 steps of an hereditary imperial and 
 royal throne. Such was their re- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 173 
 
 lative position then; what is it 
 now ? Has history a lesson for 
 mankind more instructive than the 
 contrast and the parallel of their 
 fortunes and their fate 1 Time and 
 chance, and the finger of Provi- 
 dence, which, in every deviation 
 from the path of justice, reserves 
 or opens to itself an avenue of re- 
 turn, has brought each of these 
 mighty men to a close of life, con- 
 genial to the character with which 
 he travelled over its scenes. The 
 consul for life, the hereditary em- 
 peror and king, expires a captive 
 on a barren rock in the wilderness 
 of a distant ocean — separated from 
 his imperial wife — separated from 
 his son, who survives him only to 
 pine away his existence, and die at 
 the moment of manhood, in the 
 
174 LIFE OF 
 
 condition of an Austrian prince. 
 The apostle of liberty survives, 
 again to come forward, the ever- 
 consistent champion of her cause, 
 and finally to close his career in 
 peace, a republican, without re- 
 proach in death, as he had been 
 without fear throughout life. 
 
 But Napoleon was to be the arti- 
 ficer of his own fortunes, prosper- 
 ous and adverse. He was rising 
 by the sword ; by the sword he was 
 destined to fall. The counsels of 
 wisdom and of vjrtue fell forceless 
 upon his ear, or sunk into his heart 
 only to kindle resentment and hatred. 
 He sought no further personal inter- 
 course with Lafayette ; and denied 
 common justice to his son, who had 
 entered and distinguished himself 
 in the army of Italy, and from 
 
GENERAL LAEAYETTE. 175 
 
 whom he withheld the promotion 
 justly due to his services. 
 
 The career of glory, of fame, 
 and of power, of which the consu- 
 late for life was but the first step, 
 was of ten years' continuance, till 
 it had reached its zenith ; till the 
 astonished eyes of mankind beheld 
 the charity scholar of Brienne, 
 emperor, king, and protector of the 
 confederation of the Rhine, ban- 
 queting at Dresden, surrounded by 
 a circle of tributary crowned heads, 
 among whom was seen that very 
 Francis of Austria, the keeper, in 
 his castle of Olmutz, of the re- 
 publican Lafayette. And upon that 
 day of the banqueting at Dresden, 
 the star of Napoleon culminated 
 from the equator. Thenceforward 
 it was to descend with motion far 
 
176 LIFE OF 
 
 more rapid than when rising, till it 
 sunk in endless night. Through 
 that long period, Lafayette remain- 
 ed in retirement at La Grange. 
 Silent amidst the deafening shouts 
 of victory from Marengo, and Jena, 
 and Austerlitz, and Friedland, and 
 Wagram, and Borodino — silent at 
 the conflagration of Moscow; at 
 the passage of the Beresina ; at the 
 irretrievable discomfiture of Leipzic; 
 at the capitulation at the gates of 
 Paris, and at the first restoration of 
 the Bourbons, under the auspices 
 of the inveterate enemies of France 
 — as little could Lafayette partici- 
 pate in the measures of that resto- 
 ration, as in the usurpations of 
 Napoleon. Louis the Eighteenth 
 was quartered upon the French 
 nation as the soldiers of the victo- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 177 
 
 rious armies were quartered upon 
 the inhabitants of Paris. Yet Louis 
 the Eighteenth, who held his crown 
 as the gift of the conquerors of 
 France, the most humiliating of the 
 conditions imposed upon the van- 
 quished nation, affected to hold it 
 by divine right, and to grant, as a 
 special favour, a charter, or con- 
 stitution, founded on the avowed 
 principle that all the liberties of the 
 nation were no more than gratuitous 
 donations of the king. 
 
 These pretensions, with a cor- 
 responding course of policy pursued 
 by the reinstated government of the 
 Bourbons, and the disregard of the 
 national feelings and interests of 
 France, with which Europe was 
 remodelled at the Congress of 
 Vienna, opened the way for the re- 
 
 12 
 
178 LIFE OF 
 
 turn of Napoleon from Elba, with- 
 in a year from the time when he 
 had been relegated there. He 
 landed as a solitary adventurer, 
 and the nation rallied around him 
 with rapture. He came with pro- 
 mises to the nation of freedom as 
 well as of independence. The 
 allies of Vienna proclaimed against 
 him a war of extermination, and 
 re-invaded France with armies ex- 
 ceeding in numbers a million of 
 men. Lafayette had been courted 
 by Napoleon upon his return. He 
 was again urged to take his seat in 
 the House of Peers, but perempto- 
 rily declined, from aversion to its 
 hereditary character. He had re- 
 fused to resume his title of nobility, 
 and protested against the constitu- 
 tion of the empire, and the additional 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 179 
 
 act entailing the imperial hereditary 
 crown upon the family of Napoleon. 
 But he offered himself as a candi- 
 date for election as a member of 
 the popular representative chamber 
 of the legislature, and was unani- 
 mously chosen by the electoral 
 college of his department to that 
 station. 
 
 The battle of Waterloo was the 
 last desperate struggle of Napoleon 
 to recover his fallen fortunes, and 
 its issue fixed his destiny for ever. 
 He escaped almost alone from the 
 field, and returned a fugitive to 
 Paris, projecting to dissolve by 
 armed force the legislative assem- 
 bly, and, assuming a dictatorial 
 power, to levy a new army, and 
 try the desperate chances of another 
 battle. This purpose was defeated 
 
180 LIFE OF 
 
 by the energy and promptitude of 
 Lafayette. At his instance the 
 Assembly adopted three resolutions, 
 one of which declared them in per- 
 manent session, and denounced 
 any attempt to dissolve them as a 
 crime of high treason. 
 
 After a feeble and fruitless at- 
 tempt of Napoleon- through his 
 brother Lucien, to obtain from the 
 Assembly itself a temporary dicta- 
 torial power, he abdicated the Im- 
 perial Crown in favour of his infant 
 son; but his abdication could not 
 relieve France from the deplorable 
 condition to which he had reduced 
 her. France, from the day of the 
 battle of Waterloo, was at the mer- 
 cy of the allied monarchs ; and, as 
 the last act of their revenge, they 
 gave her again the Bourbons. 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 181 
 
 France was constrained to receive 
 them. It was at the point of the 
 bayonet, and resistance was of no 
 avail. The legislative assembly 
 appointed a provisional council of 
 government, and commissioners, of 
 whom Lafayette was one, to nego- 
 tiate with the allied armies then 
 rapidly advancing upon Paris. 
 
 The allies manifested no disposi- 
 tion to negotiate. They closed the 
 doors of their hall upon the repre- 
 sentatives of the people of France. 
 They reseated Louis the Eighteenth 
 upon his throne. Against these 
 measures Lafayette and the mem- 
 bers of the assembly had no means 
 of resistance left, save a fearless 
 protest, to be remembered when the 
 day of freedom should return. 
 
 From the time of this second re- 
 
182 LIFE OF 
 
 storation until his death, Lafayette, 
 who had declined accepting a seat 
 in the hereditary chamber of peers, 
 and inflexibly refused to resume his 
 title of nobility, though the charter 
 of Louis the Eighteenth had re- 
 stored them all , was almost constant- 
 ly a member of the chamber of 
 deputies, the popular branch of the 
 legislature. More than once, how- 
 ever, the influence of the court was 
 successful in defeating his election. 
 At one of these intervals, he em- 
 ployed the leisure afforded him in 
 revisiting the United States. 
 
 Forty years had elapsed since 
 he had visited and taken leave of 
 them, at the close of the revolution- 
 ary war. The greater part of the 
 generation for and with whom he 
 had fought his first fields, had pass- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 183 
 
 ed away. Of the two millions of 
 souls to whose rescue from oppres- 
 sion he had crossed the ocean in 
 1777, not one in ten survived. But 
 their places were supplied by more 
 than five times their numbers, their 
 descendants and successors. The 
 sentiment of gratitude and affection 
 for Lafayette, far from declining 
 with the lapse of time, quickened 
 in spirit as it advanced in years, 
 and seemed to multiply with the in- 
 creasing numbers of the people. 
 The nation had never ceased to 
 sympathize with his fortunes, and 
 in every vicissitude of his life had 
 manifested the deepest interest in 
 his welfare. He had occasionally 
 expressed his intention to visit once 
 more the scene of his early achieve- 
 ments, and the country which 
 
184 LIFE OF 
 
 had requited his services by a 
 just estimate of their value. In 
 February, 1824, a solemn legisla- 
 tive act, unanimously passed by 
 both houses of Congress, and ap- 
 proved by the President of the Uni- 
 ted States, charged the chief magis- 
 trate of the nation with the duty of 
 communicating to him the assuran- 
 ces of grateful and affectionate at- 
 tachment still cherished for him by 
 the government and people of the 
 United States, and of tendering to 
 him a national ship, with suitable 
 accommodation, for his conveyance 
 to this country. 
 
 Ten years have passed away 
 since the occurrence of that event. 
 Since then, the increase of popula- 
 tion within the borders of our 
 Union exceeds, in numbers, the 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 185 
 
 whole mass of that infant commu- 
 nity to whose liberties he had de- 
 voted, in early youth, his life and 
 fortune. His companions and fel- 
 low-soldiers of the war of indepen- 
 dence, of whom a scanty remnant 
 still existed to join in the universal 
 shout of welcome with which he 
 landed upon our shores, have been 
 since, in the ordinary course of na- 
 ture, dropping away : pass but a 
 few short years more, and not an 
 individual of that generation with 
 which he toiled and bled in the 
 cause of human kind, upon his first 
 appearance on the field of human 
 action, will be left. The gallant 
 officer, and distinguished represen- 
 tative of the people, at whose mo- 
 tion, upon this floor, the invitation 
 of the nation was given — the chief 
 
186 LIFE OF 
 
 magistrate by whom, in compliance 
 with the will of the legislature, it 
 was tendered — the surviving Presi- 
 dents of the United States, and their 
 venerable compeer signers of the 
 Declaration of Independence, who 
 received him to the arms of private 
 friendship, while mingling their 
 voices in the chorus of public ex- 
 ultation and joy, are no longer here 
 to shed the tear of sorrow upon his 
 departure from this earthly scene. 
 They all preceded him in the trans- 
 lation to another, and, we trust, a 
 happier world. The active, ener- 
 getic manhood of the nation, of 
 whose infancy he had been the pro- 
 tector and benefactor, and who, by 
 the protracted festivities of more 
 than a year of jubilee, manifested 
 to him their sense of the obligations 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 187 
 
 for which they were indebted to 
 him, are already descending, into 
 the vale of years. The children of 
 the public schools, who thronged 
 in double files to pass in review be- 
 fore him to catch a glimpse of his 
 countenance, and a smile from his 
 eye, are now among the men and 
 women of the land, rearing another 
 generation to envy their parents the 
 joy which they can never share, of 
 having seen and contributed to the 
 glorious and triumphant reception 
 of Lafayette. 
 
 Upon his return to France, Lafa- 
 yette was received w r ith a welcome 
 by his countrymen scarcely less 
 enthusiastic than that with which he 
 had been greeted in this country. 
 From his landing at Havre, till his 
 arrival at his residence at La 
 
188 LIFE OF 
 
 Grange, it was again one triumphal ! 
 march, rendered but the more stri- j 
 king by the interruptions and ob- ; 
 stacles of an envious and jealous j 
 government. Threats were not : 
 even spared of arresting him as a i 
 criminal, and holding him responsi- I 
 ble for the spontaneous and irre- | 
 pressible feelings manifested by the 
 people in his favour. He was, very 
 soon after his return, again elected 
 a member of the chamber of depu- 
 ties, and thenceforward, in that 
 honourable and independent station, 
 was the soul of that steadfast and 
 inflexible party, which never ceased 
 to defend, and was ultimately des- 
 tined to vindicate the liberties of 
 France. 
 
 The government of the Bourbons, 
 from the time of their restoration, 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 189 
 
 was a perpetual struggle to return 
 to the saturnian times of absolute 
 power. For them the sun and 
 moon had stood still, not, as in the 
 miracle of ancient story, for about 
 a whole day, but for more than a 
 whole century. Reseated upon 
 their thrones, not, as the Stuarts 
 had been in the seventeenth cen- 
 tury, by the voluntary act of the 
 same people which had expelled 
 them, but by the arms of foreign 
 kings and hostile armies, instead of 
 aiming, by the liberality of their 
 government, and by improving the 
 condition of their people, to make 
 them forget the humiliation of the 
 yoke imposed upon them, they la- 
 boured with unyielding tenacity to 
 make it more galling. They dis- 
 armed the national guards ; they 
 
190 LIFE OF 
 
 cramped and crippled the right of 
 suffrage in elections ; they pervert- 
 ed and travestied the institution of 
 juries ; they fettered the freedom of 
 the press, and in their external po- 
 licy lent themselves willing instru- 
 ments to crush the liberties of Spain 
 and Italy. The spirit of the nation 
 was curbed, but not subdued. The 
 principles of freedom proclaimed in 
 the Declaration of Rights of 1789, 
 had taken too deep root to be ex- 
 tirpated. Charles the Tenth, by a 
 gradual introduction into his coun- 
 cils of the most inveterate adherents 
 to the anti-revolutionary govern- 
 ment, was preparing the way for 
 the annihilation of the charter and 
 of the legislative representation of 
 the people. In proportion as this 
 plan approached to its maturity, the 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 191 
 
 resistance of the nation to its ac- 
 complishment acquired consistency 
 and organization. The time had 
 been, when, by the restrictions 
 upon the right of suffrage, and the 
 control of the press, and even of 
 the freedom of debate in the legis- 
 lature, the opposition in the cham- 
 ber of deputies had dwindled down^ 
 to not more than thirty members. 
 But, under a rapid succession of 
 incompetent and unpopular admin- 
 istrations, the majority of the house 
 of deputies had passed from the 
 side of the court to that of the peo- 
 ple. 
 
 In August, 1829, the king, con- 
 fiding in his imaginary strength, 
 reorganized his ministry by the 
 •appointment of men whose reputa- 
 tion was itself a pledge of the vio- 
 
192 
 
 '1 
 
 lent and desperate designs in con- 
 templation. At the first meeting 
 of the legislative assembly, an ad- 
 dress to the king, signed by two 
 hundred and twenty-one out of four 
 hundred members, declared to him, 
 in respectful terms, that a concur- 
 rence of sentiments between his 
 ministers and the nation was indis- 
 pensable to the happiness of the 
 people under his government, and 
 that this concurrence did not exist. 
 He replied that his determination 
 was immoveable, and dissolved the 
 assembly. A new election was 
 held; and so odious throughout 
 the nation were the measures of 
 the court, that, of the two hundred 
 and twenty-one members who had 
 signed the address against the 
 ministers, more than two hundred 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 193 
 
 were re-elected. The opposition 
 had also gained an accession of 
 numbers in the remaining part of 
 the deputations, and it was appa- 
 rent that, upon the meeting of the 
 assembly, the court party could 
 not be sustained. 
 
 At this crisis, Charles the Tenth, 
 as if resolved to leave himself not 
 the shadow of a pretext to complain 
 of his expulsion from the throne, in 
 defiance of the charter, to the ob- 
 servance of which he had solemnly 
 sworn, issued at one and the same 
 time, four ordinances — the first of 
 which suspended the liberty of the 
 press, and prohibited the publication 
 of all the daily newspapers and 
 other periodical journals, but by 
 license, revocable at pleasure, and 
 renewable every three months ; the 
 
 13 
 
194 LIFE OF 
 
 second annulled the election of 
 deputies, which had just taken 
 place ; the third changed the mode 
 of election prescribed by law, and 
 reduced nearly by one half the 
 numbers of the house of deputies 
 to be elected ; and the fourth com- 
 manded the new elections to be 
 held, and fixed a day for the meet- 
 ing of the assembly to be so con- 
 stituted. 
 
 These ordinances were the im- 
 mediate occasion of the last revo- 
 lution of the three days, terminat- 
 ing in the final expulsion of Charles 
 the Tenth from the throne, and 
 of himself and his family from the 
 territory of France. This was 
 effected by an insurrection of the 
 people of Paris, which ^urst forth 
 by spontaneous and unpremedi- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 195 
 
 tated movement, on the very day 
 of the promulgation of the four 
 ordinances. The first of these, the 
 suppression of all the daily news- 
 papers, seemed as if studiously de- 
 vised to provoke instantaneous 
 resistance, and the conflict of 
 physical force. Had Charles the 
 Tenth issued a decree to shut up 
 all the bakehouses of Paris, it 
 could not have been more fatal to 
 his authority. The conductors of 
 the proscribed journals, by mutual 
 engagement among themselves, de- 
 termined to consider the ordinance 
 as unlawful, null and void; and 
 this was to all classes of the peo- 
 ple the signal of resistance. The 
 publishers of two of the journals, 
 summoned immediately before the 
 judicial tribunal, were justified in 
 
196 LIFE OF 
 
 their resistance by the sentence of 
 the court, pronouncing the ordi^- 
 nance null and void. A marshal 
 of France receives the commands 
 of the king to disperse by force of 
 arms the population of Paris ; but 
 the spontaneous resurrection of the 
 national guard organizes at once 
 an army to defend the liberties of 
 the nation. Lafayette is again 
 called from his retreat at La 
 Grange* and by the unanimous 
 voice of the people, confirmed by 
 such deputies of the legislative as- 
 sembly as were able to meet for 
 common consultation at that trying 
 emergency, is again placed at the 
 head of the national guard as their 
 commander-in-chief. He assumed 
 the command on the second day of 
 the conflict, and on the third Charles 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 197 
 
 the Tenth had ceased to reign. He 
 formally abdicated the crown, and 
 his son, the Duke d'Angouleme, 
 renounced his pretensions to the 
 succession. But, humble imitators 
 of Napoleon, even in submitting to 
 their own degradation, they clung 
 to the last gasp of hereditary sway, 
 by transmitting all their claim of 
 dominion to the orphan child of the 
 Duke de Berri. 
 
 At an early stage of the revolu- 
 tion of 1789, Lafayette had declared 
 it as a principle that insurrection 
 against tyrants was the most sacred 
 of duties. He had borrowed this 
 sentiment perhaps from the motto 
 of Jefferson — " Rebellion to tyrants 
 is obedience to God." The prin- 
 ciple itself is as sound as its enun- 
 ciation is daring. Like all general 
 
198 LIFE OF 
 
 maxims, it is susceptible of very- 
 dangerous abuses : the test of its 
 truth is exclusively in the correct- 
 ness of its application. As forming 
 a part of the political creed of La- 
 fayette, it has been severely criti- 
 cised ; nor can it be denied that in 
 the experience of the French revo- 
 lutions, the cases in which popular 
 insurrection has been resorted to, 
 for the extinction of existing au- 
 thority, have been so frequent, so 
 unjustifiable in their causes, so 
 atrocious in their execution, so de- 
 structive to liberty in their conse- 
 quences, that the friends of freedom, 
 who know that she can exist only 
 under the supremacy of the law, 
 have sometimes felt themselves 
 constrained to shrink from the de- 
 velopement of abstract truth, in the 
 
= 
 
 GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 199 
 
 dread of the danger with which 
 she is surrounded. 
 
 In the revolution of the three 
 days of 1830, it was the steady, 
 calm, but inflexible adherence of 
 Lafayette to this maxim which de- 
 cided the fate of the Bourbons. 
 After the struggles of the people 
 had commenced, and even while 
 liberty or power were grappling 
 with each other for life or death, 
 the deputies elect to the Legislative 
 Assembly, then at Paris, held seve- 
 ral meetings at the house of their 
 colleague, Lafitte, and elsewhere, at 
 which the question of resistance 
 against the ordinances was warmly 
 debated, and aversion to that resist- 
 ance by force was the sentiment 
 predominant in the minds of a 
 majority of the members. The 
 
200 LIFE OF 
 
 hearts of some of the most ardent 
 patriots quailed within them at the 
 thought of another overthrow of 
 the monarchy. All the horrible 
 recollections of the reign of terror, 
 the massacre of the prisons in 
 September, the butcheries of the 
 guillotine from year to year, the 
 headless trunks of Brissot, and 
 Danton, and Robespierre, and last, 
 not least, the iron crown and sceptre 
 of Napoleon himself, rose in hide- 
 ous succession before them, and 
 haunted their imaginations. They 
 detested the ordinances, but hoped 
 that by negotiation and remon- 
 strance with the recreant king, it 
 might yet be possible to obtain the 
 revocation of them, and the sub- 
 stitution of a more liberal ministry. 
 This deliberation was not concluded 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 201 
 
 till Lafayette appeared among them. 
 From that moment the die was 
 cast. They had till then no mili- 
 tary leader. Louis Philippe, of 
 Orleans, had not then been seen 
 among them. 
 
 In all the changes of government 
 in France, from the first assembly 
 of notables to that day, there never 
 had been an act of authority pre- 
 senting a case for the fair and just 
 application of the duty of resist- 
 ance against oppression, so clear, 
 so unquestionable, so flagrant as 
 this. The violations of the charter 
 were so gross and palpable, that 
 the most determined royalist could 
 not deny them. The mask had 
 been laid aside. The sword of 
 despotism had been drawn, and the 
 scabbard cast away. A king openly 
 
202 LIFE OF 
 
 forsworn, had forfeited every claim 
 to allegiance ; and the only resource 
 of the nation against him was re- 
 sistance by force. This was the 
 opinion of Lafayette, and he de- 
 clared himself ready to take com- 
 mand of the national guard, should 
 the wish of the people, already 
 declared thus to place him at the 
 head of this spontaneous movement, 
 be confirmed by his colleagues of 
 the Legislative Assembly. The ap- 
 pointment was accordingly con- 
 ferred upon him, and the second 
 day afterwards Charles the Tenth 
 and his family were fugitives to a 
 foreign land. 
 
 France was without a govern- 
 ment. She might then have con- 
 stituted herself a republic ; and 
 such was, undoubtedly, the aspira- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 203 
 
 tion of a very large portion of her 
 population. But with another, and 
 yet larger portion of her people, 
 the name of republic was identified 
 with the memory of Robespierre. 
 It was held in execration ; there 
 was imminent danger, if not abso- 
 lute certainty, that the attempt to 
 organize a republic would have 
 been the signal for a new civil war. 
 The name of a republic, too, was 
 hateful to all the neighbours of 
 France ; to the confederacy of em- 
 perors and kings, which had twice 
 replaced the Bourbons upon the 
 throne, and who might be propitiated 
 under the disappointment and mor- 
 tification of the result, by the re- 
 tention of the name of king, and 
 the substitution of the semblance of 
 a Bourbon, for the reality. 
 
204 LIFE OF 
 
 The people of France, like the 
 Cardinal de Retz, more than two 
 centuries before, wanted a descend- 
 ant from Henry the Fourth, who 
 could speak the language of the 
 Parisian populace, and who had 
 known what it was to be a plebeian. 
 They found him in the person of 
 Louis Philippe, of Orleans. La- 
 fayette himself was compelled to 
 compromise with his principles, 
 purely and simply republican, and 
 to accept him, first as lieutenant- 
 general of the kingdom, and then 
 as hereditary king. There was, 
 perhaps, in this determination, be- 
 sides the motives which operated 
 upon others, a consideration of dis- 
 interested delicacy, which could be 
 applicable only to himself. If the 
 republic should be proclaimed, he 
 
General Lafayette. 205 
 
 knew that the chief magistracy 
 could be delegated only to himself. 
 It mast have been a chief magis- 
 tracy for life, which, at his age, 
 could only have been for a short 
 term of years. Independent of the 
 extreme dangers and difficulties to 
 himself, to his family, and to his 
 country, in which the position 
 which he would have occupied 
 might have involved them, the 
 inquiry could not escape his 
 forecast, who, upon his demise, 
 could be his successor ? and what 
 must be the position occupied by 
 him 1 If, at that moment, he had 
 but spoken the word, he might 
 have closed his career with a 
 crown upon his head, and with a 
 withering blast upon his name to 
 the end of time. 
 
206 LIFE OF 
 
 With the Duke of Orleans him- 
 self, he used no concealment or 
 disguise. When the crown was 
 ofFered to that prince, and he look- 
 ed to Lafayette for consultation, 
 " You know,'' said he, " that I am 
 of the American school, and par- 
 tial to the constitution of the United 
 States." So, it seems, was Louis 
 Philippe. " I think with you," said 
 he. " It is impossible to pass two 
 years in the United States, without 
 being convinced that their govern- 
 ment is the best in the world. But 
 do you think it suited to our pre- 
 sent circumstances and condition ?" 
 " No," replied Lafayette. " They 
 require a monarchy surrounded by 
 popular institutions." So thought, 
 also, Louis Philippe ; and he ac- 
 cepted the crown uftder the condi- 
 
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. 207 
 
 tions upon which it was tendered 
 to him. 
 
 Lafayette retained the command 
 of the national guard so long as it 
 was essential to the settlement of 
 the new order of things, on the 
 basis of order and of freedom ; so 
 long as it was essential to control 
 the stormy and excited passions of 
 the Parisian people; so long as 
 was necessary to save the minis- 
 ters of the guilty but fallen mon- 
 arch from the rash and revengeful 
 resentments of their conquerors. 
 When this was accomplished, and 
 the people had been preserved from 
 the calamity of shedding in peace 
 the blood of war, he once more 
 resigned his command, retired in 
 privacy to La Grange, and resumed 
 his post as a deputy in the Legisla- 
 
208 LIFE OF LAFAYETTE. 
 
 tive Assembly, which he continued 
 to hold till the close of life. 
 
 His station there was still at the 
 head of the phalanx, supporters of 
 liberal principles and of constitu- 
 tional freedom. In Spain, in Por- 
 tugal, in Italy, and above all, in 
 Poland, the cause of liberty has 
 been struggling against the hand 
 of power, and, to the last hour of 
 his life, they found in Lafayette a 
 never-failing friend and patron. 
 
 THE END. 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 
 
 u 
 
LIFE OF 
 GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 
 
 Thaddeus Kosciusko was born 
 in Poland, about the year 1752. 
 Descended from a family, at once 
 noble and poor, from his earliest 
 youth he was dedicated to the pro- 
 fession of arms. Being according- 
 ly sent to Warsaw, at a precocious 
 age he made rapid advances in. the 
 study of the art of war, and early 
 obtained a commission in the service 
 of " The King and Republic of 
 Poland" as it was then called. 
 
 In the course of a few years 
 
214 LIFE OF 
 
 more, we find this young officer in 
 France, whither he had repaired for 
 the purpose of further military in- 
 struction ; and, on his return to his 
 native country, he was immediately 
 advanced to a higher rank in the 
 Polish army, having found means 
 to obtain the protection, not only of 
 the king, but also of one of the 
 chief nobles, who maintained a 
 powerful ascendency both in the 
 diet and in public affairs. 
 
 But, being young and ambitious, 
 he at length determined to repair to 
 the trans-atlantic continent, for the 
 express purpose of aiding and sup- 
 porting the American cause. As 
 for himself, he already appertained 
 to the party that opposed the en- 
 croachments of Russia, and lan- 
 guished for the independence of 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 215 
 
 their native country ; and, in addi- 
 tion to feelings of this kind, there 
 is something fascinating in the very 
 sound of liberty to a young, ardent, 
 and ingenuous mind. On this oc- 
 casion, Kosciusko prevailed on a 
 lady of noble birth and distinguished 
 family, to unite her fate to his, and 
 to accompany him to the New 
 World : but these romantic lovers 
 were pursued, overtaken, and sepa- 
 rated for many long years, by the 
 interposition of paternal authority ; 
 for it was then a species of treason 
 in that country for one of the poor 
 nobles to aspire to the hand of a 
 daughter of a great and a powerful 
 magnat. At this period, too, the 
 bulk of the Polish nation actually 
 consisted of vassals, literally ad- 
 scribti glebce ; and, as in Russia, 
 
216 LIFE OF 
 
 at the absolute disposal of the 
 aristocracy. 
 
 After a variety of adventures, 
 Captain Kosciusko at length landed 
 in America, and instantly repaired 
 to the head-quarters of General 
 Washington, by whom he was 
 handsomely received. He had ar- 
 rived, indeed, at a fortunate moment ; 
 for hostilities had but recently com- 
 menced, and the defenders of liberty, 
 although numerous, active, and re- 
 solute, were at the same time raw, 
 ignorant, undisciplined, and unac- 
 quainted with every thing that ap- 
 pertains to the art of war. To such 
 an army, — if army it could then be 
 called, — this young and spirited 
 Pole then became a treasure. He 
 was present at many engagements 
 during the war, in all of which he 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 217 
 
 conducted himself with great gal- 
 lantry ; and was admitted into the 
 family of General Washington, as 
 an officer appertaining to his suite. 
 It is gratifying to remark the 
 association of these great men of 
 kindred minds in a common cause ; 
 the one, afterwards establishing the 
 triumph of liberal principles, for 
 which he contended, the other a like 
 asserter of his country's freedom, 
 treading in the footsteps of his patron 
 and friend. The circumstance re- 
 flects much credit on the discern- 
 ment of Washington, and is pecu- 
 liarly interesting, from the subse- 
 quent celebrity which the gallant 
 Kosciusko attained. It was while 
 enjoying the confidence of our great 
 commander, that Colonel Kosciusko 
 acquired the friendship of the cele- 
 
218 LIFE OF 
 
 brated Marquis de Lafayette ; he 
 was much esteemed by the Count 
 de Rochambeau, who afterwards 
 became a marshal of France ; and, 
 in short, he appears, by his skill, 
 his bravery, and his amiable man- 
 ners, to have conciliated the regard, 
 not only of the American officers, 
 but also of the numerous body of 
 French, and other foreigners, then 
 in their service. 
 
 At length, when peace arrived, 
 he determined to return to Europe. 
 Having landed in France, he imme- 
 diately proceeded to Poland, where 
 his love and patriotism were both 
 excited by some obscure rumours 
 that had recently reached his ears. 
 On his arrival at Warsaw, it was 
 reported to him that his intended 
 bride was married, and he found 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 219 
 
 the Poles longing for an opportunity 
 to shake off the yoke of Russia, 
 and to rid themselves of grievances 
 experienced since the first partition 
 of Poland. 
 
 He now betook himself to a se- 
 cluded and retired life, partly to in- 
 dulge his melancholy, and partly to 
 avoid suspicion; for the generals 
 of the Empress Catherine were be- 
 come jealous of all popular charac- 
 ters, and the fame of Kosciusko had 
 aleady reverberated from the shores 
 of the Atlantic, and began to be 
 pronounced with rapture by a nation 
 which panted for a liberator ! 
 
 At length an opportunity of ad- 
 vancement presented itself, and he 
 instantly left his retreat. A new 
 diet, actuated by a spirit of national 
 independence, was anxious to lessen 
 
220 LIFE OF 
 
 the influence of foreigners in Po- 
 land ; and, to effect this, wished to 
 encourage such of the natives as 
 displayed a love of country united 
 with a knowledge of the art of war. 
 As no Pole was more prominent in 
 respect to both qualifications, Kos- 
 ciusko was now promoted to the 
 rank of major-general. 
 
 But this very assembly, over- 
 awed by the presence of foreign 
 troops, and menaced by a Russian 
 envoy, was obliged, reluctantly and 
 indignantly, to ratify the bondage of 
 their country by a second partition 
 of Poland. The pretext for this, — 
 and when is arbitrary power defi- 
 cient in pretext ? — was the new con- 
 stitution of 1791, by which the 
 vassalage of the peasants was to 
 be mitigated. In the year 1794, 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 221 
 
 Baron d'Ingelstrohm, acting with 
 the authority of a master, demand- 
 ed the restoration of the servile 
 code of 1772, and actually ordered 
 every vestige of that of 1791 to be 
 erased from the records of the se- 
 nate. Humiliating compliance only 
 increased the extent of Russian in- 
 terference, and the empress now 
 required that the national army 
 should be reduced to 16,000 men, a 
 body insufficient to maintain the in- 
 dependence of Poland proper, under 
 her new limits. This imperious 
 demand produced a new civil war 
 in Poland, the event of which was 
 for some time uncertain. 
 
 Meanwhile, Kosciusko had al- 
 ready taken the field in support of 
 the new constitution ; for he served 
 as general of division under Count 
 
222 LIFE OF 
 
 Poniatovvski. During a whole cam- 
 paign, he distinguished himself, as 
 usual, by an union of courage and 
 good conduct. The king, who had 
 been placed on the throne for the 
 express purpose of serving the in- 
 terests of Russia, was an accom- 
 plished scholar, but weak, vacilla- 
 ting, and fickle. The menaces of the 
 court of St. Petersburgh prevailed ; 
 and, instead of taking the field in 
 person, and placing himself at the 
 head of his countrymen, he soon 
 proved himself unworthy of that 
 crown which was beset by the le- 
 gions and intrigues of Russia. On 
 learning the fatal intelligence of 
 this servile compliance, General 
 Kosciusko resigned his commission, 
 and retired to Germany. 
 
 But new events speedily fixed his 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 223 
 
 attention once more on his native 
 country, now likely to become a 
 theatre of war and bloodshed, of 
 ruin and desolation. The politicians 
 of Europe waited for the effects 
 likely to be produced by the new 
 and insolent order for disbanding 
 the troops ; and it was generally 
 supposed that the Poles would be 
 once more obliged to submit. But 
 they were mistaken, for Madalinski 
 refused to obey an illegal command ; 
 on the contrary, hastily summoning 
 all the troops within the extent of 
 his jurisdiction, he passed the Vis- 
 tula, and attacked a body of Prus- 
 sians : for the conquest was tripar- 
 tite, and the courts of Vienna and 
 Berlin were nearly as active in re- 
 spect to the partition, although not 
 quite so ferocious as the Russians. 
 
224 LIFE OF 
 
 No sooner had the news of this 
 insurrection been communicated to 
 Kosciusko, who still kept up a con- 
 stant intercourse with the insurgents, 
 than he suddenly quitted his retreat 
 at Leipsic, where he had taken re- 
 fuge, and advanced rapidly, with 
 several officers in his suite, to the 
 frontiers. Having there learned 
 the precise state of affairs, he in- 
 stantly entered Poland, and soon 
 received a deputation from a body of 
 respectable Poles, who had secretly 
 assembled at Warsaw, and chosen 
 him generalissimo. Accompanied 
 by a chosen band, in 1794 he made 
 a sudden irruption into the palati- 
 nate of Cracovia, in which but few 
 of the enemy had as yet appea??d ; 
 and, entering the capital at the pre- 
 cise moment when a feeble garrison 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 225 
 
 had been driven but, he instantly 
 replaced it in its former station, and 
 obliged the victors, in their turn, to 
 betake themselves to flight. 
 
 He now published a formula, 
 which was constantly designated in 
 Poland, by the term of an " An act 
 of Insurrection ;" and, having fallen 
 in with Madalinski, Who had been 
 obliged to fly before a superior corps 
 of Russians, they immediately turn- 
 ed on the pursuers ; and, with a 
 body of light and undisciplined 
 troops, actually conquered a supe- 
 rior number of veterans : but the 
 latter only fought for pay and booty ; 
 the former were actuated by far 
 different motives — patriotism, in- 
 dignation, and revenge! 
 
 Meanwhile the Warsovians, ac- 
 tuated by similar principles, and 
 
 15 
 
226 LIFE OF 
 
 inflamed still more by the presence, 
 the rapacity, the cruelty, and the 
 injustice of a foreign force, de- 
 termined on joining in the insurrec- 
 tion. No sooner did intelligence of 
 this disposition arrive in the Polish 
 camp, by means of numerous emis- 
 saries whom the love of country 
 had attached to the common cause, 
 than Kosciusko determined to repair 
 thither. He accordingly set out at 
 the head of a motley assemblage, 
 incompletely armed, and but badly 
 disciplined, with the view of giving 
 battle to the finest troops in Europe, 
 all of whom were provided with 
 muskets and bayonets ; while most 
 had seen service, either in the wars 
 of Poland or of Turkey ; and, in 
 addition to a regular supply of 
 ammunition and provisions, they 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 227 
 
 possessed a formidable train of ar- 
 tillery. 
 
 While in full march towards the 
 capital, this raw and inexperienced 
 body of recruits fell in with a large 
 detachment of Russians ; but Kos- 
 ciusko was at their head, and, dis- 
 daining the thought of retreat, they 
 commenced an action, making the 
 onset with such dreadful impetu- 
 osity, that the invaders, unable to 
 withstand the shock, broke and fled 
 in all directions. On learning the 
 happy news, the citizens of Warsaw, 
 faithful to their vows, instantly flew 
 to arms ; and the Russian garrison, 
 endangered by this defeat of their 
 countrymen, were under the neces- 
 sity of retreating. 
 
 The gallant Pole, on entering 
 Warsaw, found King Stat;' 'ms 
 
228 LIFE OF 
 
 Augustus, who had been abandoned 
 by his allies, in a state of despon- 
 dency. Instead of triumphing on 
 a feeble and fallen monarch, he 
 raised him from the dust, and 
 ordered that his majesty should be 
 treated with all the deference due to 
 his exalted rank. The policy of 
 this conduct is perhaps less worthy 
 of commendation than its heroism. 
 His duplicity, timidity, and irreso- 
 lution, had rendered this prince net 
 only despised but hated by his sub- 
 jects. He readily declared himself, 
 indeed, at the head of the confedera- 
 tion, and, for a time, sanctioned the 
 insurrection by the thin and trans- 
 parent veil of legitimacy, which he 
 threw over the ranks of his embat- 
 tled countrymen. On this, as on 
 all other occasions, his majesty was 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 229 
 
 entirely passive ; for, adopting a 
 cunning, but odious neutrality, he 
 prepared, as usual, to abandon the 
 vanquished, and declare himself on 
 the side of the victor. An oppor- 
 tunity but too soon presented itself! 
 
 Kosciusko now beheld multitudes 
 joining his standard ; he calculated 
 on an army of 70,000 men, and 
 he was in hopes to be able to excite 
 a universal insurrection among the 
 whole body of peasants. 
 
 In this situation of affairs, the 
 general has been loudly censured 
 for not summoning a national diet, 
 declaring bondage at an end, and 
 converting all Poland into one great 
 camp, in which every one of an 
 age capable of bearing arms should 
 assemble. But unhappily, many 
 of the nobles of his own party 
 
230 LIFE OF 
 
 possessed multitudes of slaves, whom 
 they considered as no less their 
 property than their horses, their 
 hawks, and their dogs ; and such 
 is the effect of vassalage, that, rather 
 than give liberty to their bondsmen, 
 they themselves were willing to bow 
 the neck beneath the iron yoke of 
 Russia. 
 
 Meanwhile, Prussia, which had 
 hitherto temporized, began to act 
 with decision and effect. While 
 one body of the troops of that na- 
 tion seized on Cracovia, another 
 marched against Warsaw; and it 
 was expected that a sanguinary 
 combat would take place between 
 Kosciusko and Frederick William. 
 j But Kosciusko now, for the first 
 j time, acted on the defensive ; and 
 j the Prussian army was doomed to 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 231 
 
 be overcome by raw troops, and a 
 general unknown in the annals of 
 European warfare. This accord- 
 ingly took place ; for after a long 
 and hopeless siege, the assailants 
 were obliged to retreat : happy at 
 being able to reach the frontiers of 
 Silesia. 
 
 But Suwarrow now advanced 
 at the head of a body of veterans, 
 breathing revenge and denouncing 
 slaughter. To prevent a meditated 
 junction with the troops under Ge- 
 neral Fersen, Kosciusko attacked 
 the latter, who were far superior to 
 him, both in skill and numbers. 
 A bloody and decisive engagement 
 now ensued, and, after a conflict of 
 five hours, the Poles at length gave 
 way. Kosciusko, after a variety of 
 charges, and risking his life a 
 
232 LIFE OF 
 
 thousand times, received a deep and 
 dangerous wound ; and, being both 
 unable and unwilling to leave the 
 field, he at length found himself 
 surrounded and a prisoner. Such 
 was the change of circumstances, 
 that the victor of yesterday was 
 obliged to submit to those he had 
 so recently vanquished, and that 
 too, with such fearful odds against 
 him. 
 
 Meanwhile, the Generals Su- 
 warrow and Fersen, having effected 
 the meditated junction and Koscius- 
 ko being now strictly guarded and 
 confined, all Poland from this mo- 
 ment appertained to the victors. 
 A ferocious general immediately 
 marched against Warsaw, which 
 was garrisoned by a body of gal- 
 lant Poles, the only remaining hope 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 233 
 
 and consolation of their unhappy- 
 country. But it was fated that the 
 army which had sacked Ismailoff, 
 and destroyed its garrison of 20,000 
 men, should repeat the same scene in 
 the capital of Poland. The Russians 
 marched to the assault, and made 
 themselves masters of the works. 
 The Polish chiefs, Kosciusko, 
 Polocki, &c, were sent under a 
 strong military escort to Petersburgh, 
 and thrown into dungeons ; and the 
 unhappy monarch himself was or- 
 dered to repair, first to Grodno 
 and then to Petersburgh, where he 
 soon ended his days, without ex- 
 citing, after the high hopes, on very 
 slender grounds, conceived of him 
 in the commencement of his reign, 
 the slightest emotion of either esteem 
 or regret. 
 
234 LIFE OF 
 
 A third and final partition of the 
 unfortunate kingdom of Poland, 
 after a short interval, took place, 
 conformably to a new convention, 
 (signed atPetersburgh, October 24th 
 1795,) between the crown of Rus- 
 sia and Prussia, to which Austria 
 afterwards acceded ; and the very 
 name of Poland was, from this time, 
 blotted out from the map of Eu- 
 rope. Such were the exploits per- 
 formed on the eastern side of 
 Christendom, by the high and very 
 dear allies of England, jointly en- 
 gaged with her in a confederacy, 
 which had for its professed object 
 the restoration of religion and 
 social order, and regular govern- 
 ment — exploits which infinitely ex- 
 ceeded, in atrocity and barbarity, 
 any crimes which, surrounded as 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 235 
 
 she was with enemies, and irritated 
 by every species of provocation, 
 had been, in the very crisis of her 
 revolution, perpetrated by the athe- 
 ists and anarchists of France. 
 
 In the meantime, Kosciusko was 
 confined in the dungeon of a fort in 
 the vicinity of the capital of Rus- 
 sia, by Catherine II., who, by a 
 judicious distribution of a few pen- 
 sions and medals among the literati 
 of Europe, had contrived to obtain 
 a high reputation for clemency at a 
 cheap rate. The death of that 
 princess, whose real character has 
 never been sufficiently developed, 
 at length freed this noble Pole from 
 his fetters ; and the magnanimity of 
 her son, which has never been duly 
 appreciated, conferred on him his 
 liberty, to which he generously ad- 
 
236 LIFE OF 
 
 ded an income, sufficient to supply 
 all his wants. Nay, the new em- 
 peror did more ; he visited his illus- 
 trious prisoner, and was himself 
 the harbinger of his own generous 
 intentions. 
 
 But Kosciusco had no longer any 
 country in Europe; he therefore 
 resolved to repair to his adopted 
 one in America. Having taken a 
 passage from St. Petersburgh to 
 London, on his arrival in the capi- 
 tal of England, the house where he 
 resided was completely surrounded 
 by an admiring multitude ; and per- 
 sons of rank, of all parties and de- 
 scriptions, were eager to pay their 
 respects to the hero. The whig 
 club voted him a sword, and sent a 
 deputation to announce the intelli- 
 gence. 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 237 
 
 His reception in America was of 
 the most brilliant kind ; for, on his 
 arrival there, he was joyfully re- 
 ceived both by the government and 
 the people* But the state of his 
 wounds, and indeed his declining 
 health, prohibited a long sojourn in 
 the trans-atlantic continent. The 
 situation of Europe* too, was such 
 as to afford hopes of better times 
 for his unfortunate country. 
 
 After a short stay, during which 
 he obtained possession of the grants 
 of land formerly assigned to him 
 by Congress for his services in the 
 revolutionary war, Kosciusko re- 
 embarked, and landed in France,— 
 which he had left a monarchy, and 
 now found a republic ! He was re- 
 ceived with every possible attention 
 by the directory; and as the cli- 
 
238 LIFE OF 
 
 mate agreed with him, he soon after 
 settled in that country. But, Rus- 
 sia, having declared war against 
 France, by a rare instance of mag- 
 nanimity, he resigned the pension 
 of the emperor, and lived long 
 enough to see the autocrat crouch 
 under the sword of Bonaparte. He 
 also beheld his enemy Suwarrow 
 die in disgrace, amidst the scorn and 
 indignation of mankind, — who by 
 this time, had forgotten his exploits, 
 and only remembered his enormi- 
 ties. 
 
 When Bonaparte became first 
 consul, and then sovereign, it was 
 hoped he would extend a protecting 
 hand to Poland ; but this was not 
 the case, and no mention of that 
 unhappy country is made in the 
 treaty of Amiens, although the in- 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 239 
 
 terests of the Ottoman Porte are 
 strictly guarded and provided for by 
 an express article. 
 
 At length, on the renewal of the 
 continental war, it was expected that 
 Bonaparte would have achieved the 
 liberation of Poland ; and, had he 
 been in earnest on this subject, he 
 might have obtained far more real 
 glory than he had hitherto enjoyed. 
 His grand project for the invasion 
 of Russia ; his bold scheme, which 
 led him to encounter all the horrors 
 of a polar winter ; his energetic but 
 useless march to Moscow ; — would 
 have been then unnecessary. In 
 this case, his army would have re- 
 mained entire ; his reputation would 
 have been enhanced ; the tranquillity 
 of Europe would have been strength- 
 ened by recreating a new and inde- 
 
240 LIFE OF 
 
 pendent kingdom; and the crown 
 of France would have been firmly 
 fixed on his head ; while the sceptre 
 of Charlemagne must have been 
 transferred to a son who* in his own 
 person, united the blood of Napo- 
 leon and St. Louis, to that of Maria 
 Theresa. 
 
 In 1806, when the Emperor of 
 France deemed it necessary, for his 
 defence, to occupy Poland, he invi- 
 ted Kosciusko to join him at Berlin : 
 but, as his health would not permit 
 him to remove from the vicinity of 
 the French capital, he declined to 
 repair thither. However, his name 
 and credit were invoked upon this 
 occasion, as will appear from the 
 following state paper. 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 241 
 
 GENERAL KOSCIUSKO'S ADDRESS TO 
 HIS COUNTRYMEN. 
 
 Amidst the clangour of arms, 
 which re-echoes from Poland, Kos- 
 sciusko is about to join you. In 
 the enterprise of the French, in their 
 triumphs, and by their awful eagle 
 hovering before them, you will dis- 
 tinguish those legions which display 
 their courage in the four quarters of 
 the globe, while in one campaign 
 they have dispersed the united force 
 of two great empires; and have 
 lately in one week annihilated the 
 labours of a century, the work of 
 Frederick, and the trophies of his 
 old and celebrated generals. 
 
 Dear countrymen and friends, who 
 have proved yourselves to possess 
 a degree of fortitude equal to our 
 
 16 
 
242 LIFE OF 
 
 misfortunes ; you, who banished 
 from your native soil, have remain- 
 ed under a nation friendly to Po- 
 land; and who, having become 
 strangers in the heart of that coun- 
 try, nevertheless preserved the sense 
 of glory, and the recollection of 
 our brethren, — arise ! the great na- 
 tion is before you : Napoleon ex- 
 pects, and Kosciusko calls you ! 
 
 I soon shall again behold the pa- 
 ternal earth which my arm defend- 
 ed ; those fields which I have bathed 
 with my blood ; and with tears of 
 joy I embrace the unfortunate friends 
 whom I was not permitted to follow 
 to the grave. 
 
 Beloved and brave countrymen, 
 whom I was compelled to abandon 
 to the yoke of the conquerors, I 
 have only lived to avenge your 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 243 
 
 wrongs ; and I now return to restore 
 you to freedom. Sacred remains 
 of my country ! I hail you with 
 transport, and embrace you with a 
 sacred mania. I will join you, 
 never more to part. Worthy of 
 the great man whose arm is ex- 
 tended towards you, worthy of the 
 Poles who now hear my voice, I 
 shall endeavour to establish a more 
 splendid and stable basis ; or, if the 
 name of my native country amount 
 to no more with my fellow-citizens 
 than so many empty words, in this 
 case I shall know how to avoid my 
 own disaster and your disgrace, by 
 burying myself under the noble 
 ruins of our aspiring fortune. But, 
 no ; the good times of Poland have 
 returned. ' Destiny has not led 
 Napoleon and his invincibles to the 
 
244 LIFE OF 
 
 shores of the Vistula without an 
 object. We are under the segis of 
 the monarch who vanquished diffi- 
 culties as it were by a miracle ; and 
 the re-animation of Poland is too 
 glorious a subject not to have been 
 left by the Eternal Judge for him 
 to achieve. Kosciusko. 
 
 Paris, Nov. 1, 1806. 
 
 But Bonaparte was content, on 
 this memorable occasion, with ex- 
 pelling the Russians, and occupying 
 their portion of Poland with his 
 troops: this measure had become 
 absolutely necessary for his ultimate 
 designs, for he now converted it into 
 a place of arms ; and it afterwards 
 became a place of retreat, when for- 
 saken by fortune, and abandoned by 
 his allies, he here sought refuge, with 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 245 
 
 the remnant of an army, from the 
 flames of Moscow, and the ven- 
 geance of the Cossacks. His treaties 
 and connexions with the court of 
 Vienna precluded the possibility of 
 becoming the restorer of Poland; 
 for he had yielded to the vulgar 
 ambition of having an emperor for 
 a father-in-law, and did not find, 
 until too late, that the house of 
 Austria was wholly regardless of 
 such ties, which were, indeed, con- 
 sidered as a humiliation ; — security 
 and aggrandizement alone have ever 
 been the leading features of the 
 policy of that family. 
 
 The events that succeeded are 
 too well known to all Europe and 
 America to be enumerated here; 
 certain it is, that after the fall of 
 Kosciusko, the Poles despaired of 
 
246 LIFE OF 
 
 their freedom, and their unhappy 
 country, finally united to Russia, 
 was governed by an archduke, the 
 brother of the emperor. 
 
 Meantime, the gallant and un- 
 fortunate Pole, steadfast to his pur- 
 pose, remained amid the happy 
 solitude of a country life, and never 
 more revisited his beloved country. 
 Such was the veneration paid to 
 his character, however, that when 
 the allies entered France, his little 
 habitation remained sacred and in- 
 violable ; even the Russians had 
 been now taught to respect so gal- 
 lant and so noble an enemy. 
 
 The Emperor Alexander, like 
 his father Paul, seemed anxious to 
 salute the Pole ; he commiserated 
 his misfortunes, he admired his in- 
 trepidity, and he could not but 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 247 
 
 respect his patriotism ; he even ex- 
 pressed a wish to restore him to his 
 former rank and consequence in 
 the country that had given him birth, 
 but, with a consistency worthy of 
 his character, he is said to have 
 sternly rejected the proffered boon. 
 "If your majesty means by Po- 
 land," continued he, " that Poland, 
 such as it was in 1794, I am both 
 ready and willing to return to my 
 native land ; but I cannot condescend 
 to serve under a foreign prince who 
 wears its crown. Therefore, un- 
 less Poland be governed by a native 
 sovereign, or a republican form of 
 government is established there, I 
 must decline your majesty's most 
 gracious offer." The emperor is re- 
 ported to have replied, with his usual 
 policy and circumspection, "All 
 
248 LIFE OF 
 
 you have uttered, general, is praise- 
 worthy, and merits my esteem; 
 but I can say nothing at present 
 about the government of Poland, 
 for all these matters are to be finally 
 discussed and settled at a congress 
 about to be held at Vienna.'' 
 
 The private life of Kosciusko 
 was to the full as romantic as the 
 public one. With the high-born 
 dame, alluded to in a former part 
 of this narrative, he was afterwards 
 united, and became her third hus- 
 band. By this lady he had a 
 daughter, who is since married, 
 and resides in Poland ; so that he 
 may have grand-children to glory 
 in his name ; and, if occasion should 
 offer, to vindicate his honour and 
 his cause. 
 
 When forsaken, and nearly for- 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 249 
 
 gotten by all the world, one faithful 
 friend still remained to the gallant 
 Pole. This was M. Ziltner, with 
 whom he resided during the last 
 few years of his life, in the vicinity 
 of Fontainbleau. This gentleman 
 had been formerly minister from 
 the Swiss cantons to the court of 
 the Tuileries, and his friend, in 
 return, contrived that the imperial 
 bounty of which he himself dis- 
 dained to partake, should insure 
 independence to the old age of his 
 kind and beneficent host. 
 
 During the autumn of 1817, they 
 took a long journey together, for 
 the purpose of visiting Switzerland, 
 and paying homage to the cradle of 
 so many patriots and heroes. It 
 was at Soleure that Kosciusko re- 
 signed his breath, in the sixty-fifth 
 
250 LIFE OF 
 
 year of his age, happy to escape 
 from a land of tyranny and priest- 
 craft, and to draw his last sigh 
 within sight of the canton that gave 
 birth to William Tell, the liberator 
 of Switzerland. 
 
 The brave, disinterested, and 
 virtuous Kosciusko is now no more. 
 He is gone where the voice of flat- 
 tery cannot reach, followed by the 
 praises of the good in every clime 
 where liberty is prized or under- 
 stood. He loved America, fought 
 and bled in her defence. In all his 
 intercourse with the citizens of this 
 country he evinced the utmost de- 
 sire to serve their cause and pro- 
 I mote their interests. In his days 
 of power, at the head of armies 
 that adored his name, no false glory 
 dazzled him, nor corrupt ambition 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 251 
 
 could betray him. He nobly re- 
 sisted the foreign potentates who 
 had laid waste his country, not be- 
 cause they were kings and emperors, 
 but because they were invaders and 
 oppressors. He combated with no 
 rebellious sword — for no ambiguous 
 object. When Poland lost her inde- 
 pendence, Kosciusko lost his home : 
 as she sunk he rose ; but not upon 
 her ruins. The court of Russia 
 would have allured this illustrious 
 defender of the people whom she 
 had subjugated, by temptations irre- 
 sistible to vulgar minds ; Bonaparte 
 would have made him the flattered 
 instrument o'f a spurious and hollow 
 liberty to his countrymen ; but Kos- 
 ciusko saw that their lot was irre- 
 trievable, and his own he refused to 
 change. As a soldier and a patriot, 
 
252 LIFE OF 
 
 in public life and in retirement, his 
 principles were untainted, and his 
 name unsullied; the monarchs whom 
 he opposed, respected him ; the fac- 
 tions who failed to seduce, forbore 
 to slander him ; and he would have 
 been a Washington, had he not been 
 a Wallace. 
 
 Unnoticed shall the mighty fall ? 
 Unwept and unlamented die ? — 
 Shall he, whom bonds cannot enthral, 
 Who planned, who fought, who bled for 
 
 all, 
 Unconsecrated lie ? 
 Without a song, whose fervid strains 
 Might kindle fire in patriotic veins ! — 
 No ! — thus it ne'er shall be : and fame 
 Ordains to thee a brighter lot ; 
 While earth — while hope endures, thy 
 
 name, 
 Pure — high — unchangeable — the same- 
 Shall never be forgot ; 
 'Tis shrined amid the holy throng ; 
 'Tis woven in immortal song ! — 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 253 
 
 Yes ! — Campbell of the deathless lay, 
 The ardent poet of the free, 
 Has painted Warsaw's latest day, 
 In colours that resist decay, 
 In accents worthy Thee ; 
 Thy hosts on battle-field arrayed, 
 And in thy grasp the patriot blade ! 
 
 Oh ! sainted is the name of him, 
 And sacred should his relics be, 
 Whose course no selfish aim bedim : 
 Who, spotless as the seraphim, 
 Exerts his energy, 
 
 To make the earth by freedom trod, 
 And see mankind the sons of God ! 
 
 And thou wert one of these; 'twas thine, 
 Through thy devoted country's night, 
 The latest of a freeborn line, 
 With all that purity to shine, 
 Which makes a hero bright ; 
 With all that lustre to appear, 
 Which freemen love, and tyrants fear. 
 
 A myrtle wreath was on thy blade, 
 Which broke before its cause was won !— 
 Thou, to no sordid fears betrayed, 
 Mid desolation undismayed, 
 Wert mighty, though undone ; 
 No terrors gloomed thy closing scene, 
 In danger and in death serene ! 
 
254 LIFE OF 
 
 Though thou hast bade our world fare- 
 well, 
 And left the blotted land beneath, 
 In purer, happier realms to dwell ; 
 With Wallace, Washington, and Tell, 
 Thou sharest the laurel wreath — 
 The Brutus of degenerate climes ! 
 A beacon-light to other times ! 
 
 In no country is the character of 
 Kosciusko held in higher estima- 
 tion, than in the United States. 
 His eminent services in the revolu- 
 tionary war are remembered with 
 fervent gratitude, and his elevation 
 and firmness of spirit as a champion 
 of national independence and free- 
 dom, are duly appreciated by the 
 American people. At West Point 
 a monument is erected to his me- 
 mory, on which his services and 
 merits are recorded ; and in the 
 annals of our country the name of 
 
GENERAL KOSCIUSKO. 255 
 
 Kosciusko will always remain 
 among the most able, disinterested, 
 and valiant of its defenders. 
 
 In his native country, Poland, 
 Kosciusko's memory is held in the 
 deepest reverence. There an im- 
 mense monument is erected to com- 
 memorate his services, and he is 
 universally regarded as the Wash- 
 ington of Poland. Their Sobieskis, 
 and Poniatowskys, are all regarded 
 as inferior in glory to the great 
 Kosciusko. 
 
 THE END. 
 
I 
 
 <4 
 
I 
 
** 
 
• 
 
H':A.;.-4.- : ^<'i.----v^-.--.v.: 
 
 ... ; . , : , v 
 
 :^*^v 
 
 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
 011 801 088 7 6