202 LA F A Y E T T E
by other foreigners, they had been attended with such substantial sacrifices, and they promised such substantial indirect advantages, that Congress had no hesitation in passing a resolution, on the 31st of July 1777, "that his services be accepted, and that, in consideration of his zeal, illustrious family, and connexions, he have the rank and commission of major-general of the United States." Next day La Fayette met Washington, who invited him to make the quarters of the commander-in-chief his own, and to consider himself at all times as one of his family. This invitation, as useful as it was flattering to the young officer, was joyfully accepted, and thus commenced a friendship which only death terminated. La Fayette was now anxious to have active employment, but it appeared that Congress intended his appointment as purely honorary, and the question of giving him a command was left entirely to Washington's discretion. At the time La Fayette went into camp the British commander was trying to secure possession of Philadelphia and the line of the Hudson from the Canadian frontier to New York, which, if accomplished, might prove fatal to the American cause. By the capture of Burgoyne at Saratoga, on the 17th of October 1777, that portion of the scheme was effectually spoiled. In the southern campaign the British arms were more fortunate. The fall of Philadelphia was one of the immediate results of the battle of Brandywine on the 11th of September. This was the first battle in which La Fayette was engaged, and in an attempt to rally his troops in their retreat he had the good fortune to receive a musket ball in his leg. We say good fortune, for it doubtless secured him what of all things in the world he most desired, the command of a division – the immediate result of a communication from Washington to Congress of November 1, 1777, in which among other things he said: –
"The Marquis de la Fayette is extremely solicitous of having a command 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 connexions, 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 his wishes, and the more so as several 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 impropriety of their making any unfavourable representations upon their arrival at home. Besides, he is sensible, discreet in his manners, has made great proficiency in our language, and from the disposition he discovered at the battle of Brandywine possesses a large share of bravery and military ardour."
The recommendation of Washington was conclusive, and La Fayette's happiness was now complete. Barely twenty years of age, he found himself invested with a most honourable rank, purchased by his blood in fighting at once to secure the independence of a strange people and to punish the enemies of his own. He had justified the boyish rashness which his friends deplored and his sovereign resented, and had already acquired a place in history.
Of La Fayette's military career in the United States there is not much to be said. Though the commander of a division, he never had the command of many troops, and whatever military talents he possessed were not of the kind which appeared to conspicuous advantage on the theatre to which his wealth and family influence rather than his soldierly gifts had called him. He fought at the battle of Monmouth in 1778, and received from Congress a formal recognition of his services in the field, and of his probably more valuable exertions in healing dissensions between the French and native officers. His retreat from Barren Hill was also commended as masterly.
The treaty of commerce and defensive alliance, signed by the insurgents and France on the 6th of February 1778, was promptly followed by a declaration of war by England against the latter, and La Fayette felt it to be his duty to ask leave to revisit France and consult his king as to the farther direction of his services. This leave was readily granted; it was not difficult for Washington to replace the major-general, but it was impossible to find another equally competent, influential, and devoted champion of the American cause near the court of Louis XVI. In fact, he went on a mission rather than a visit. He embarked in January 1779, and on the 4th of March following Franklin wrote to the president of Congress: "The Marquis de la Fayette, who during his stay in France has been extremely zealous on all occasions, 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."
La Fayette was absent from America about six months, and his return was the occasion of a complimentary resolution of Congress. From this time until October 1781 he was charged with the defence of Virginia, in which Washington gave him the credit of doing all that was possible with the forces at his disposal; and he showed his zeal by borrowing money from the bankers in Baltimore on his own account to provide his soldiers with necessaries. The battle of Yorktown, in which La Fayette bore an honourable if not a distinguished part, was the last serious trouble of the war, and terminated his military career in the United States. He immediately sought and obtained leave to return to France, where it was supposed he might be useful in the negotiations looking to a general peace, of which prospects had begun to dawn. He was also much occupied in the preparations for a combined French and Spanish expedition against some of the British West India Islands, of which he had been appointed chief of staff, and a formidable fleet had already assembled at Cadiz, when, on the 30th of November 1782, the preliminary treaties of peace between the several belligerents put an end to the war. To La Fayette was accorded the grateful privilege of first communicating this welcome intelligence to Congress. He returned to his native land one of the heroes of a noble conflict, and fortified with the most flattering testimonials from his commander-in-chief and from the Government he had served, which were crowned by a notification from the French minister of war that he should have the same rank in the army of his sovereign that he had held in America, his commission to date from the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown. He visited the United States again in 1784, to gratify his curiosity as well as his affections, and while he remained some five months was the guest of the nation, and received every mark of public and private consideration which his hosts supposed would be acceptable.
La Fayette did not appear again in public life until 1787, when he took his seat in the Assembly of Notables. From this time till near the close of the Revolution he was a conspicuous figure in the history of France, and almost the only one who, at no stage of that cycle of horrors, seems to have lost his reason or his humanity.
When the States-General, convened after the Assembly of Notables had proved wholly unequal to its task, met at Versailles in May 1789 the throne was occupied by a shadow. The royal authority was gone. France was already, though few if any, and least of all the sovereign, suspected it, in full revolution. On the 11th of July 1789 La Fayette presented to the National Assembly, into which the States-General had been fused, a declaration of rights, modelled on Jefferson's Declaration of Independence in 1776. The struggle between the expiring monarchy and popular sovereignty was already big with the horrors of the French Revolution. The palace and the assembly were guarded by troops; a national guard was organized, which soon embraced the whole kingdom, and
