but as having been most ungrateful to the king and queen, from which last charge I defend him, in order to see what may be the amount of the inculpation; and it resolves itself into two favors received from the court. First, pardon for having gone to America, notwithstanding an order given him to the contrary; and next, promotion to the rank of maréchal de camp over the heads of several who were, many of them, men of family. To crown all, he accuses him of the want of courage, and declares that he has seen him contumeliously treated without resenting it. To this I give as peremptory a negative as good-breeding will permit, and he feels it.

'Indeed, the conversation of these gentlemen, who have the virtue and good fortune of their grandfathers to recommend them, leads me almost to forget the crimes of the French Revolution; and often, the unforgiving temper and sanguinary wishes which they exhibit, make me almost believe that the assertion of their enemies is true, viz., that it is the success alone which has determined on whose side should be the crimes, and on whose the misery."

While the émigrés, driven by democracy from their native soil, vowed hatred and vengeance against the prisoner of Olmutz, the French democrats had for him only the same malediction. His destiny, a truly frightful one, was to find pity from neither side.

In 1796, Madame de Staël, whose generous heart and noble enthusiasm are well known, wrote to Morris the follow- ́ ing letter, never published even in America until the appearance of the Life of Morris, and which you will like to see here, as a new proof of respect due to this illustrious

woman.

"I have no right to take this step in addressing you. esteem you most highly; but who would not esteem you? I admire your talents, for I have listened to you, and in this

I am not singular. But what I have to ask of you is so much in accordance with your own feelings, that my letter will only repeat to you their dictates in poorer expressions. You are travelling through Germany, and whether on a public mission or not, you have influence; for they are not so stupid as not to consult a man like you. Open the prison door of M. de Lafayette, you have already saved his wife from death; deliver the whole family. Pay the debt of your country. What greater service can any one render to his native land, than to discharge her obligations of gratitude! Is there any severer calamity than that which has befallen Lafayette? Does any more glaring injustice attract the attention of Europe; I speak to you of glory, yet I know a more elevated sentiment is the motive of your conduct.

"The unhappy wife of M. de Lafayette has sent a message, in which she begs her friends to apply to him who has already been her preserver. I had no difficulty in recognising you, under this veil. In this period of terror, there are a thousand virtues by which they, who fear to pronounce your name, may distinguish you. For myself, who am more afflicted, I believe, than any one, by the fate of M. de Lafayette, I shall not have the presumption to imagine that my solicitations can influence you in his favor. But you cannot prevent me from admiring you, nor from feeling as grateful to you, as if you had granted to myself alone that which humanity, your own glory, and both worlds expect of

you.

"NECKER DE STAEL."

Morris replied very coldly to this earnest letter, and contented himself with acting prudently, without going too fast, without hazarding anything. He forwarded, to the Emperor of Austria, the letter by which Washington requested the enfranchisement of M. de Lafayette. Again Madame de Staël wrote to Morris.

2*

"The place where your letter was written, is enough to give me some hope. It is impossible you should be there without succeeding. Such glory is reserved for you, and there is none more delightful, or more brilliant, for you, or for any man. It is possible the opposition may have been indiscreet; but could the unfortunate man, of whom they spoke, have solicited it of them? It appears certain that his wife was kindly received by the emperor; that he permitted her to write to him; and that he has never received her letters. Humane and just as we are assured he is, would he have suffered the wife and children to be treated in the same manner? The wife and children! What a reward for such a noble self-devotion! It is as cruel as the condition from which you once before saved her. What do they expect? Do they wish that the earliest enemies of the unhappy man should be roused to claim that a period should be put to his misfortunes? -that they should imitate the demand of the Romans from the Carthagenians? It seems to me, if you were to speak for a single hour to those on whom his fate depends, all would be well. I have such experience of your influence over opinions which were even opposed to your own, that I am tempted to ask,-What effect would you not produce were you to lend your intelligence and talent to second the persuasions of interest? Should you ask this, as the reward of your counsels, could it be refused? In short, the idea that this calamity may be terminated by your exertion, this idea excites in me so much emotion, that without disguising to myself the indiscretion of a second letter, I could not deny myself the expression of this belief, which arises as much from admiration of you, as from pity for him.

"NECKER DE STAEL."

Happily the arms of Bonaparte aided the eloquence of Coppet, the diplomacy of Morris, and the letters of Washington.

M. de Lafayette was freed, and one of the most absurd and atrocious injustices of modern times was put an end to. The majority of historians, Walter Scott among them, give all the credit of the liberation to Bonaparte; the documents furnished by Morris, prove that the proposition came from Austria, solicited by Morris and the President of the United States.

Another European wreck, another fragment of revolutionary lava, a name famous, proscribed, a victim, General Moreau, suddenly presents himself to Morris in his agricultural establishment where he now only occupies himself in making his orchards prosper and in planting his park.

"November 10th, 1807.-General Moreau comes to breakfast. Walk with him and endeavor to dissuade him from his projected journey to New Orleans. He is at length shaken, and would renounce it if his preparations were not too far advanced.

"I persist, and at length render it doubtful in his mind. I am certain this journey will be imputed by many evil meaning men to improper motives. He treats the chattering of idlers with contempt. But I tell him that such idlers form a power in Republics. That he must not suppose himself as free here as he would be in an absolute monarchy; that his reputation makes him a slave to public opinion; that he cannot with impunity do many things here which would be of no consequence in a country where he was surrounded by spies in the service of government; because there, the Ministers having convinced themselves that his views are innocent, and his conduct irreproachable, he might safely laugh at the suspicions both of the great vulgar and of the small; but here where the same modes of knowing what men do are not adopted, every one is at liberty to suspect, and will decide rashly on appearances, after which it may be impossible to deracinate the ideas hastily, lightly, and unjustly assumed.

In the course of our conversation, touching very gently the idea of his serving (in case of necessity), against France, he declares frankly, that when the occasion arrives he shall feel no reluctance; that, France having cast him out he is a citizen of the country in which he lives, and has the same right to follow his trade here, as any other man. And as it would be unjust to prevent a French hatter, whom Bonaparte might banish, from making hats, so it would be unjust to prevent a French General from making war. I assent to the truth of this observation, not because I believe it true, but because I will not impeach the reasons he may find it convenient to give to himself for his own conduct, should he hereafter be employed in our service."

What was false and trivial in Moreau's words has been sufficiently punished.

How different the result of different revolutions!

Moreau, wandering through the world, denies his country and dies by a French cannon; Governeur Morris ends his honored old age in the bosom of the liberty he has founded, of the land he has served.

SECTION VII.

BROCKDEN BROWN-WASHINGTON IRVING.

Morris is very like a clever English naval officer, mingling in the good society of the XVIIIth century; Jonathan Edwards like a Scottish theologian of the XVIIth; Benjamin Franklin is not far from the qualities which distinguish Goldsmith and his charming Vicar. All three lack originality.