quiries. His
inquiries being mainly addressed to Silas Deane and other zealous
friends of the insurgents, could not fail to confirm him in his
first impressions. He became fired with an ardent zeal for
Republican principles and the American cause. That zeal continued
ever afterwards--for well nigh sixty years--the polar star of his
course. That zeal, favored as it was by fortune, adapted to the
times that came upon him, and urged forward by great personal
vanity, laid the foundations of his fame far more, as I conceive,
than any strength of mind or talents of his own. Few men have ever
been so conspicuous from afar with so little, when closely viewed,
of real weight or dimension. As a general, it can scarcely be
pretended that his exploits were either many or considerable. As
an orator, we look in vain for any high powers of debate. As a
statesman, we find only an undistinguishing eagerness to apply the
Transatlantic examples and to act the part of Washington, without
duly estimating either the immense superiority of Washington's
character above his own, or the manifold points of difference
between America and Europe.

It was said by Napoleon at St. Helena, that "La Fayette was a man
of no ability, either in civil or military life; his understanding
was confined to narrow bounds; his character was full of
dissimulation, and swayed by vague ideas of liberty, which, in
him, were undefined and ill-digested." No doubt there is some
exaggeration in these words. No doubt the late Emperor, at that
period, was stirred by personal resentment at the hostile conduct
of the General in 1815; yet it will perhaps be found more easy by
any admirer of La Fayette to impugn the good faith of the
draughtsman than the general accuracy of the portrait.

The fortune of La Fayette was ample, his yearly income being
little short of two hundred thousand livres; and his connexions,
as we have seen, were among the first at Court. Under such
circumstances, Silas Deane felt the vast importance of securing
him. An agreement was concluded between them, by the intervention
of one Mr. Carmichael (for as yet La Fayette spoke no English, and
Deane little French), according to the terms of which the Marquis
de La Fayette was to join the American service, and to receive
from Congress the rank of Major-General-