e President, as are the kings of men, on thrones or elsewhere."

"To be loved of that man would be worth while," said his companion. He
was to see him again in an hour of distress for himself and of trouble
and grief for the harassed statesman.

When at home he told his mother he had seen Washington.

"What was he like?"

"I can not say--tall, straight, ruddy, a big nose."

She smiled at his description. "Your father, Rene, once told me of a
letter Marquis La Fayette had of him the day after he last parted with
Washington. It was something like this: 'When our carriages separated, I
said, I shall never see him again. My heart said Yes. My head said No;
but these things happen. At least I have had my day.' That is not like a
man, Rene. He must have strong affections."

"Men say not, mother."

VII

The years which followed our long struggle for freedom were busy years
for the mind of man. The philosophers in France were teaching men
strange doctrines, and fashion, ever eager for change, reveled in the
new political philosophy. The stir of unrest was in the air, among the
people, in the talk of the salons.

The Bastille had long since fallen, and already in the provinces murder
and pillage had begun. The terrible example set by Jourdan late in '91
was received in Paris with other than reprobation. He was to return to
Avignon and, strange irony of fate, to be condemned as a moderate and to
die by the guillotine amid the rejoicing of the children of his victims;
but this was to be far away in '94.

The massacres of August, '92, when the king left the Swiss to their
fate, all the lightning and thunder of the gathering storm of war
without and frenzied murder within the tottering kingdom, had not as yet
in this midsummer been heard of in America.

After four years as our minister in Paris, Mr. Jefferson had long ago
come back to add the mischief of a notable intellect to the party which
sincerely believed we were in danger of a monarchy, and was all for
France and for Citizen Equality, who, as Hamilton foresaw, might come
to be the most cruel of tyrants.

The long battle of States' rights had begun in America. The Federalists,
led by Hamilton, were for strong central rule; their opponents, the
Republicans, later to be called Democrats, were gone mad in their
Jacobin clubs of many cities, _bonnet rouge_ at feasts, craze about
titles, with Citizen for Mr., and eagerly expecting a new French
minister.

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