tice of the law, however, did not satisfy him, and he at once took an ardent interest in politics, attaching himself naturally enough to the Jackson party. As a reward for his political services in the campaign, which closed with the triumphant election of the hero of New Orleans, Dix was in 1830 appointed Adjutant-General of the State, a position in which his military experience was of signal service. In 1833 he was elected Secretary of State. His practical knowledge of engineering was here of service in the Canal Board, and his fine literary training on the Board of Public Instruction, of both of which he was by virtue of his office a member. In 1841 and 1842 he represented the county of Albany in the Legislature, and was one of the celebrated Albany Regency, a political oligarchy, which ruled the Democratic party with a rod of iron. On his return from a second visit to Europe in 1844 he was elected to the Senate to the United States, to fill the unexpired term of Silas Wright, who had resigned to run for Governor of the State of New York. All these were the well-devised plans of the Regency to hold the control of the State. It was as Senator that Dix had the first opportunity of showing the independence and uprightness of his character. The slavery question was already beginning to control national legislation and to divide parties. To a man like Dix, whose early years were passed in the free air of the New Hampshire hills, and all of whose instincts were on the side of personal liberty, there could be no hesitation. He became at once the leader of the Free Soil wing of the Democratic party of New York, and its candidate for Governor in 1848, but was defeated by Hamilton Fish, and the Legislature also having passed into the hands of the Whig party, he was replaced in the Senate by Mr. Seward. On the election of Pierce as President in 1852 he had the tender of important posts in his administration and abroad, but the ostracism of the Southern leaders would not allow of his acceptance. He received the appointment of Assistant United States Treasurer in New York in 1853, but his want of sympathy with the authorities at Washington soon led to his resignation of the office. In 1859 he was appointed Postmaster of New York. The crisis of his career is now reached. On the breaking up of Buchanan's Cabinet at the outset of secession, Dix was forced upon the President as Secretary of the Treasury. It was in the short period that he held this post that he issued the famous order to a subordinate in New Orleans "If any man attempt to haul down the American flag, shoot him on the spot." Nor would he have asked of his subordinate that which he would not have done himself. In the administration of justice he was stern as an ancient Roman, as he showed when Governor of New York. No persuasion could bend his decision where public interests required the sternest application of the law. After presiding at the famous meeting in Union Square, which electrified the country, on the news of the attack on Fort Sumter, he threw himself at once into the contest which had been summarily forced on the country, received the appointments of Brigadier and Major General of Volunteers in quick succession, and was assigned first to the Baltimore district, the post of danger, then to Fortress Monroe, and finally to the Eastern Department, with his headquarters at New York, in which difficult field his great administrative faculties were of invaluable assistance to the Government. In 1866 he was appointed Minister to France, a post for which he was eminently fitted by the accomplishments of his mind, the graces of his person, and the dignified courtesy of his manners. Returned home in 1872, he was the unanimous choice of the Republican party for Governor, and elected by an immense majority. With this service his public life closed. While in its review no incident of special brilliancy attracts attention, it will be found that he was equal to every emergency, and showed a reserved intellectual power, sufficient for the severest strain, only found in minds of the highest order and natures thoroughly trained. While not a seeker of office, he understood his own fitness, and accepted government as his true career. Yet never did man hanker less for the power and emolument of place than he. Indeed side by side with his active political life, to which he devoted his active energies, he maintained the independent and distinct habits of a scholar. His translations of the classic poets into English verse are as fine renderings of the originals into their precise English equivalents as the language affords, gems in their exquisite chiseling and sparkle. Among these, the best known is his version of the Monkish verses, the Dies Irae, which is faultless in its adherence to meter and sense. He also leaves behind him two books, "A Winter in Madeira" and "A Summer in Spain," in which he records in easy passages his personal experinces of foreign travel. In conversation he was attractive, genial and instructive; scholarly, without the faintest tinge of pedantry. He was the idol of his home, and beloved by all with whom he was brought into personal contact. In addition to these many social qualities, he had the love for outdoor sports and exercise which seems natural to statesmen. In a word, he was a thoroughly representative man of the best type of American character. MAGAZINE OF AMERICAN HISTORY VOL. III JULY 1879 No. 7 T THE FRENCH IN RHODE ISLAND I-EXPEDITION OF COUNT D'ESTAING—1778 HERE is no more beautiful instance of national gratitude than the affection with which France is regarded by the American people. While the traditional policy of the United States, the wise legacy of the Father of his country, has prevented any direct assistance to France in her many struggles, our sympathy and moral support have never failed her. Our regard has outlived the contemptuous encroachments of the first, and the unfriendly diplomacy of the second Empire; and now that, after nearly a century of struggle against the combined powers of Europe, the prejudices of her own higher classes, the faithlessness of her rulers, and the repressive forces of military power, she has shaken off the last shackle which bound her strong and noble limbs, and with firm and stately step entered upon full possession of her government, these American States, which she helped to found, return the cry with which their own declaration of independence was greeted-the cry of Live the Republic. In its origin the sympathy of the United States for France was as sudden as in its continuation it has been steadfast. It sprung into life full grown in a moment. In the history of the two countries there is no evidence of any premonitory symptoms. The espousal of the cause of the people of the American colonies dissipated, as by the wand of enchantment the antipathy which the ancestral feud of the mother country with her rival across the channel had given to them as an inheritance, and the hot struggles of a hundred fields on the American Continent had perpetuated and heightened. Besides the feeling of national gratitude, which makes the name of France sacred to every true American, there still exists a lively recollection of the personal qualities of the gallant men who shared the privations, the dangers and the triumphs of the American army. Wherever they lived, or camped or marched, their discipline, their manners and their charming social qualities endeared them individually to the populations whom they visited. Before passing to a recital of the incidents of their sojourn in Rhode Island, a glimpse of the events which immediately determined the dispatch of an expeditionary corps to aid the Americans in their struggle may not be thought superfluous. A few general reflections will properly precede the narrative. It is quite the habit of historians, and particularly of French historians, to claim that the fall of the Bastile in 1789 was the opening of the Great Revolution. This is true in no sense. of the word. It was in America that the universal aspiration towards individual liberty, under which the Continent of Europe was heaving during the middle of the eighteenth century, found first expression. The cry of "no taxation without representation" was the first distinct formula of the popular yearning. It was the volley of musketry that met the English troops at Lexington, before which the secular walls of the Bastile crumbled, and with it the first of a hundred thrones. The declaration of hostilities was received with intense satisfaction by the French aristocracy. In no country is national spirit greater than in France; and the nobility, who owned the larger part of the land, and held all the great posts of trust, considered the honor of the country as in their keeping. Their pride had been deeply wounded by the mortifying conditions of the Treaty of 1763, the most glorious and advantageous to the arms of England, the most restrictive to the ambition of France in the history of the countries. By it France had virtually surrendered her claim to participate in the empire of the Western continent, where for more than a century she had maintained a not unequal control, and over which her fondest dream had been to acquire undisputed dominion. The generous inspiration of Lafayette to abandon favor and promotion, and the delights of domestic felicity for service in the cause of liberty was not confined to his own young and manly breast. His example was immediately followed by numbers of the first gentlemen. Sympathy with America became the fashion in the higher circles of the gay court. The hesitation of the Government to sanction any overt movement in the almost hopeless condition of the finances of the king. dom was amply compensated by the ardor which inflamed not only the men, but the ladies of the capital. During the earlier half of the eighteenth century the favorites of the monarch had exercised a direct influence upon public affairs, and the influence of women, constantly |