from Great Britain, and the relative condition of the two continents now indicates this as the commencement of a new era in American history. While these events were developing the views of American statesmen, and giving, in the eyes of the world, a definite character to the policy of the country, the force of circumstances had, in a great measure, obliterated the party distinctions which had existed in the United States since the adoption of the federal constitution. The quiet prevailing in Europe permitted the government to turn its efforts from the vindication of its rights, to the prosecution of its claims to those which were still withheld; and the restoration of the ancient regime in France, by the victorious allies, gave a check to any foreign partialities, which had before retarded the growth of a national feeling. The partizans of the great belligerents, whose measures and principles had occupied the attention, and created the parties of the civilized world for twenty-five years, were borne down by the broad current of American feelings; the thoughts and views of men were turned homewards, and both government and people united in discarding the consideration of any interests but their own. The visit of La Fayette to the land in whose cause he had spent his early years, contributed power fully to the development of this national feeling. This venerable and venerated man had landed at New York, in the month of August,the preceding year, upon the invitation of the president of the United States, Mr. Monroe, and had visited, during the year, the twenty-four states of the Union. In all parts of the country he had been received with the warmest manifestations of pleasure and gratitude. All the survivors of the revolution hastened to meet him from every quarter; and their descendants of the present generation crowded around the gallant Frenchman, who had left his country and family in his youth to serve in the cause of freedom by the side of their fathers. Veterans who had stood shoulder to shoulder in most of the conflicts of the revolution, and who had parted upon the disbanding of the continental army, with the expectation of never meeting again in this life, now found themselves assembled under the most interesting circumstances.They met upon Bunker Hill, just half a century after they had encountered, for the first time, on the same spot, the disciplined troops of Great Britain. The scarred and war worn relics of a seven years contest, then assembled to welcome the nation's guest on the field, where, as unskilled and almost unarmed husbandmen, they had manfully contended for the nation's cause. They assembled around him at father. Youth and age joined to York town, on the anniversary of. that day which had witnessed the crowning act of the war of independence in the surrender of Cornwallis and his army to Washington. He found some of his surviving companions in arms in every state of the Union. In the Atlantic states he encountered them on the scenes of their former triumphs and reverses: Triumphs, the recollections of which were heightened by their glorious results; and reverses only remembered as among the trials of that eventful war. west he found them surrounded by a dense and industrious population, which, after they had resumed the pursuits of peace,they had led beyond the Alleghanies, to make the wilderness subservient to the purposes of civilized life. Here were no fields hardly won, but the fruits of the revolution were found without alloy. In the New communities had sprung up beyond mountains. The population which had been restrained by the colonial policy of the mother country to the sea coast, conducted by the Pioneers of civilization, had broken their bounds, and were found clustering around the sources of the Missouri, and establishing themselves on the borders of the Rocky mountains. In journeying through the twenty-four states, his presence had been every where hailed like that of a heap honors and blessings on his head; and the spontaneous burst of grateful feeling with which he was welcomed in every city and village of this vast confederacy, proved how deeply his early sacrifices in their behalf were imprinted in the memory of the American people. After an uninterrupted succession of fetes and celebrations during the whole year, his visit now began to draw to a close. It was thought most fitting that his final departure from the country should take place from its capitol; and a frigate was prepared at that place, and named, in compliment to him, the Brandywine, to transport him to his native country. The few weeks spent upon the invitation of the president, as the guest of the nation, in the national palace, were appropriated to taking leave of those venerable men who had shared with him both in establishing the independence of the country and in receiving all the appropriate honors which the people could bestow. He had previously visited the venerable Adams, who, from his earliest youth, aimed at independence, as the right of the colonies, and whose resolute and singlehearted devotion to that cause, made him emphatically the masterspirit of the revolution. He now, in succession, took leave of the other ex-presidents-the illustrious au thor of the declaration of independence the able supporter and advocate of the federal constitutionand the soldier of the revolution, who had shed his blood in the same cause with La Fayette. These preliminary visits being paid, he now prepared for his departure. The 7th of September, which was the day appointed for that purpose, the civil authorities of the district of Columbia assembled at the president's, house, to take leave of him. About noon, he entered the great hall, accompanied by the marshal of the district and one of the president's sons: Mr. Adams then with dignity, but with evident emotion, addressed him in the following terms :— "General LA FAYETTE: It has been the good fortune of many of my fellow-citizens, during the course of the year now elapsed, upon your arrival at their respective places of abode, to greet you with the welcome of the nation.The less pleasing task now devolves upon me, of bidding you, in the name of the nation, adieu. "It were no longer seasonable, and would be superfluous to recapitulate the remarkable incidents of your early life-incidents which associated your name, fortunes and reputation, in imperishable connection with the independence and history of the North American union. "The part which you performed at that important juncture, was marked with characters so peculiar, that, realizing the fairest fable of antiquity, its parallel could scarcely be found in the authentic records of human history. "You deliberately and perseveringly preferred toil, danger, the endurance of every hardship, and privation of every comfort, in defence of a holy cause, to inglorious ease, and the allurements of rank, affluence, and unrestrained youth, at the most splendid and fascinating court of Europe. "That this choice was not less wise than magnanimous, the sanction of half a century, and the gratulations of unnumbered voices,all unable to express the gratitude of the heart with which your visit to this hemisphere has been welcomed, afford ample demonstration. "When the contest of freedom, to which you had repaired as a voluntary champion, had closed, by the complete triumph of her cause in this country of your adoption, you returned to fulfil the duties of the philanthropist and patriot in the land of your nativity. There, in a consistent and undeviating career of forty years, you have maintained, through every vicissitude of alternate success and disappointment, the same glorious cause to which the first years of your active life had been devoted, the improvement of the moral and political condition of man. "Throughout that long succession of time, the people of the United States, for whom, and with whom you had fought the battles of liberty, have been living in the full possession of its fruits; one of the happiest among the family of nations. Spreading in population; enlarging in territory; acting and suffering according to the condition of their nature; and laying the foundations of the greatest, and, we humbly hope, the most benificent power that ever regulated the concerns of man upon earth. "In that lapse of forty years, the generation of men with whom you co-operated in the conflict of arms, has nearly passed away. Of the general officers of the American army in that war, you alone survive. Of the sages who guided our counsels; of the warriors who met the foe in the field or upon the wave, with the exception of a few, to whom unusual length of days has been allotted by Heaven, all now sleep with their fathers. A succeeding, and even a third generation, have arisen to take their places; and their children's children, while rising up to call them blessed, have been taught by them, as well as admonished by their own constant enjoyment of freedom, to include in every benison upon their fathers, the name of him, who came from afar, with them and in their cause, to conquer or to fall. "The universal prevalence of these sentiments was signally manifested by a resolution of congress, representing the whole people, and all the states of this union, requesting the president of the United States to communicate to you the assurances of grateful and affectionate attachment of this government and people, and desiring that a national ship might be employed, at your convenience, for your passage to the borders of your country. "The invitation was transmitted to you by my venerable predecessor: himself bound to you by the strongest ties of personal friendship, himself one of those whom the highest honors of his country had rewarded for blood early shed in her cause, and for a long life of devotion to her welfare. By him the services of a national ship were placed at your disposal. Your delicacy preferred a more private conveyance, and a full year has elapsed since you landed upon our shores. It were scarcely an exageration to say, that it has been, to the people of the union, a year of uninterrupted festivity and enjoyment, inspired by your presence.— You have traversed the twenty-four states of this great confederacy-. you have been received with rap ture by the survivors of your earliest companion in arms-you have been hailed as a long absent parent by their children, the men and women of the present age and a rising generation, the hope of future time, in numbers surpassing the whole population of that day when you fought at the head and by the side of their forefathers, have vied with the scanty remnants of that hour of trial, in acclamations of joy, at beholding the face of him whom they feel to be the common benefactor of all. You have heard the mingled voices of the past, the present, and the future age, joining in one universal chorus of delight at your approach; and the shouts of unbidden thousands, which greeted your landing on the soil of freedom, have followed every step of your way, and still resound, like the rushing of many waters, from every corner of our land. "You are now about to return to the country of your birth-of your ancestors of your posterity. The executive government of the union, stimulated by the same feeling which had prompted the congress to the designation of a national ship for your accommodation in coming hither, has destined the first service of a frigate, recently launched at this metropolis, to the less welcome, but equally distinguished trust, of conveying you home. The name of the ship has added one more memorial to distant regions and to future ages, of a stream already memorable, at once in the story of your sufferings and of our independence. "The ship is now prepared for your reception, and equipped for sea. From the moment of her departure, the prayers of millions will ascend to Heaven that her passage may be prosperous, and your return to the bosom of your family as propitious to your happiness, as your visit to this scene of your youthful glory has been to that of the American people. Go, then, our beloved friendreturn to the land of brilliant genius, of generous sentiment, of heroic valour; to that beautiful France, the nursing mother of the twelfth Louis, and the fourth Henry; to the native soil of Bayard and Coligni, of Turenne and Catinat, of Fenelon and D'Aguesseau. In that illustrious catalogue of names which she claims as of her children, and with honest pride holds up to the admiration of other nations, the name of LA FAYETTE has already for centuries been enrolled. And it shall henceforth burnish into brighter fame: for if, in after days, a Frenchman shall be called to indicate the character of his nation by that of one individual, during the age in which we live, the blood of lofty patriotism shall mantle in his cheek, the fire of conscious virtue |