LAFAYETTE’S EXPEDITION TO CANADA.
During the preceding year, while the treaty between France and America was pending, the Marquess de Lafayette, a warm-hearted and warm-headed young Frenchman, who had imbibed the political notions of the new school of philosophy, which had for some time been sowing the seeds of revolution in France, resolved to embark in the cause of America. Accordingly he set sail for that country, accompanied by Baron Kalb, and a few other adventurers, and when he arrived he was received with open arms by Washington and by congress. On the 31st of July, indeed, the members of congress expressed their sense of his accession to their cause in warm terms, and conferred on him the rank and commission of major-general. He fought in the battle of the Brandywine, where he was shot in the leg, and where he narrowly escaped being taken prisoner. Nothing more is heard of him till the depth of the winter, when Washington still lay hutted in Valley Forge, contending against the horrors of sickness and famine, as previously narrated. At this time congress, who were sitting in York Town, at the instigation of a board of war, composed of Gates, Starke, and others, all personal enemies of Washington, resolved to make another irruption into Canada, and that the command should be given to Lafayette. It was supposed that the young French nobleman would have great influence with the French descendants in Canada, which was the chief reason of his being raised to the command. The plan was completed without a word of intimation to Washington; and when it was fully resolved upon he received a letter from Gates, now his rival, enclosing another for the young marquess, requiring his immediate attendance on congress to receive his instructions. At the same time, Washington was directed to send one of his best regiments to join the Canadian expedition. Lafayette repaired to congress, and Washington put the required regiment in motion for Albany, on the Hudson, where the invading force was to be assembled. According to his own account, Lafayette made large demands on congress in order to ensure the success of his expedition, which demands were all complied with. He soon, however, found that the word of congress could not be depended upon. He was told that 2500 men would be assembled at Albany; that he would be joined by a great body of militia further up the Hudson; that he should have a certain sum of money in specie, and 2,000,000 dollars in paper-money; and that he must proceed from the head of the Hudson to Lake Champlain, cross that water on the ice, burn the English fleet at the Isle Aux Noix, and then, descending the Sorel and crossing the St. Lawrence, repair to Montreal, to act as circumstances should permit him. Lafayette set out full of ardour and hope, but he had scarcely left congress when it crossed their minds that the young Frenchman might, instead of inducing the Canadians to join the thirteen United States, induce them to renew their connexion with their mother country—France. These misgivings were natural, and the result was that congress resolved to neglect this long-cherished scheme of conquest. Accordingly, when Lafayette arrived at Albany, he did not find half of the promised regular troops, and as for the militia, it had either not received or attended to the summons. Even the troops he found there wanted clothing and provisions, and while he had little or no specie, the paper-dollars proved scarcely worth the carriage. Moreover, he had no sledges to carry his troops across the ice, and when the month of March arrived, the lakes began to thaw, and he received intelligence that the English were well prepared to receive him. Lafayette now gave up the enterprise, and after having made an attempt to engage some Mohawk Indians in the service of congress, in which he met with but little success, and having administered a new form of oath, devised by congress, to the population of Albany, he was permitted to return to the camp of Washington.