* Marshall, i., 448. Stedman, ii., 398-401. Ramsay, Gordon, Rochambeau's Memoirs.
** Sir Henry seems not to have suspected the destination of the allies until the second of September, on which day he wrote to Cornwallis, and expressed his belief that they were marching toward Virginia.
*** Francis John, Marquis De Chastelieux, came to America with Rochambeau, hearing the title of major general. He traveled extensively while here, and wrote a journal of his tour. A large portion of it was printed on board one of the ships of the French fleet, before leaving America. Only twenty-four copies were printed for distribution among his most intimate friends. The complete work was translated by an English traveler from the original manuscript, and published in London, with maps and drawings, in 1787. On his return to France, the king made De Chastellux a field-marshal, and the French Academy elected him one of its members. At the close of 1787, he married an accomplished lady, a relative of the Duke of Orleans. This circumstance he communicated to Washington, who, in a playful letter (April, 1788) in reply, said, "I saw, by the eulogium you often made on the happiness of domestic life in America, that you had swallowed the bait, and that you would as surely be taken, one day or another, as that you were a philosopher and a soldier. So your day has at length come. I am glad of it, with all my heart and soul. It is quite good enough for you. Now you are well served for coming to fight in favor of the American rebels, all the way across the Atlantic Ocean, by catching that terrible contagion, domestic felicity, which, like the small-pox or plague a man can have only once in his life." De Chastellux died in 1793. The fortune of himself and wife seems to have been swept away by the storm of the French Revolution, for in 1795 his widow made application to Washington, asking for an allowance from our government to her and her infant son, on account of the services of her husband. The application was unavailing.
**** This was the first time that Washington had visited his home since he left it to attend the Continental Congress in Philadelphia, in 1775, a period of six years and five months: and he now remained there only long enough to await the arrival of Count De Rochambeau, whom he left at Baltimore.
Arrival of Troops at Williamsburg.—Washington's first Interview with De Grasse.—Approach of the Allied Armies.
of De Grasse had left the Capes to fight Graves, but when he arrived at Williamsburg and found both French fleets in the Chesapeake, * he sent Count Fersen, one of Rochambeau's aids, with ten transports from Barras's squadron, to hasten the troops forward.
This was speedily accomplished, and the forces at the head of Elk, and at Annapolis, proceeded by water to the James River.