The Marquis

by Laura Auricchio

  At the time, Murray felt as though he were in the company of the misguided Doctor Sangrado who, in the picaresque novel Gil Blas, admits that “it is indeed true … that all my prescriptions have brought people to their graves, and I should change my principles and practice; but I have written a book to support them!” Murray found Lafayette’s delusions “lamentable, for he seems to be really governed by a most insatiable thirst after honesty and good intentions, and is certainly generous and amiable.” Adams, who had inherited some of his father’s wariness of Lafayette’s motives, was less generous in his response, writing that, “I am glad you have seen La F[ayette] and not surprised that you found him full of the same fanaticism … a great part of which however with him, is what it always was, ungovernable ambition in disguise.” Adams admitted that Lafayette “thinks his intentions as good as you allow them to be; but he is a man apt to mistake the operations of his heart as well as those of his head.”

  Although Lafayette received no encouragement, he continued to plan for an American voyage for most of the year. Writing to Adrienne on July 4, 1799, he declared himself willing to cross the Atlantic in a hot air balloon if need be, and in August he sought Murray’s help in obtaining a passport. As before, Murray was flabbergasted. Relating the conversation to Washington, Murray reported that Lafayette had asked “could I not … be useful in uniting parties? I told him no!” Yet Lafayette was “much bent on going—Leaving his lady and daughter in France,” where they had returned to begin the long process of reclaiming whatever property they could. Intending “to settle for life” on the other side of the Atlantic, Lafayette planned to “land in the Chesapeake” and “pass the winter” as Washington’s guest and then “buy a farm near Mount Vernon.” So confident was Lafayette of his imminent relocation that by October, correspondents in Europe were addressing his mail to the United States.

  To those unfamiliar with Lafayette, this giddy perseverance seemed to cry out for explanation. On June 25, 1799, Major General Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina—one of the three American emissaries in the XYZ Affair—forwarded to Washington a letter speculating that Talleyrand was driving Lafayette’s plan. Written in cipher by a colleague in The Hague, the document asserted that Lafayette had received “letters from Talleyrand advising him strongly to it, and buoying him up with his canting flattery.” The author surmised that “trusting to what popularity, and influence [Lafayette] may still retain in the U[nited] States, especially among the people, Talleyrand expects that on his arrival, [Lafayette] would be courted, flattered and cherished by the Democrats and Anti’s.” By August, Murray, too, was growing wary that Lafayette might do more harm than good were he to emigrate. Writing to John Quincy Adams, Murray avowed that Lafayette seemed sincere in declaring “explicit federalism, and a support of our government, and abhorrence of the conduct of France towards it and our nation.” Yet Murray cautioned, “I think that I know his character—his ambition—too well not to fear that should he go, he will think that he finds reasons to change his tone.”

  Washington, whose friendship with Lafayette had survived many ups and downs over the course of more than two decades, took all of the speculation in stride. Writing to Secretary of State Timothy Pickering, he initially dismissed allegations that Talleyrand was behind Lafayette’s plans. “Surely Lafayette will not come here on such an errand, and under such circumstances,” Washington exclaimed. But further reflection led him to amend his views: “And yet—I believe he will, if the thing is proposed to him!” Washington knew all too well that Lafayette “has a blind side, not difficult to assail.” In the end, he concurred with Lady Macbeth that “what has been done, cannot be undone.… To make the best of it,” Washington concluded, “is all that remains to do.”

  When Washington died, on December 14, 1799, news that Lafayette had abandoned his vision of an American retirement and abruptly returned to France had not yet reached the United States. Had Washington known, he would likely have been relieved. Murray, however, was stunned; Lafayette had left the Netherlands in November without so much as bidding him adieu.

  When Napoleon Bonaparte carried out a coup d’état on November 9–10, 1799 (or 18–19 Brumaire year VIII, according to the French revolutionary calendar that dubbed September 22, 1792, the first day of “Year I” to signal the new era created by the foundation of the French republic), Lafayette’s aide-de-camp leapt into action. Over the course of two tumultuous days, General Bonaparte, recently returned from Egypt, had overthrown the troubled Directory and installed himself and two colleagues as a three-man Consulate. As Napoleon and his collaborators presented it, they had come to save the republic, not to bury it. The constitution, they argued, had been defiled by the misdeeds of the Directory and could no longer guide the nation. In its place, the consuls would institute a new system designed “to consolidate, guarantee, and inviolably consecrate the sovereignty of the French people, the Republic one and indivisible, the representative system, the division of power, liberty, equality, safety, and property.” As Napoleon pledged allegiance to the principles of 1789, and before the dust could settle, the aide hastened to Holland bearing a passport that Adrienne had obtained for Lafayette under an assumed name. Two hours after receiving the forged papers, Lafayette was on the road to France.

  Fully understanding that Napoleon might not welcome the sudden appearance of a rival general, Lafayette wrote to Provisional Consul Bonaparte immediately upon reaching Paris. Lafayette acknowledged his “obligations” to Napoleon and minimized the appearance of threat by emphasizing that he was about “to depart for the distant countryside where I will reunite with my family.” These were not the first conciliatory words Bonaparte had received from Lafayette. Adrienne had begun laying the groundwork by meeting with Napoleon in October. On her recommendation, Lafayette had written an uncharacteristically succinct letter on October 30 reassuring Napoleon of his gratitude and support.

  Nonetheless, Napoleon was incensed when he learned that Lafayette was in Paris. Possessing a keen strategic mind, Napoleon was wary of Lafayette’s uncommon “talent for making friends.” If allegiances had to be declared, Napoleon wondered, whom could he count on to choose him over of Lafayette?

  Lafayette learned of Napoleon’s outrage from go-betweens who advised a prompt return to Holland. Lafayette remembered replying that “they surely knew me well enough to understand that this imperious and menacing tone would be enough to set me even more firmly in my course.” Moreover, he recalled saying, “It would be quite amusing if I were to be arrested in the evening by the National Guard and locked in the Temple the next day by the restorer of the principles of 89.” In other words, Napoleon could not move against Lafayette without undermining his claim to be the true heir of the revolution. Once again, Adrienne brokered a truce. Napoleon would permit Lafayette to remain in France on the condition that he avoid all “éclat” (brilliance or acclaim). In practice, this meant that Lafayette would have to settle outside of Paris and play no role in the public eye.

  By far the more practical spouse, Adrienne arranged a retreat perfectly suited to the situation. When she had returned to France, one of her first orders of business had been securing her inheritance of the château and estate of La Grange. Located some forty miles southeast of Paris, La Grange had descended through Adrienne’s mother’s family and was far enough from the capital to appease Napoleon but near enough to allow Lafayette to keep abreast of current events. Although Lafayette never took his eye off the national and international struggles for liberty, his life would revolve around the house and grounds of La Grange for the next thirty-five years.

  CHAPTER 19

  HOMAGES

  On February 8, 1800, the chapel of the Invalides—which had been deconsecrated during the revolution and renamed the Temple of Mars—hosted a magnificent memorial service celebrating the life and legacy of George Washington. Government officials, army officers, veterans, and other dignitaries gathered beneath the building’s soaring dome to gaz
e upon a sculpted bust of Washington while listening to orations praising the “warrior … legislator … citizen above reproach!” These panegyrics were dedicated to Washington, but they had been carefully designed to celebrate another soldier-turned-ruler as well: Napoleon Bonaparte, who was the mastermind of the day’s events. Handpicked by Napoleon to deliver the official eulogy, the poet Louis de Fontanes lauded Washington in terms that the consul might well have applied to himself. As Fontanes put it, Washington belonged to history’s select group of “prodigious men who appear, from time to time, on the world stage,” where they are destined by a higher power either “to build a cradle or to repair the ruins of empires.” Such men are born for greatness, Fontanes declared. They can only “try in vain … to blend into the crowd; the hand of fortune suddenly carries them off and speeds them from obstacle to obstacle, from triumph to triumph, until they reach the summit of power.”

  If the ceremony’s speeches hinted at parallels between Washington and Bonaparte, its decorations made clear which man was more glorious. A vibrant array of ninety-six flags seized by the French army during its Egyptian expedition flew high above the assembly, proclaiming Napoleon’s recent triumphs and dwarfing the lifeless bust of Washington, who was effectively upstaged at his own memorial, his honor co-opted and his legacy twisted to legitimate Napoleon’s thirst for power. It’s probably for the best that neither Lafayette, nor his son, nor any representative of the United States was permitted to attend; true friends of Washington’s would have found little to appreciate in the spectacle.

  A more suitable homage to Washington was beginning to take shape at La Grange, where Lafayette was transforming Adrienne’s ancestral estate into a French version of Mount Vernon. Memories of Washington’s retirement on the banks of the Potomac had stayed with Lafayette since his 1784 visit to the United States, and the dream of emulating the American Cincinnatus continued to inspire him. As Lafayette remembered it, his own interest in agriculture had redoubled during the years he spent “within the four walls of a prison,” when he read any books he could find on the subject and imagined the pleasures of laboring in the open air. Writing from Vianen in 1799, Lafayette confided to Washington that he dreamed of “retirement on a small farm,” and although the details of his plan remained unsettled for quite a while—at times he considered plots of land in Virginia, New England, or New York; at other times he envisioned tending fields in France—he never doubted that he would follow in Washington’s footsteps. Whatever its location, the farm would meld ancient virtue with Enlightenment science and civic duty, becoming a site, Lafayette hoped, where new methods would be introduced, tested, and perfected, and the lessons learned shared widely for the betterment of all mankind.

  Such were Lafayette’s goals when he began afresh at La Grange the agricultural projects that he had abandoned at Chavaniac, and this work would occupy him for the rest of his life. Between 1800 and 1834, Lafayette reconfigured nearly every feature of the 700-acre estate, which, in 1807, included some 416 acres of arable fields, 70 acres of pastureland, and 134 acres of woods and park, crisscrossed by a web of walking, riding, and carriage paths as well as ponds, streams, and irrigation ditches. Lafayette rerouted miles of roads, undertook the large-scale felling of trees, and purchased thousands of plants and seeds, which served a combination of decorative and economic purposes. In one 1806 delivery alone, Lafayette received 203 pear trees and 165 apple trees, which, together with other trees and vines on the property, filled Lafayette’s tables with a bountiful selection of preserves and desserts. Not only did Lafayette grow wheat, oats, potatoes, barley, and corn and keep pigs, sheep, cows, turkeys, pigeons, and fish but, determined to make his lands at least as profitable as those of his neighbors, he maintained meticulous records documenting each year’s income and expenditures, sought advice from experts near and far, and took copious notes on matters ranging from the best practices in crop rotation to new processes for preparing feed.

  Obliged to desist from political activities because of his agreement with Napoleon, Lafayette remained eager to put his energies to good use and became as enthusiastic about his farm as he had once been about the American Revolution; to judge by reports of visitors to La Grange, agriculture ranked with liberty among Lafayette’s favorite topics of conversation. Describing an 1802 stay with Lafayette, William Taylor of Norwich wrote, “Before breakfast Lafayette took me over his farm” while speaking of both political and agricultural reform. Taylor was a leading translator of German Romantic literature with no particular expertise in land management, but he was a cousin of John Dyson—the English farmer who had spent a year at Chavaniac back in 1791 and 1792—and the family tie was good enough for Lafayette. Taylor described having been “obliged to answer questions about [Dyson’s] farm at Gunton” and quipped that “having by great good-luck fancied that beans would grow on the stiffer and bluer upland … I was presented to his farmer as Sir Oracle.”

  Aesthetic changes were also afoot at La Grange, where, Taylor observed, “the taste of the owner is giving it the appearance of an English park.” In late 1800 or early 1801 Lafayette hired Hubert Robert, one of the foremost landscape painters of the day, to design gardens in the “picturesque” manner at La Grange. Sometimes termed “English” because the fashion originated in the United Kingdom, the picturesque style of gardening had become popular in France in the last decades of the eighteenth century as some of the more forward-looking landowners stripped their grounds of symmetrical allées and topiaries pruned à la française and replaced them with meandering pathways and plantings that conveyed an air of naturalness. Taylor, who visited while Lafayette’s garden was being remodeled, described the changes in progress, noting that the moat around the château “is in part filled up, and is about to assume the form of a passing rivulet.… Irregular vistas are breaking into the dark circle of wood … [and a few] tall oaks have been singled out on the lawn.” The result was a landscape that appeared to be as informal and unaffected as Lafayette himself.

  Lafayette’s tastes similarly infused the château’s interior, which quietly reminded visitors of their host’s values and achievements. Taylor wrote to his cousin that he initially found “the bed-chambers … furnished with a simplicity which struck me … as nakedness.” But gradually he “learnt to perceive that not the minutest wish was unforeseen; that the two chairs were enough; that pen, ink, paper, shaving-glass were all at hand.” Lafayette’s past was displayed proudly in the “round saloon of the south-west tower,” where breakfast and tea were served. Taylor described seeing four paintings there: a “portrait of the young Lafayette in his first uniform,” as well as a view of the Victoire—the “ship which Lafayette at his own expense equipped to carry succour to the army of Washington”— and scenes of “the demolition of the Bastille” and the Festival of Federation. In the library, located in a “round room of the south-east tower,” Taylor noted a preponderance of “works on agricultural and political topics, both French and English.”

  Of the forty-five habitable rooms in the château, the library was the one closest to Lafayette’s heart. Nowhere was the link between agriculture and ideas more visible than here, as Sydney, Lady Morgan, the noted Irish author and outspoken advocate of humanitarian causes, observed. In an excerpt from the book France (1817), reproduced in American newspapers, Lady Morgan wrote that Lafayette’s “elegant and well chosen collection of books, occupies the highest apartments in one of the towers of the château, and like the study of Montaigne, hangs over the farm-yard of the philosophical agriculturalist.” As she remembered it, she was standing in the library with Lafayette one day, “looking out of the window at some flocks that were passing beneath,” when Lafayette confessed that the lure of the fields often distracted him from his reading: “It frequently happens … that my merinos, and my hay carts, dispute my attention with your Hume, or our own Voltaire.” An 1826 visitor from the United States drew out the uniquely American implications of the vista, recalling that the library windo
ws “command a view of a rural domain, such as Cincinnatus or Washington would have enjoyed, and such as its own proprietor would not exchange for an empire.”

  The arrangement was no coincidence; Lafayette had worked closely with Vaudoyer—the same architect he had hired to transform Chavaniac—to design every feature of the library. On May 18, 1802, Lafayette spelled out a decorative scheme, still visible today, featuring nine painted cameos and an array of trophies placed in a ring around the tops of the bookshelves, each commemorating one of his fallen comrades. Of the nine men depicted in paint, two are Americans (Washington and Franklin) and one is a Dutchman—Albert van Ryssel, who led the Dutch Patriot forces in 1787 and lived the next five years in exile in France as punishment for having adhered to his principles. The other six depict Frenchmen whose deaths resonated deeply with Lafayette. During the French Revolution, all six had shared Lafayette’s commitment to a constitutional monarchy, and all were executed on account of it. Among them were Jean-Sylvain Bailly, guillotined on November 12, 1793; Louis-Georges Desrousseaux, the mayor of Sedan, who had been among some two dozen men condemned to death for supporting Lafayette in 1792; and Louis-Alexandre, Duc de La Rochefoucauld, a member of the liberal nobility and a friend of Franklin’s; he was assassinated during the September massacres, shortly after Lafayette’s flight to Belgium.