Ixxxi 



masters, that he never afterwards acquired a truly national fondness for the poetry 

 of France." 



When the well-known Baron Steuben was in Paris, on his way to the United 

 States to join the American army, and, " being unacquainted with the English lan- 

 guage, was making inquiries for some young man, who could speak English, to 

 accompany him as his secretary, he was informed of young Du Ponceau, who hap- 

 pened then to be in Paris, and an arrangement was made with him accordingly. 

 We recollect," adds Mr. Pickering, " to have heard Mr. Du Ponceau say, that, at 

 that time, though he had never been out of France, he understood and could speak 

 English as perfectly as he ever could afterwards." 



" Mr. Du Ponceau left Paris in the suite of Baron Steuben for the United States, 

 fired with the ardor of youth, and full of zeal in the cause of American liberty, 

 which he ever fondly cherished. He landed at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, on 

 the first day of December, 1777, an event in his life which he often alluded to 

 with lively interest." 



" At the close of the war, he had fixed his mind on the profession of the law, 



and many years did not elapse before he attained the first rank." — " His purity of 

 purpose, incorruptible integrity, and independence, never suffered him, during pe- 

 riods of the highest political excitement, to deviate from the sacred duty of a faith- 

 ful legal adviser, even when pressed by the almost irresistible influence of national 

 feeling or partisan principles, or — what in our own time is a still stronger stimu- 

 lant — the corrupting lure of political advancement." 



" During the latter part of his life, after he had acquired a competent fortune 

 by his profession, he devoted most of his time to his favorite study of general phi- 

 lology, a science which has employed the first intellects of the Old World, from the 

 time of the great Leibnitz to that of the late illustrious Baron William Humboldt 

 in our own time ; and there can be little, if any doubt, that the labors of Mr. Du 

 Ponceau in that noble, but boundless field, have, among the profound scholars of 

 Europe, contributed more to establish our reputation for solid erudition than those 

 of any other individual in this country." 



Mr. Du Ponceau most heartily reciprocated the admiration entertained of him 

 by Mr. Pickering, whom he regarded as an honor and an ornament to his country, 

 and often alluded to the high estimation in which he was held by the first phi- 

 lologists and ethnographers of the Old World, — the Humboldts and the Prichards, 

 who sought and appreciated his correspondence. 



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