xxvn FRANKLIN IN PARIS 347 



Late in the year 1776 Franklin transferred his activities 

 to Paris, and devoted his consummate powers to obtaining 

 that French and Spanish aid for America which seems 

 to have turned the scale in the long doubtful conflict. 

 War brings strange companions ; and ends must justify 

 means if they can ever do so : the atmosphere of the 

 court of Louis XVI., in the years before the French 

 Revolution broke out, was in no way worthy of the past 

 of the American statesman, and it was surely another 

 side of his character than that which had won the love of 

 Fothergill which could work during all these nine years 

 with the selfish duplicity of Vergennes, or submit to the 

 public embrace of Voltaire. He was a notable figure at 

 Passy ; grander in his simplicity than the grandees of the 

 court ; receiving the homage of the French, both as 

 philosopher and as apostle of liberty eripuit codo fulmen 

 sceptrumque tyrannis such was Turgot's epigram : " he 

 snatched lightning from the sky, and the sceptre from the 

 hands of tyrants " ; and through all his glory and his 

 toils for the difficulties of his task were herculean he 

 was the same cool patient philosopher, not over scrupulous 

 in his methods, but candid, tactful and humane. 1 



As the war went on communications all but ceased 

 between England and America : the ocean, scoured by 

 privateers from French ports, became once more a gulf 

 of separation. Fothergill still tried to write to his friends, 

 and sent letters by Burgoyne, Howe, Strachey and others. 

 Some were destroyed or lost, others probably opened ; 

 through Franklin in Paris he was more successful, and 

 he kept in some touch with Pemberton by this route, 

 although one letter is known to have occupied eleven 

 months in transit. 



1 Franklin's house at Passy (formerly Rue Basse 40, later forming the 

 corner of Rue Raynouard and Avenue Mercedes) stood on rising ground, 

 looking southward across the Seine. An ornate mansion with an inscription 

 in his honour occupies the site. A bronze statue by J. J. Boyle, the gift of 

 J. H. Harjes, was set up in the Place du Trocadero in 1906 : a stout figure 

 with a benevolent face is reclining in a chair. More satisfying are the reliefs 

 on the pedestal by Brou, " Reception a la Cour," 1778, and " Signature du 

 Traite du Paris," 1783. The words of Mirabeau in 1790 are added : " Ce 

 genie qui affranchit 1'Amerique, et qui versa sur 1'Europe les torrents de 

 lumiere ! le sage que deux mondes reclament." 



