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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



beau, as soon as he had landed, began to 

 correspond. The letters thus exchanged, 

 generally unpublished, give a vivid pic- 

 ture of the life then led in the Isles. Cut 

 off from the world most of the time, not 

 knowing what was taking place in 

 France, in America, on the sea, or even 

 sometimes on the neighboring island, 

 unaware of the whereabouts of Rodney, 

 having to guess which place he might try 

 to storm and which they should there- 

 fore garrison, these men, suffering from 

 fevers, having now and then their ships 

 scattered by cyclones, played to their 

 credit and with perfect good humor their 

 difficult game of hide and seek. 



They send their letters in duplicate and 

 triplicate, by chance boats, give news of 

 the French court when they have any, 

 and learn after a year's delay that their 

 letters of October, 1780, have been duly 

 received by Rochambeau in June, 1781. 



The Marquis de Saint-Simon writes 

 from Santo Domingo to say how much 

 he would like to go and fight under Ro- 

 chambeau on the continent: "I would be 

 delighted to be under your orders, and to 

 give up for that the command-in-chief I 

 enjoy here." 



rochambeau's warm heart and strict 

 discipline; 



The stanch devotion of Rochambeau 

 to his duties as a soldier, his personal dis- 

 interestedness, his cool-headedness and 

 energy as a leader, his good humor in 

 the midst of troubles, had secured for 

 him the devotion of many, while his 

 brusquerie, his peremptoriness, the se- 

 verity which veiled his real warmth of 

 heart whenever the service was at stake, 

 won him a goodly number of enemies, 

 the latter very generally of less worth as 

 men than the former. 



In the affectionate letter by which he 

 made up early differences with "his son 

 Lafayette," shortly after his arrival, he 

 observes, concerning his own military 

 career: "If I have been lucky enough to 

 preserve, up to now, the confidence of 

 the French soldiers, . . . the reason is 

 that out of 15,000 men or thereabout 

 who have been killed or wounded under 

 my orders, of different rank and in the 

 most deadly actions, I have not to re- 



proach myself with having caused a sin- 

 gle one to be killed for the sake of my 

 own fame." 



"He seemed," Segur said in his me- 

 moirs, "to have been purposely created to 

 understand Washington and be under- 

 stood by him, and to serve with republi- 

 cans. A friend of order, of law, and of 

 liberty, his example more even than his 

 authority obliged us scrupulously to re- 

 spect the rights, properties, and customs 

 of our allies." 



WAITING FOR THE; SECOND DIVISION 



Nothing without my second division, 

 Rochambeau thought. He had urged the 

 government in his last letters before leav- 

 ing France to send it not later than a 

 fortnight after he himself had sailed: 

 "The convoy will cross much more safely 

 now under the guard of two warships," 

 he had written to Montbarey, "than it 

 will in a month with an escort of thirty, 

 when the English are ready." And again, 

 after having embarked on the Due de 

 Bourgogne: "For Heaven's sake, sir, 

 hasten that second division. . . . We 

 are just now weighing anchor." 



But weeks and months went by and no 

 news came of the second division. Wash- 

 ington with his ardent patriotism, Lafay- 

 ette with his youthful enthusiasm, were 

 pressing Rochambeau to risk all in order 

 to capture New York, the stronghold of 

 the enemy and chief center of their 

 power. "I am confident," Rochambeau 

 answered, "that our general (Washing- 

 ton) does not want us to give here a sec- 

 ond edition of Savannah," and he felt the 

 more anxious that, with the coming of re- 

 cruits and going of veterans and the short 

 term enlistments, "Washington would 

 command now 15,000 men, now 5,000." 



Rochambeau decided in October to 

 send to France his son, then colonel of 

 the regiment of Bourbonnais, to remon- 

 strate. As capture was possible and the 

 envoy might have to throw his dispatches 

 overboard, young Rochambeau, being 

 blessed with youth and a good memory, 

 had learned their contents by heart. One 

 of the best sailors of the fleet had been 

 selected to convey him, on the frigate 

 Amasone. 



On account of superior forces mount- 



