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with three other travelers was sunk on a
sand-bank, and the whole party remained
there, without selter, until the next morning.
Their rescuers had to carry them, "like
so many logs," says De Kalb. One of the
boatmen died from exposure, and all of the
party except the Baron suffered loss of
limbs, fingers or toes. The old soldier, on
arriving at the nearest house, where they were
given such care as was possible until the
arrival of a doctor, asked for a cold bath,
into which he plunged, to the people's great
amazement, and stayed in it one hour. Getting
into a warm bed after this, he slept so
soundly that the doctor mistook him for a
dead man. On the same day De Kalb resumed
his journey with no other damage than heels
and the right hand slightly frostbitten.
But he had met with a serious mishap; he
had lost his dictionary, that is the key to the
cipher he used in his correspondences with the
Duke de Choiseul. Luckily he found a copy
of the book, of the same edition, in New
York. This cipher, the most difficult to penetrate,
since it is a selection by previous
agreement of words taken in a certain order
from the pages of a book of which each correspondent
has an exactly similar copy. De
Kalb used also this cipher in his correspondence
with his wife.

DE KALB STUDYING THE COLONIES.

Once in New York, De Kalb devoted three
weeks to a closer study of the important
questions at issue. During this time he made
the acquaintance of the leading men of the
city, as he had done in Philadelphia, and secured
correspondents who would keep him
regularly posted after this return to Europe.
His first report to De Choiseul was made on
the 21st of February. He pointed out clearly
the difficulties attending the settlement of
the existing differences between England and
her colonies, unless the former recognized
the constitutional right of the colonists to
assess their own taxes, and even then, he
concludes that "this country will soon be too
powerful to be governed from so far." He
considers the possibility of England yielding
the right of taxation. It would be necessary,
then, that the King should address his
request to each province separately, or that
these should be represented in the English
Parliament. The first alternative is scarcely
practicable, and the colonists would reject
the second, not only because it would involve
heavy expense, but they knew that
they would find a majority against them,
and representation would necessarily lead
to the colonies being committed to take part
in the wars England or the elector of
Hanover might engage in. The colonists
would be willing to form a parliament
or general assembly on this continent,
but this would be creating a
power dangerous to the crown. After
considering the various phases of the question
De Kalb says prophetically: "There is so
great a spirit of individual independence and
license in this country that, beyond all doubt,
if the provinces had the facility of communication
through their deputies, and their
common interests came under discussion
they would soon form an independent State.
And this shall happen in time." De Kalb
next visited the provinces of New England,
and tarried some time in Boston, where, as
in other cities, he made friends and secured
trustworthy correspondents. He returned
to France in the month of June, 1768, his
tour of observation having lasted about six
months.

HIS OPINIONS OF AMERICA.

De Kalb came among a people struggling
for their liberties to see whether they had
any intention to rebel against a government
of whose tyrannical measures they complained.
Had he found that intention to
exist he would have offered them help in the
name of his government. But the grievances
of the colonists were not yet beyond redress;
open rebellion had not been even hinted at
and there was no desire for foreign intervention.
His mission resulted in a careful study
of a new country, and of a people whose
future greatness his observant eye already
detected, and in his establishing friendly personal
relations with eminent men, who in the
years that followed communicated to him
their fears and their hopes—men whose patriotism
would lead them, inevitably, he foresaw,
to risk all for the independence of their
country. If this was the work of a spy, the
term ceases to be opprobrious, and well may
an eminent Frenchman, in a recent letter to
a friend in Baltimore, say: "Should the Baron
De Kalb be simply Kalb, the name is nevertheless
so glorious that the baronial family
of the De Kalbs, if they still exited, should
feel proud of counting him as one of their
members!

DE KALB RETURNS TO EUROPE.

On his return to Europe De Kalb addressed
to the Duke De Choiseul a memoir, in which
he reviewed the events that had come under
his observation, pointed out to the minister
the difficulties which would attend any attempt
at foreign interference in the Angle-
American conflict, and affirmed that the only
policy to be followed by France was to await
patiently the inevitable rupture between the
English colonies and their metropolis, which
he saw in the near future. Choiseul was disappointed.
With him the wish had been
father to the throught, and he had expected
an invitation to immediate action.
He refused to see De Kalb, and
contented himself with sending him an order
for ten thousand livres (or francs) for expenses
incurred and services rendered. As
De Kalb was six months on his errand, and
besides had lost some two thousand francs
and his personal effects in the mishap at
Staten Island, this certainly does not look
like the reward of a man who works for
money only. Choiseul, however, was not
long in satisfying himself of the correctness
of his agent's views: their relations were resumed,
and until 1770, when he left the cabinet
in disgrace, the minister continued to depend
on De Kalb for information and advice
cocnerning the British colonies.

IMPORTANT SERVICES TO AMERICA.

We shall now see De Kalb in a new role.
The fall of the minister did not induce him
to give up a cause in which his sympathies
were enlisted in the highest degree. The
march of events was soon to take a more
decisive turn, and our impatient general was
destined to play a most active par in Paris as
the intermediary of the Americans before
going to place his sword at the service of a
cause which he connected closely with the
idea of a national revenge against England.
During his first visit to America De Kalb had
made the acquaintance of some of the leading
men in the colonies: he had secured correspondents
in Philadelphia, Baltimore,
Annapolis, New York and Boston, and, as we
have seen, Choiseul relied on him to the last
for news from America. When matters came
to an issue in 1776, therefore, he was naturally
the right man to espouse the interests of
the Americans and to enlist in their favor
the sympathies of French noblemen and
adventurous officers seeking distinction. We
should not forget that the philosophers of the
18th century had instilled new ideas in the
minds of the French, and that some of the
warmest advocates of individual liberty and
of the "rights of man" belonged to that
artistocratic class which gave the most victims
to the bloody French revolution a few years
later. They did not dream of a republic.
They were devoted to their King, but they had
adopted liberal views, and they proved their
sincerity when the time came by giving up
voluntarily privileges long enjoyed by their
ancestors. The gentlemen who so nobly
aided us in our struggle for independence
were mostly of this class, and their motives
were a combination of three passions: liberal
enthusiasm, hatred of England, and
love of military glory and adventure.
Such were the nen[men] whom De Kalb
gather round him. That he was
looked up to as the head of the movement
there cannot be any doubt. The only mystery
hanging over this connection with
American affairs previous to his coming with
Lafayette is that, while it is certain that he
received news regularly from America, not a
line has been found in his papers to show who
his corresopndents were. The only reasonable
inference is that, fully aware of the consequences
of discovery to his American
friends, he destroyed their letters and never