man of New England, and so I have chosen a byroad, that I may not offend the scrupulous." "Yes, friend; but supposing you offend me? and supposing, too, that the Pennsylvania legislature should have passed a law which comes in force this day, that neither man nor beast shall travel on a Sunday ?" "Oh!" replied the other, "I have no intention to disobey your laws; if that be the case, I will put up at the next town." "No, no; you may just put up here. I will show your sheep to the stable, and, if you be willing, yourself to the church." This was done accordingly; and the next morning the Pennsylvanian, shaking hands with his Connecticut friend, begged him to inform his old acquaintance, when he should return home, that the traveller and his horse had not forgotten their sabbath-day's rest in his dwelling, and that, unbacked by a law of the legislature, they had equally enforced the law of God upon his neighbor and his neighbor's sheep."

There is a curious spirit of opposition in the human mind. I see your papers full of anathemas against blasphemous pamphlets. We have no such things here; and why? Because every man is free to write them; and because every man enjoys his own opinion, without any arguing about the matter. Where religion never arms the hand of power, she is never obnoxious; where she is seated modestly at the domestic hearth, whispering

peace and immortal hope to infancy and age, she is always respected, even by those who may not themselves feel the force of her arguments. This is truly the case here; and the world has my wish, and, I am sure, yours also, that it may be the case every where.

441

LETTER XXV.

ACCOUNT OF COLONEL EUGEE.

OBSERVATIONS ON THE

I

MY DEAR FRIEND,

CLIMATE, &c.

New Jersey, April, 1820.

am happy to have it in my power to reply to the question contained in the letter now before me, and this without any trouble, as I am so fortunate as to be intimately acquainted with some near relatives of the individual about whom you enquire.

Colonel Eugee is a native of South Carolina, and the member of a family remarkable (so far at least as my acquaintance with it extends) for ardor of character and distinguished talents. He passed to London in his youth to complete his medical studies, and was thus engaged when the news reached him of the seizure and imprisonment of General La Fayette, whom he had learned from his infancy to respect as the companion in arms of his father, and the champion of his country's liberties. He instantly conceived the project of devoting his time, and, if it should be necessary, his life, to effect the rescue of the illustrious captive. Having digested his scheme, and finding that a coadjutor would be necessary, he took into

his confidence a young German, a companion of his studies, and embarked with him for Holland. The story of the attempted rescue, as commonly told, is pretty accurate; the best that I remember to have seen, was in a number of the Annual Register. I suppose you are acquainted with the incidents which defeated the scheme, and gave back the rescued La Fayette to his prison, and made his generous deliverer also an inhabitant of the gloomy dungeons of Olmutz. The sufferings of the young American, after the failure of the attempt, were cruelly severe; alone, in a dank and stony cell, apprehensive for the safety, even for life of La Fayette, uncertain as to the fate of his friend; now cursing his own rashness, which had perhaps doubled the sufferings of him he came to rescue, and now the untoward chances which had defeated his attempt when so near success; this fever of the spirit soon fell on the blood, and, for three weeks, delirium rendered him insensible to the horrors of his dungeon. Without assistance of any kind that he can recollect, how the fever left him, he knows not; the damps and confinement ill forwarded the recovery of his strength; stretched on the stones, he sought to divert his mind by laying plans for his future life, if his prison-doors should ever be opened, but for his corpse. What is singular, he has followed out the mode of life he then amused himself with scheming.

The first human sound that reached him was the

cry of a child (for the keeper who supplied him with bread and water, made neither query nor reply). "A child! then there must be a woman, and where there is a woman, there may be compassion." So saying, he crawled towards the wall, at the top of which was the grate that admitted light, air, and all the inclemencies of the seasons; often he listened, watched, and called, till at last a woman's face was stooped towards the grate; he tried French, which fortunately she could reply to. "You are a mother;" such was the manner of his address, to remove her scruples; "I have a mother, for her sake have pity on her son!" After a good deal of pathetic entreaty, she promised to bring him back an answer to his inquiries, and to procure for him a German grammar. He learned that his friend was in a dungeon in the same fortress, and that La Fayette was in tolerable health, but in stricter confinement than ever. The grammar was squeezed through the bars, another book was afterwards procured, and thus he acquired a tolerable knowledge of German. After some time, he told his visitor, that his grammar had afforded him so much amusement, that if she could discover the grate of his friend's prison, he wished she would convey it to him. Having in vain tried to make intelligible marks upon the paper, he made some with a piece of mortar, scraped from the wall, upon a black silk handkerchief that he took from his neck, and in which he