gression. He must be complaisant, popular, and encourage the universal feeling instead of opposing it, and this part he certainly played to perfection.

He was by no means the sole representative of his country in France, and considerable work had been accomplished before he arrived. In fact, the French were ready to do the work themselves without waiting for a representative. When Franklin was leaving London in 1775 the French ambassador called upon him and gave him to understand in no doubtful terms that France would be on the side of the colonies.

It is a mistake to suppose, as has sometimes been done, that some one person suggested to the French government, or that Franklin himself suggested or urged, the idea of weakening England by assisting America. It was a policy the wisdom of which was obvious to every one. As early as the time of the Stamp Act, Louis XV. sent De Kalb to America to watch the progress of the rebellion, and to foment it. The English themselves foresaw and dreaded a French alliance with the colonies. Lord Howe referred to it in his last interview with Franklin; Beaumarchais argued about it in long letters to the king; it was favored by the Count d'Artois, the Duke of Orléans, and the Count de Broglie, not to mention young Lafayette; and the colonists themselves thought of it as soon as they thought of resistance. The French king, Louis XVI., who, as an absolute monarch, disliked rebellion, hesitated for a time; but he was won over by Vergennes and Beaumarchais.

France had just come out of a long war with England in which she had lost Canada and valuable possessions in the East and West Indies. England held the port of Dunkirk, on French soil, and searched French ships whenever she pleased. France was humiliated and full of resentment. She had failed to conquer the English colonies; but it would be almost as good and some slight revenge if she deprived England of them by helping them to secure their own independence. It would cripple English commerce, which was rapidly driving that of France from the ocean. England had in 1768 helped the Corsican rebels against France, and that was a good precedent for France helping the American rebels against England.

In the autumn of 1775 the Secret Committee of Congress had sent Thomas Story to London, Holland, and France to consult with persons friendly to the colonies. He was also to deliver a letter to Arthur Lee, who had taken Franklin's place as agent of Massachusetts in London, and this letter instructed Lee to learn the disposition of foreign powers. A similar letter was to be delivered to Mr. Dumas in Holland, and soon after Story's departure M. Penet, a French merchant of Nantes, was sent to France to buy ammunition, arms, and clothing.

A few months afterwards, in the beginning of 1776, the committee sent to Paris Silas Deane, of Connecticut, who had served in the Congress. He was more of a diplomatic representative than any of the others, and was instructed to procure, if possible, an audience with Vergennes, the French Minister of

Foreign Affairs, suggest the establishment of friendly relations, the need of arms and ammunition, and finally lead up to the question whether, if the colonies declared their independence, they might look upon France as an ally.

Meantime that strange character, Beaumarchais, the author of "The Barber of Seville" and "The Marriage of Figaro," and still a distinguished light of French literature, fired by the general enthusiasm for the Americans, constituted himself their agent and ambassador, and was by no means an unimportant one. He was the son of a respectable watchmaker, and when a mere youth had distinguished himself by the invention of an improvement in escapements, which was stolen by another watchmaker, who announced it as his own. Beaumarchais appealed to the Academy of Sciences in a most cleverly written petition, and it decided in his favor. Great attention had been drawn to him by the contest; he appeared at court, and was soon making wonderful little watches for the king and queen; he became a favorite, the familiar friend of the king's daughters, and his career as an adventurer, courtier, and speculator began. A most wonderful genius, typical in many ways of his century, few men have ever lived who could play so many parts, and his excellent biographer, Loménie, has summed up the occupations in which he excelled:

"Watch-maker, musician, song writer, dramatist, comic writer, man of fashion, courtier, man of business, financier, manufacturer, publisher, ship-owner, contractor, secret agent, negotiator, pamphleteer, orator on certain occasions, a peaceful man by taste, and

yet always at law, engaging, like Figaro, in every occupation, Beaumarchais was concerned in most of the events, great or small, which preceded the Revolution."

He traded all over the world, and made three or four fortunes and lost them; he had at times forty vessels of his own on the ocean, and his private man-of-war assisted the French navy at the battle of Grenada. In fact, he was like his great contemporary, Voltaire, who, besides being a dramatist, a philosopher, a man of letters, and a reformer, was one of the ablest business men of France, a shipowner, contractor, and millionaire.

The resemblance of Franklin to these two men is striking. He showed the same versatility of talents, though perhaps in less degree. He had the same strange ability to excel at the same time in both literary and practical affairs, he had very much the same opinion on religion, and his morals, like Voltaire's, were somewhat irregular. When we connect with this his wonderful reputation in France, the adoration of the people, and the strange way in which during his residence in Paris he became part of the French nation, we are almost led to believe that through some hidden process the causes which produced Franklin must have been largely of French origin. He is, indeed, more French than English, and seems to belong with Beaumarchais and Voltaire rather than with Chatham, Burke, or Priestley.

But to return to Beaumarchais and the Revolution. He was carried away by the importance of the rebellion in America, and devoted his whole soul to bringing France to the assistance of the

colonies. He argued with the court and the king, visited London repeatedly in the secret service of his government, and became more than ever convinced of the weakness of Great Britain.

The plan which the French ministry now adopted was to aid the colonies in secret and avoid for the present an open breach with England. Arms were to be sent to one of the French West India islands, where the governor would find means of delivering them to the Americans. Soon, however, this method was changed as too dangerous, and in place of it Beaumarchais established in Paris a business house, which he personally conducted under the name of Roderique Hortalez & Company. He did this at the request of the government, and his biographer, De Loménie, has given us a statement of the arrangement in language which he assumes Vergennes must have used in giving instructions to Beaumar

chais :

"The operation must essentially in the eyes of the English government, and even in the eyes of the Americans, have the appearance of an individual speculation, to which the French ministers are strangers. That it may be so in appearance, it must also be so, to a certain point, in reality. We will give a million secretly, we will try to induce the court of Spain to unite with us in this affair, and supply you on its side with an equal sum; with these two millions and the co-operation of individuals who will be willing to take part in your enterprise you will be able to found a large house of commerce, and at your own risk can supply America with arms, ammunition, articles of equipment, and all other articles necessary for keeping up the Our arsenals will give you arms and ammunition, but you shall replace them or shall pay for them. You shall ask for no money from the Americans, as they have none; but you shall ask them for returns in products of their soil, and we will help you to get rid of them in this country, while you shall grant them, on your

war.