A BOY'S IDEALS
By this time Lafayette was a tall, slender young fellow, of commanding
height, and with a look of piercing and imperative sincerity in his
clear, hazel eyes. His hair was red--some one in the family used to
call him "the big boy with red hair"; but hero worshipers need have no
misgivings about this characteristic, nor feel that they must
apologize for it as a defect. Lafayette said of himself that he was an
awkward boy. It may be that the youth who was rapidly growing to a
height of "five feet eleven" may have felt, as most boys do at that
age, as if he were all hands and feet. But that Lafayette was really
awkward--it is unthinkable! Not one single lady of all the beauties in
France and America, who handed it down to her descendants that she
"once danced with Lafayette," ever mentioned the fact that her partner
lacked any element of grace, while many speak of the ease of manner
and address of the distinguished man. One friend of Lafayette's early
days reports that he was too tall to make a distinguished appearance
on horseback or to dance with special grace; but this was said in a
period when the dancing-master's art was the ideal of social conduct.
Those who did not know Lafayette very well at this time thought him
cold and serious and stiff. Perhaps he was shy; yet beneath that calm
exterior seethed a volcano of emotion of which no casual onlooker
dreamed.
Lafayette was fortunate in having a cousin, the Count de Ségur, who
understood him and who realized that under that surface of gravity was
hidden, as he said, "a spirit the most active, a character the most
firm, a soul the most burning with passionate fervor."
After his marriage Lafayette continued his studies at the Collège du
Plessis, and later he spent a year at the military academy at
Versailles, that his education as an officer might be complete.
In the summer his inclinations led him to make various journeys to the
fortified city of Metz, where the regiment "de Noailles" was in garrison
under the charge of the Prince de Poix who was a brother-in-law of
Adrienne, Lafayette's wife. On his way back from one of these visits he
stayed at Chaillot for a time and there was inoculated for smallpox.
This preventive method was a medical novelty at that time. To submit to
the experiment showed a great freedom from prejudice on the part of the
youth. The Duchess d'Ayen had once suffered from the ravages of this
disease, so she could safely stay with the now adored son-in-law through
this disagreeable period of seclusion.
Soon after this the youthful Marquis de Lafayette and his shy girl
bride were presented at court. The benevolent king, Louis XVI, was
then reigning. The queen, Marie Antoinette, was the head of a social
life that was elaborately formal and splendid. Marie Antoinette
herself was young and light-hearted, and was at this time without
fears from misadventure at the hands of the state or from any personal
enemies. The king had thousands of servants and attendants in his
military and personal households. A court scene was a display of knots
of ribbon, lace ruffles, yellow and pink and sky-blue satin coats,
shoes with glittering buckles, red-painted heels, and jeweled
trimmings. Fountains threw their spray aloft, and thousands of candles
flung radiance broadcast. Said Chateaubriand, "No one has seen
anything who has not seen the pomp of Versailles." And no one dreamed
that the end was nearing, or realized that no nation can live when
the great mass of the people are made to toil, suffer, and die, in
order that a favored few may have luxuries and amusement.
Into this Vanity Fair the young Marquis de Lafayette was now plunged. The
grand world flowed to the feet of the Marquis and Marchioness de Lafayette.
More than that, the queen at once took the tall, distinguished-looking
young chevalier into the circle of her special friends. The circle included
some who were to follow Lafayette in his adventure to the New World in aid
of American independence, and some who were to follow in another long
procession equally adventurous and as likely to be fatal--the Revolution
in their own country. During the Terror some of them, including their
beautiful and well-meaning queen, were to lose their lives. Of any such
danger as this, these young nobles, in the present state of seemingly
joyous and abundant prosperity, were farthest from dreaming.
On the whole, however, court life did not have much charm for
Lafayette. It was a part of the duty of the Marquis and Marchioness de
Lafayette to take part in the plays and merrymakings that centered
about a queen who loved amusement only too well. But Lafayette could
not throw his whole heart into the frivolity of the social sphere in
which he was now moving. There were features of life at court that he
could not tolerate. His knee would not crook; he already knew, as
Everett said, that he was not born "to loiter in an antechamber."
It was liberty itself--the revolt against tyranny in every realm of
life--that interested him from the first. Lafayette was against
whatever stood for tyranny, against whatever appeared to be an
institution that could foster despotism. He believed that the
well-being of society would be advanced by giving the utmost freedom
to all, high and low, educated and uneducated. He saw a world in
chains only waiting for some hero to come along and strike off the
fetters.
Where did Lafayette, a born aristocrat, get these ideas? Certainly not
from the peasants as they knelt beside the road when he, their
prospective liege lord, rode by. He was brought up to believe that it
was the sacred privilege of the ruling class to throw largesse to the
poor, who stood aside, waiting and expectant, to receive the gifts.
It is hard to say where Lafayette imbibed his love of freedom. One
might as well ask where that "wild yeast in the air" comes from that
used to make the bread rise without "emptins." There was a "wild
yeast in the air" in the France of 1760 and 1770, and all the young
people of that country, whether highborn or lowborn, were feeling the
ferment.
If Lafayette had pursued the course that his circumstances urged, he
would soon have crystallized into a narrow, subservient character,
without purpose or ideals. By all the standards of his time, he would be
thought to be throwing away his life if he should take steps to alienate
himself from the glittering, laughing, sympathetic friends who stood
about him at court. All advancement for him appeared to be in line with
the influences there. But if he had done this, if he had followed the
star of court preferment, he would have remained only one of many highly
polished nonentities--and would have lost his head at last. By throwing
away his life, by choosing the way of self-sacrifice, he won the whole
world; by throwing away his world, the natural world of compliance and
ease about him, he won a world, nay, two worlds. He became what Mirabeau
named him, the "hero of two worlds."