To Thomas Jefferson from Madame de Lafayette, 26 March 1789
From Madame de Lafayette
ce 26 mars
Je dois a votre amitie pour mr. De la fayette, monsieur, de vous envoyer les nouvelles que jai recues de lui. J’ai ète desolee de navoir pas éte ches moy Lorsque vous y êtes venu, et de n’avoir pu trouver le moment de vous les porter moy même. J’attends un de ces jours-ci des nouvelles du sort de l’élection, et j’espere fort qu’il sera elu deputé de sa province. Tous les soins different qui me partagent depuis quelques tems môtent les moment que j’auroit un vrai plaisir a passer avec vous, Monsieur. Je suis bien touchée de l’interêt si aimable que vous prenez a l’interêt le plus tendre de mon coeur. Recevés l’assurance de l’attachement bien sincere que je vous ai voué,
N[oailles] d[e] L[a] f[ayette]
RC (DLC); endorsed. Recorded in SJL as sent from Paris and received 26 Mch. 1789. Enclosures not identified.
Gouverneur Morris heard during the days preceding this letter that “La Fayette is like to loose his Election in Auvergne, a Circumstance which gives great Pleasure … to some Persons here. His Conduct is much disapproved; as indeed is naturally to be expected by all those attached to the Order of Nobility. I believe he has mined a little too deep, for I am very much mistaken if he is not, without perhaps knowing it himself, a much greater Aristocrat than those of the Party opposed to him.” But on 2 Apr. 1789 Morris called to congratulate Madame de Lafayette on her husband’s election. Morris, with his skeptical views of republicanism, was not impressed by TJ’s republican-minded aristocrats: on the day that TJ presented him to Montmorin and La Luzerne, both of whom gave him a chilly reception, TJ brought him back to Paris for dinner at Madame de Tessé’s, an experience that must have shaken even Morris’ aplomb, for he recorded in his diary of the circle at Madame de Tessé’s: “Republicans of the first Feather. The Countess, who is a very sensible Woman, has formed her Ideas of Government in a Manner not suited (I think) either to the Situation, the Circumstances or the Dispositions of France, and there are many such” (Morris, Diary, i, 6, 13, 27).