He had done a great deal for France, he had done as much for the United States. His love of liberty bound the two nations together, and when, in 1917, one hundred and forty years after his coming to America to fight for freedom, the United States proclaimed war as an ally of France in that same great cause, the thought of Lafayette sprang to every mind. The cause for which he had fought was again imperiled. The America in which Lafayette had believed was now to show that he had not been mistaken in his vision of her. XV AMERICA’S MESSAGE TO FRANCE--“LAFAYETTE, WE COME!” There have been many great changes in all the countries of the world since the time of Lafayette, and in most nations liberty has become more and more the watchword and the goal. The French Revolution was like a deep chasm between the era of feudalism and the era of the rights of man, and though the pendulum has sometimes seemed to swing backward for a short time it has almost constantly swung farther and farther forward in the direction of independence. The right of the common man to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness has gradually taken the place of the so-called divine right of kings to do as they pleased with their subjects. In a sense the United States blazed the trail and led the way. The men of 1776 proclaimed the principles of liberty and drew up a constitution which has required few changes to the present day. They were remarkably wise men; and the people of America were almost as wise, for they appreciated the laws under which they lived and showed no disposition to thwart or overthrow the statesmen they themselves elected to guide the nation. The United States grew and grew, crossed the Mississippi, crossed the Rocky Mountains, reached the Pacific coast, and fronted on two oceans. As pioneers from the east had pushed out into the middle of the continent, cleared the wilderness, and filled it with prosperous cities and villages, so pioneers from the middle-west went on across the deserts and the mountains and made the far west flourish like the rose. The great northern territory of Alaska became part of the republic; to the south Porto Rico; far out in the Pacific Hawaii and the Philippines joined the United States; the Panama Canal was cut between the two oceans; and the republic that had begun as thirteen small states along the Atlantic seaboard became one of the most powerful nations in the world. Her natural resources were almost limitless and the energy of her people made the most of what nature had provided. [Illustration: “AMERICA’S ANSWER”]