Lafayette knew that he could expect to find no place of refuge on either side of the French frontier; on the one hand were the Jacobin soldiers of the Reign of Terror who held him to be a traitor, and on the other the emigrant noblemen and their allies who regarded him as in large part responsible for all the troubles that had befallen Louis XVI. and his court. He had got himself into a position where both sides considered him an enemy; and his best course seemed to be to make his way to England and there take ship for America, where he was always sure to meet a friendly welcome. Austrian and Prussian troops held the northern border of France and garrisoned the outpost towns of Belgium. Lafayette and his companions crossed the frontier on their road to Brussels, but were stopped at the town of Rochefort because they had no passports. One of the party, Bureaux de Pusy, rode to Namur, the nearest large town, to try to get the necessary papers, but when he told the officer in charge there that the passports were wanted for General Lafayette and several friends there was great commotion. “Passports for Lafayette, the enemy of the King and of order!” the Austrian officer exclaimed. Lafayette was too important a man to let escape in any such fashion. And at once the command was given to arrest the Frenchman and his companions. They were found at Liège and arrested. Lafayette protested that he and his friends were now non-combatants, and moreover were on neutral territory in Belgium. In spite of that they were held as prisoners, although a secret message was sent to Lafayette that he could have his freedom if he would forswear his republican principles and give certain information about conditions in France. Indignantly he refused to buy his liberty in any such way, and then was sent to the Prussian fortress of Wesel on the Rhine. On the journey there he was questioned several times about the French army he had commanded, but the haughty contempt with which he refused to make any answers quickly showed his captors the sort of man they had to deal with. At one town an officer of the Duke of Saxe Teschen came to him and demanded that Lafayette turn over to the Duke the treasure chest of his army that his enemies supposed he had taken with him. At first Lafayette thought the request a joke; but when the demand was repeated he turned on the officer. “I am to infer, then, that if the Duke of Saxe Teschen had been in my place, he would have stolen the military chest of the army?” said he. The officer backed out of the room in confusion, and afterward no one dared to doubt the Frenchman’s honesty. [Illustration: LAFAYETTE, A PRUSSIAN PRISONER]