Morse found time, in spite of his absorption in his artistic work, to interest himself and others in behalf of the Poles who had unsuccessfully struggled to maintain their independence as a nation. He was an active member of a committee organized to extend help to them, and this committee was instrumental in obtaining the release from imprisonment in Berlin of Dr. S.G. Howe, who "had been entrusted with twenty thousand francs for the relief of the distressed Poles." In this work he was closely associated with General Lafayette, already his friend, and their high regard for each other was further strengthened and resulted in an interchange of many letters. Some of these were given away by Morse to friends desirous of possessing autographs of the illustrious Lafayette; others are still among his papers, and some of these I shall introduce in their proper chronological order. The following one was written on September 27, 1832, from La Grange:-- My Dear Sir,--I am sorry to see you will not take Paris and La Grange in your way to Havre, unless you were to wait for the packet of the 10th in company with General Cadwalader, Commodore Biddle, and those young, amiable Philadelphians who contemplate sailing on that day. But if you persist to go by the next packet, I beg you here to receive my best wishes and those of my family for your happy voyage. Upon you, my dear sir, I much depend to give our friends in the United States a proper explanation of the state of things in Europe. You have been very attentive to what has passed since the Revolution of 1830. Much has been obtained here and in other parts of Europe in this whirlwind of a week. Further consequences here and in other countries--Great Britain and Ireland included--will be the certain result, though they have been mauled and betrayed where they ought to have received encouragement. But it will not be so short and so cheap as we had a right to anticipate it might be. I think it useful, on both sides of the water, to dispel the cloud which ignorance or design may throw over the real state of European and French politics. In the mean while I believe it to be the duty of every American returned home to let his fellow citizens know what wretched handle is made of the violent collisions, threats of a separation, and reciprocal abuse, to injure the character and question the stability of republican institutions. I too much depend upon the patriotism and good sense of the several parties in the United States to be afraid that those dissensions may terminate in a final dissolution of the Union; and should such an event be destined in future to take place, deprecated as it has been by the best wishes of the departed founders of the Revolution,--Washington at their head,--it ought at least, in charity, not to take place before the not remote period when every one of those who have fought and bled in the cause shall have joined their contemporaries.