La Fayette had already begun to speak a little English, and by degrees acquired more. But to the last the difficulties of the language were a main obstacle, not only to himself, but to every other foreigner who served with, or under, the United States. Thus there are still preserved some of the ill-spelled and scarcely intelligible notes of Count Pulasky, during the short time that he served as general of cavalry. Still worse was the case of Baron Steuben, a veteran of the school of Frederick the Second, who joined the Americans a few months later than La Fayette, and who greatly aided them in the establishment of discipline. The Baron, it appears, could not teach and drill, nor even swear and curse, but by means of an interpreter! He was, therefore, most fortunate in securing as his aid-de-camp Captain Walker of New-York—most fortunate, if, as his American biographer assures us, "there was not, perhaps, another officer in the army, unless Hamilton be excepted, who could speak French and English so as to be well understood in both." La Fayette did not always confine himself to the bounds of his own profession; sometimes, and, perhaps, not greatly to his credit, he stepped beyond them. Here is one case recorded with much satisfaction by himself. He states, that soon after his arrival in America, and while attending on Sunday the service of the Church of England, he was displeased with the clergyman, because in his sermon he had said nothing at all of politics. "I charged him to his face," says La Fayette, "with preaching only about Heaven!... But next Sunday," continues the keen young officer, "I heard him again, when his loud invectives against ’the execrable House of Hanover,’ showed that he was ready and willing to take my good advice." JOHN HORNE TOOKE.