He did not content himself with æsthetically expressing his sympathy, but his enthusiasm always led him to action. Whatsoever he did he entered into with his whole might, and where there was wrong and oppression, he felt himself called upon to devote his energies, his position, and his purse in the cause of the oppressed. So greatly was he moved in behalf of the negro slaves, that he wrote to Washington soon after the American war as follows:— “Permit me, my dear General, now that you are about to enjoy some repose, to propose a plan for elevating the African race. Let us unite in purchasing a small estate where we may try the experiment of freeing the negroes, and use them only as tenants. Such an example as yours would render the practice general; and if we should succeed in America, I will cheerfully devote a part of my time to render the plan fashionable in the West Indies. If it be a wild scheme, I would rather be mad in that way than be thought wise on the other tack.” Although Washington, Adams, Franklin, Jefferson, Madison, Patrick Henry, and others cordially sympathized with him, nothing definite was done except by the indefatigable La Fayette himself. Not waiting for others, he purchased a plantation in Cayenne, upon which were a large number of slaves, and in order to prepare them for gradual emancipation, he began to fit them for their freedom by a thorough course of education. Regarding this philanthropic act of La Fayette, his daughter Virginie writes:— “An earnest wish to contribute to all that was good, and a horror for all injustice, were prominent features in my mother’s character. It was, therefore, with deep satisfaction that she witnessed my father’s efforts in favor of the abolition of the slave trade. He purchased a plantation at Cayenne, La Belle Gabrielle, in order to give the example of gradual emancipation. Every just and liberal idea found a place in my mother’s heart, and her active zeal made her seek ardently for every means of putting them into immediate execution. My father entrusted her with all the details of this undertaking, in which the desire of teaching the negroes of that plantation the first principles of religion and of morals was united with the wish she shared with my father of making them worthy of liberty. Her charity was excited by the hope of teaching the blacks to know and love God, and of proving to the free-thinkers who sympathized with the negroes that the success of their undertaking would be in great part due to religion. The events of the Revolution have not allowed us to see these hopes realized, but we have at least had the satisfaction of hearing that the negroes of La Belle Gabrielle did not commit the atrocities which were perpetrated in other places.”