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.

What is to be said of Poland and the situation of her heroic, unhappy sons, you well know, having been a constant and zealous member of our committee.

You know what sort of mental perturbation, among the ignorant part of every European nation, has accompanied the visit of the cholera in Russia, Germany, Hungary, and several parts of Great Britain and France—­ suspicions of poison, prejudices against the politicians, and so forth.  I would tike to know whether the population of the United States has been quite free of these aberrations, as it would be an additional argument in behalf of republican institutions and superior civilization resulting from them.

Most truly and affectionately,

Your friend,
LAFAYETTE

As we see from the beginning of this letter, Morse had now determined to return home.  He had executed all the commissions for copies which had been given to him, and his ambitious painting of the interior of the Louvre was so far finished that he could complete it at home.  He sailed from Havre on the 1st of October in the packetship Sully.  The name of this ship has now become historic, and a chance conversation in mid-ocean was destined to mark an epoch in human evolution.  Before sailing, however, he made a flying trip to England, and he writes to his brothers from London on September 21:—­

“Here I am once more in England and on the wing home.  I shall probably sail from Havre in the packet of October 1 (the Sully), and I shall leave London for Southampton and Havre on the 26th inst., to be prepared for sailing.