=_108._= FOREIGN OFFICERS IN THE REVOLUTIONARY ARMY.
... Mrs. Greene had joined her husband early in January, bringing with
her her summer's acquisition, a stock of French that quickly made her
little parlor the favorite resort of foreign officers. There was often
to be seen Lafayette, not yet turned of twenty-one, though a husband, a
father, and a major-general; graver somewhat in his manners than
strictly belonged either to his years or his country; and loved and
trusted by all, by Washington and Greene especially. Steuben, too, was
often there, wearing his republican uniform, as, fifteen years before,
he had worn the uniform of the despotic Frederick; as deeply skilled in
the ceremonial of a court as in the manoeuvring of an army; with a
glittering star on his left breast, that bore witness to the faithful
service he had rendered in his native Germany; and revolving in his
accurate mind designs which were to transform this mass of physical
strength, which Americans had dignified with the name of army, into a
real army which Frederick himself might have accepted. He had but little
English at his command as yet, but at his side there was a mercurial
young Frenchman, Peter Duponceau, who knew how to interpret both his
graver thoughts and the lighter gallantries with which the genial old
soldier loved to season his intercourse with the wives and daughters of
his new fellow-citizens.
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