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How Lafayette Came to America

Lafayette belonged to the highest rank of the French nobility. When he was only thirteen years old, he was left with large landed estates, and the title of Marquis. He went to college in Paris, and, while there, met the King of France, Louis XV, who took him as a page into the royal household. When he was fifteen years old, he was given a military commission through the influence of the Queen.

Soon after this, he was married, and was stationed as Captain of Dragoons, at a fort on the German border. At dinner, one day, he heard someone talking about the Americans and the Declaration of Independence. He listened very attentively, and then said: "If what you say of those Colonies is true, they deserve their liberty, and I, for one, would like to help them."