Lafayette, Marie Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert Du Motier, marquis de (1757-1834) to Andre Paccard [in French]

[2] Sir, La Tour de Pin September 4 1829

You wished to take the responsibility for interpreting my book and propose a meeting; you saw my perplexities and my regrets. Permit me, nevertheless to repeat a part of what I had the honor of telling you at our all too brief meeting.
I would have preferred to take the Bourgoigne route even independently of the honorable and dear invitation that you extended to me. And nothing inspired this preference more than the happiness of seeing the city of Châlons where all the distinguished sovereigns and all of the feelings of patriotism reunite and where I am happy to be able to count my personal friends. However a sacred duty and engagements already made prohibit this satisfaction.
Upon leaving Lyons, we must pay a visit to my unfortunate son-in-law Hector [illegible] who lost his wife last year, my dear young daughter. He awaits us at his house on the other side of [illegible] and I cannot return to farm without having fulfilled this obligation, which puts us back on the road of the windmills, where one of our friends, coming from Paris, should arrive before we do, and our young daughter, Madame Adolphe [illegible] is also joining us, and who will stay at the home of her uncle Victor Tracy. She is pregnant, suffering, and brings with her her nine-month-old baby. I ask your pardon for entering into family details with you. You see the difficulties that impede my taking the route that I naturally would prefer, where I would have found one of the many pleasures that my heart is able to experience.
I am presented with another grave obstacle of a less private nature that is impossible for me to not count for many of my projects. The minister of the United States in France is about to return to his country. He wishes to see me before his departure and maybe he will leave [illegible] on the 20th of this month by steamship. His wife's health will not permit him a quick return. You see that in this case I hardly have enough time to fulfill the political engagements [3] [illegible sentence]
After having regretfully left you, sir, I looked on my map and in my itinerary to see if there was any way of reconciling my family duties and my American promise with the new and very desirable project that presents itself to me. This research only confirmed my regrets: nothing could add to my gratitude.
You have been very good for me. [illegible sentence]
I will wait with impatient hope for the happy time where I will be permitted to [illegible] and to offer our friends of Châlons the homage of my recognition and of my [illegible]. Those among you sir, who come towards Paris, would give me great consolation in staying at the farm. The union and concert of patriots was never so necessary than in the circumstance where public liberty would be especially threatened. Indeed the good citizens were forgetting that it depended on them to thwart these miserable plots and reduce them to ridiculous impotence.
Accept the expression of my many considerations and of my affectionate gratitude.
Lafayette

[address leaf]
To Mr
André Paccard
Proprietor
At Châlons su Sâone
Department of Sâone and Loire