On the 21st of March, 1780, a fleet left under the orders of Count de Grasse; after its arrival at Martinique, on the 28th of April, in spite of Admiral Hood's attempts to block his passage, Count de Grasse took from the English the Island of Tobago, on the 1st of June; on the 3d of September, he brought Washington a reinforcement of three thousand five hundred men, and twelve hundred thousand livres in specie.

In a few months King Louis XVI.

had lent to the United States or procured for them on his security sums exceeding sixteen million livres.

It was to Washington personally that the French government confided its troops as well as its subsidies.

"The king's soldiers are to be placed exclusively under the orders of the general-in-chief," M.Girard, the French minister in America, had said, on the arrival of the auxiliary corps.
After so many and such painful efforts, the day of triumph was at last dawning upon General Washington and his country.