"See Humphreys, glorious from the field retire. Sheathe the glad sword and string the sounding lyre,"
wrote Barlow in his "Vision of Columbus," The lyre accompanied songs in praise of his country, tributes to his commander-in-chief, political satires, and even love lyrics--
"Enough with war my lay has sung A softer theme awakes my tongue 'Tis beauty's force divine; Can I resist that air, that grace, The charms of motion, figure, face? For ev'ry charm is thine."
But this was by the way. Appointed secretary to the commission, consisting of Franklin, John Adams and Jefferson, sent to negotiate treaties of commerce and amity with European nations, he no doubt thoroughly enjoyed his two years in London and Paris. In theory the nobility of Europe may have been anathema to a patriotic citizen of a republic, but practically there were many persons among them whose acquaintance was agreeable to an amiable and gallant gentleman of sensibility like Colonel Humphreys and there was, no doubt, a certain gratification in dedicating one's poems to a duke and in having them reviewed by a marquis who incidentally disclosed the fact that he was an old companion in arms. Also it was pleasant to be elected a fellow of the Royal Society.
On Colonel Humphreys's return he spent some time as a member of the family at Mount Vernon where Washington encouraged him in his project of writing a history of the war which, however, never got any further in print than a memorial of his old general, Putnam. At Mount Vernon he wrote an ode celebrating his great and good friend whose friendship we may reasonably infer constituted one of his chief conversational assets:
"Let others sing his deeds in arms, A nation sav'd, and conquest's charms: Posterity shall hear, 'Twas mine, return'd from Europe's courts To share his thoughts, partake his sports And sooth his partial ear."
It is clear that European life had its attractions for Colonel Humphreys. At all events he returned to it, serving as minister to Portugal and later to Spain whence he imported his famous merino sheep to his acres at Humphreysville, now Seymour. Here, and in the adjoining town of Derby, he projected and to a creditable extent realized, an ideal patriarchal manufacturing and farming community, instructing his operatives and husbandmen in improved industrial methods, in scientific agriculture and stock raising, athletics, poetry and the drama in which one of his productions was actually presented on the stage. At least he accomplished his wish, voiced in his poem "On the Industry of the United States of America"--