them. My husband, excessively sensitive both in his affections and
his self-love, could not support the idea of the least change in
his influence; his imagination darkened, his jealousy irritated me;
happiness fled; he adored me, I sacrificed myself for him, and we were
miserable.

"If I were free, I would follow him everywhere to soften his griefs and
console his old age; a soul like mine leaves no sacrifices imperfect.
But Roland was embittered by the thought of sacrifice, and the knowledge
once acquired that I mad made one ruined his happiness; he suffered in
accepting it, and could not do without it."

The sequel to this tale is told in allusions and half revelations,
in her letters to Buzot, which glow with suppressed feeling; in her
touching farewell to one whom she dared not to name, but whom she hoped
to meet where it would not be a crime to love; in those final words of
her "Last Thoughts"--"Adieu.... No, it is from thee alone that I do not
separate; to leave the earth is to approach each other."

Beneath this semi-transparent veil the heart-drama of her life is
hidden.

For the sake of those who would be pained by this story, as well as
for her own, we would rather it had never been told. We should like to
believe that the woman who worked so nobly with and for the man who
died by his own hand five days after her death, because he could stay no
longer in a world where such crimes were possible, had lived in the
full perfection of domestic sympathy. But, if she carried with her an
incurable wound, one cannot help regretting that her Spartan courage
had not led her to wear the mantle of silence to the end. Posterity
is curious rather than sympathetic, and the world is neither wiser nor
better for these needless soul-revelations. There is always a certain
malady of egotism behind them. But it is often easier to scale the
heights of human heroism than to still the cry of a bruised spirit. Mme.
Roland had moments of falling short of her own ideals, and this was one
of them. Pure, loyal, self-sustained as she was, her strong sense
of verity did not permit the veil which would have best served the
interests of the larger truth. It is fair to say that she thought the
malicious gossip of her enemies rendered this statement necessary to
the protection of her fame. Perhaps, after all, she shows here her most
human and lovable if not her strongest side. We should like Minerva
better if she were not so faultlessly wise