She became the
critic and depositary of his manuscripts. Finally, one day, after asking
leave, in her father's presence the worthy man actually kissed her, on
his departure for Italy. Her father, sinking lower and lower, squandered
her little fortune of about three thousand dollars, wasted his own
business, and then treated her with brutality. Her only amusement at
this time was playing the violin, accompanied by an old priest who
tortured a bass viol, while her uncle made a flute complain.
Finally, after an acquaintance of five years, Roland, by letter to her
father, proposed marriage. The purity of Roland's life was esteemed by
Phlipon such a reproach to his own dissoluteness that he revenged
himself by an insulting refusal. He then made his daughter's life at
home so insupportable that she took lodgings in a convent. She was
visited there by Roland, and they were finally married, without again
consulting her father. During the year next succeeding their marriage
they remained at Paris. From Paris they went to Amiens, and lived there
four years, where her daughter was born. She assisted her husband in the
preparation of several statistical and scientific articles for the
Encyclopedic. She made a _hortus siccus_ of the plants of Picardy.
In 1784 they removed to the family estate of Roland at Villefranche,
near Lyons. She had, in the course of her studies, acquired considerable
knowledge of medicine. There was no physician in that little community,
and she became the village doctor.
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