t until the latest hours at convivial clubs and card-parties.
He formed acquaintance with those with whom Jane could not only have
no congeniality of taste, but who must have excited in her emotions of
the deepest repugnance. These companions were often at his house; and
the comfortable property which M. Phlippon possessed, under this
course of dissipation was fast melting away. Jane's situation was now
painful in the extreme. Her mother, who had been the guardian angel of
her life, was sleeping in the grave. Her father was advancing with the
most rapid strides in the road to ruin. Jane was in danger of soon
being left an orphan and utterly penniless. Her father was daily
becoming more neglectful and unkind to his daughter, as he became more
dissatisfied with himself and with the world. Under these
circumstances, Jane, by the advice of friends, had resort to a legal
process, by which there was secured to her, from the wreck of her
mother's fortune, an annual income of about one hundred dollars.

In these gloomy hours which clouded the morning of life's tempestuous
day, Jane found an unfailing resource and solace in her love of
literature. With pen in hand, extracting beautiful passages and
expanding suggested thoughts, she forgot her griefs and beguiled many
hours, which would otherwise have been burdened with intolerable
wretchedness. Maria Antoinette, woe-worn and weary, in tones of
despair uttered the exclamation, "Oh! what a resource, amid the
casualties of life, must there be in a highly-cultivated mind." The
plebeian maiden could utter the same exclamation in accents of
joyfulness.

CHAPTER IV.

MARRIAGE.

1776-1785

Sophia Cannet.--Roland de la Platiere.--M. Roland.--His personal
appearance.--Character of M. Roland.--First impressions.--Jane's
appreciation of M. Roland.--Minds and hearts.--Journal of M.
Roland.--His notes on Italy.--The light in which Jane and M. Roland
regard each other.--M. Roland professes his attachment.--Feelings
of Jane.--M. Roland writes to Jane's father.--Insulting letter of
M. Phlippon.--Jane retires to a convent.--Her mode of life
there.--Correspondence with M. Roland.--He returns to Paris.--M.
Roland renews his offers to Jane.--They are married.--First year
of married life.--Madame Roland's devotion to her husband.--Birth
of a daughter.--Literary pursuits.--Application for letters-patent
of nobility.--Visit to England.--Removal to Lyons.--La Platiere
and its inmates.--Dea