Roland's character was tranquil; it was his wife who made him ambitious, haughty, and inflexible. She should have pacified her husband, but instead of that she excited him. Never was he malevolent and {109} spiteful enough to suit her. She would not pardon him a single movement of compassion or respect towards the august unfortunates. Led by her, Roland no longer dared entertain a generous thought. He returned shamefaced to the Ministry of the Interior if he had felt a humane sentiment while at the Tuileries. It is sad to find tenderness and pity in the heart of a man, Dumouriez, and in the heart of a woman, Madame Roland, nothing but malevolence and hatred. Dumouriez wanted to put out the fire; Madame Roland, to stir it up. Dumouriez sincerely desired the King's safety; Madame Roland swore that he should perish. If a germ of pity woke to life in the hearts of the ministers, Madame Roland hastened to stifle it. Her hostility towards the royal family was more than deliberate; there was something like ferocity in it. Her Memoirs and those of Dumouriez display two very different minds. Sadness dominates in his; anger in hers. Even on the steps of the scaffold, Madame Roland will not feel her hatred lessen. Dumouriez, on the contrary, will cast a glance of melancholy respect upon the unfortunate sovereign whose sorrows and whose resignation, whose gentleness and uprightness, had touched him so profoundly. {110} XI. THE FÊTE OF THE SWISS OF CHATEAUVIEUX. Dumouriez, at the beginning of his ministry, was still the slave of the Jacobins, his allies and protectors. His elevation to the ministry was in great part due to them, and even while despising them, he felt unable to shake off their yoke. Little by little, they inspired him with horror, and before many weeks were over, his only idea was to free himself from their control. But at first he treated them like a power with which he was obliged to reckon. What proves this is his passive attitude at the time of the celebrated fête of the Swiss of Chateauvieux. The prologue of the bloody tragedies that were in course of preparation, this fête shows what headway the revolutionary ideas had made. The sinister days of the Convention were approaching, the Terror existed in germ, and already many representatives who, on a secret ballot, would have voted in accordance with right and honor, were cowardly enough to do so against their conscience when they had to answer to their names.