Madame Roland: A Biographical Study

by Ida M. Tarbell

The affair with M. de Sévelinges came to nothing, and as Manon gradually ceased to think of him she became more and more interested in the M. Roland already mentioned.

M. Roland de la Platière was a man about forty-two years of age when he first met Mademoiselle Phlipon, in 1776. He held the important position of Inspector-General of Commerce in Picardy, and lived in Amiens, the chief town of the province. In his specialty he was one of the best known men in France. His career had been one of energy and patience. Leaving his home in the Lyonnais when but a boy of eighteen, rather than to take orders or to go into business as his family proposed, he had spent two years studying manufacture and commerce in Lyons, and then had gone to Rouen, where, through the influence of a relative, he had passed ten years in familiarizing himself with the methods of the factories of Normandy, at that time one of the busiest manufacturing provinces in France. M. Roland’s work at Rouen had not been of a simple, unintelligent kind. He had studied seriously the whole subject of manufacturing in its relations to commerce, to government, to society, and had worked out a most positive set of opinions on what was necessary to be done in France in order to revive her industries. He had already begun to write, and his pamphlets had attracted the attention of the ablest men in his department of science.

In 1764 he had been sent to look after the manufacturing interests of Languedoc, then in a serious condition, and in 1776 the position of Inspector in Picardy, the third province of the country from a manufacturing point of view, was given to him. For a man without ambition, the duties of the office were simple. They required him to see that the multitude of vexatious rules which were attached then to the making of goods and articles of all kinds, were carried out; that the regulations governing masters and workmen were observed; that the formalities attending the establishment of new factories were not neglected; that everything of significance that happened in the factories in his province was reported; and that all suggestions for improvement which occurred to him were presented. Evidently an ordinary man, well protected, could fill the position of an inspector of manufactures and have an easy life.

But M. Roland did not understand his duties in this way. The value of the position in his eyes was that it permitted the regulation of disputes, allowed criticism, invited suggestions, encouraged study, and welcomed pamphlets. From the beginning of his connection with Picardy he had displayed an incredible activity in all of these directions. The various industrial interests of the province were clashing seriously at the moment, and the lawyers and councils were only making the disagreement greater. Roland dismissed all interference and became himself “the council, the lawyer, and the protector of the manufacturer.” He became familiar with every master workman of Picardy, with every industry, with every process, and in the reports sent to the Council of Commerce at Paris, he attacked, praised, suggested voluminously. At the same time he was studying seriously. Nothing was foreign to his profession as he understood it, and though already he had the reputation of being a savant he went every year to Paris to do original work in natural history, physics, chemistry, and the arts.

Roland had only been long enough in Picardy to organize his office well when he began to urge the Council to try to introduce into France some of the superior manufacturing processes of other countries. The idea seemed wise and he was invited to undertake a thorough study of foreign and domestic manufacturing methods. This commission led him into many countries. Before M. Roland met Mademoiselle Phlipon, in 1776, he had been through Flanders, Holland, Switzerland, England, Germany, and France in pursuit of information. He had studied lace-making at Brussels, ironware at Nuremberg, linen-making in Silesia, pottery in Saxony, velvet and embroidered ribbons on the Lower Rhine, paper-making at Liège, cotton weaving and printing in England.

His observations had been limited to no special step of the manufacturing. He looked after the variety of plant which produced a thread and studied the way it was raised. He knew how native ores were taken out in every part of Europe. The processes of bleaching, dyeing, and printing in all countries were familiar to him. He understood all sorts of machines and had improved many himself. His ideas on designing were excellent and had been enlarged by intelligent observation of the arts of many countries.

On all of his travels Roland had amassed samples of the stuffs he had seen, had taken notes of dimensions, of prices, of the time required for special processes, of the cost of materials, had gathered the pamphlets and volumes written by specialists, often had brought back samples of machines and utensils. All of this he had applied faithfully in Picardy, and before the time he comes into our story he had had the satisfaction of seeing, as a result of his efforts, the number of shops in his domain tripled, the utensils gradually improved, a great variety of new stuffs made, the old ones improved, and many new ideas introduced from other countries.

At the same time the full reports made of his investigations had won him honors; the Academy of Science in Paris, the Royal Society of Montpellier, had made him a correspondent; the academies of Rouen, Villefranche, and Dijon, an honorary member; different societies of Rome, an associate.

He had, too, something besides technical knowledge. He was quite up to the liberal thought of the day and had ranged himself with the large body of French philosophers who were working for greater freedom in commerce, in politics, in religion. In short, M. Roland de la Platière was a man of more than ordinary value, who had rendered large services to his country. But with all his value, and partly because of it, he was not an easy man to get along with. His hard work had undermined his health and left him morose and irritable. He was so thoroughly convinced of his own ability and usefulness that he could not suffer opposition even from his superiors, and he used often, in his reports, an arrogant tone which exasperated those who were accustomed to official etiquette. A large quantity of Roland’s business correspondence still exists, and throughout it all is evidence of his pettish, unbending superiority. In fact, some very serious controversies arose between him and his associates at different times, in which if Roland was usually right in what he urged, his way of putting it was offensive to the last degree.

Roland prided himself not only on his services, but on his character. He was independent, active, virtuous. He admired noble deeds and good lives. He cultivated virtue as he did science and he made himself a merit of being all this. Nothing is more offensive than self-complacent virtue. Be it never so genuine, the average man who makes no pretensions finds it ridiculous and is unmoved by it. Goodness must be unconscious to be attractive.