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Rh ticles for the “Dictionary of Manufactures,” upon which M. Roland was engaged. This dry and tiresome labor undertaken to assist her husband was afterward, she remarks, of decided benefit to her in strengthening her style and in teaching her to systematize and arrange her own thoughts for publication.

For the first ten years of her married life, few events worthy of note occurred to her. Her own distaste for fashionable society, together with the studious habits of her husband, caused them to live upon their estate in a secluded and retired manner. A few choice friendships were formed, and the birth of their only child, a little girl named Eudora, brought happiness to the hearts of both.

In 1784, the monotony of this quiet life —a life which she sometimes felt to be almost unendurably quiet—was broken up temporarily by a trip to England and to Switzerland—a tour which she enjoyed intensely, embodying the observations made during its progress in a book of travel.