ignorant of the details given her by Crevel, she knew that for twenty
years past Baron Hulot been anything rather than a faithful husband;
but she had sealed her eyes with lead, she had wept in silence, and no
word of reproach had ever escaped her. In return for this angelic
sweetness, she had won her husband's veneration and something
approaching to worship from all who were about her.

A wife's affection for her husband and the respect she pays him are
infectious in a family. Hortense believed her father to be a perfect
model of conjugal affection; as to their son, brought up to admire the
Baron, whom everybody regarded as one of the giants who so effectually
backed Napoleon, he knew that he owed his advancement to his father's
name, position, and credit; and besides, the impressions of childhood
exert an enduring influence. He still was afraid of his father; and if
he had suspected the misdeeds revealed by Crevel, as he was too much
overawed by him to find fault, he would have found excuses in the view
every man takes of such matters.

It now will be necessary to give the reasons for the extraordinary
self-devotion of a good and beautiful woman; and this, in a few words,
is her past history.



Three brothers, simple laboring men, named Fischer, and living in a
village situated on the furthest frontier of Lorraine, were compelled
by the Republican conscription to set out with the so-called army of
the Rhine.

In 1799 the second brother, Andre, a widower, and Madame Hulot's