BENJAMIN THOMPSON, COUNT RUMFORD 47 



was engaged, but Coffinhal, vice-president of the tribunal, de- 

 clared that "the Republic has no use for savants," and so he was 

 guillotined. 



Count Rumford was married to Madame Lavoisier in 1805, 

 and set up a handsome establishment in the center of Paris. But 

 neither party found the other agreeable to live with, as they were 

 both too independent and differed decidedly in their tastes. 

 Madame Rumford was fond of lavish entertainments and elabo- 

 rate dinners, while the Count ate little and drank less, and de- 

 tested idle conversation. Probably De Candolle's analysis of 

 their temperaments will say all that it is necessary about their 

 marital unhappiness. 



"Rumford was cold, calm, obstinate, egotistic, prodigiously oc- 

 cupied with the material element of life and the very smallest in- 

 ventions of detail. He wanted his chimneys, lamps, coffee-pots, 

 windows, made after a certain pattern, and he contradicted his 

 wife a thousand times a day about the household management. 

 Madame Rumford was a woman of resolute wilful character. 

 Her spirit was high, her soul strong and her character masculine." 



And one scene from their married life narrated in the Count's 

 own words in a letter to his daughter Sarah will be sufficient to 

 explain why they separated: 



"A large party had been invited I neither liked nor approved of, 

 and invited for the sole purpose of vexing me. Our house being 

 in the center of the garden, walled around, with iron gates, I put 

 on my hat, walked down to the porter's lodge and gave him or- 

 ders, on his peril, not to let anyone in. Besides, I took away the 

 keys. Madame came down, and when the company arrived she 

 talked with them, she on one side, they on the other of the high 

 brick wall. After that she goes and pours boiling water on some 

 of my beautiful flowers!" 



Four years of such life were enough; they parted and lived 

 happily ever after. Madame Lavoisier de Rumford kept her co- 

 terie of distinguished people about her until the day of her death 

 at the age of seventy-eight, when with her perished the last of the 

 eighteenth century salons. Count Rumford retired to a villa in 



