That she ultimately took refuge in
indifference we can perceive, but it is to be feared that she was not
always able to maintain the attitude of contemptuous composure. So, at
least, we may suspect from the evidence of that Frenchman who met
"le bon et agreable Tristram," and his wife, at Montpellier, and who,
characteristically sympathizing with the inconstant husband, declared
that his wife's incessant pursuit of him made him pass "d'assez
mauvais moments," which he bore "with the patience of an angel."
But, on the whole, Mrs. Sterne's conduct seems by her husband's own
admissions to have been not wanting in dignity.
As to the nature of Sterne's love-affairs I have come, though not
without hesitation, to the conclusion that they were most, if not all
of them, what is called, somewhat absurdly, Platonic. In saying this,
however, I am by no means prepared to assert that they would all of
them have passed muster before a prosaic and unsentimental British
jury as mere indiscretions, and nothing worse. Sterne's relations
with Miss Fourmantelle, for instance, assumed at last a profoundly
compromising character, and it is far from improbable that the worst
construction would have been put upon them by one of the plain-dealing
tribunals aforesaid.
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