s of the
guilt or innocence of the several parties implicated. The husband of
Madame de la Motte escaped to England, and in the opinion of many took the
necklace with him, and there disposed of it to different jewellers in
small quantities at a time. But Madame de la Motte insisted that she had
entrusted it to Cagliostro, who had seized and taken it to pieces, to
"swell the treasures of his immense unequalled fortune." She spoke of him
as "an empiric, a mean alchymist, a dreamer on the philosopher's stone, a
false prophet, a profaner of the true worship, the self-dubbed Count
Cagliostro!" She further said that he originally conceived the project of
ruining the Cardinal de Rohan; that he persuaded her, by the exercise of
some magic influence over her mind, to aid and abet the scheme; and that
he was a robber, a swindler, and a sorcerer!

After all the accused parties had remained for upwards of six months in
the Bastille, the trial commenced. The depositions of the witnesses having
been heard, Cagliostro, as the principal culprit, was first called upon
for his defence. He was listened to with the most breathless attention. He
put himself into a theatrical attitude, and thus began:--"I am
oppressed!--I am accused!--I am calumniated! Have I deserved this fate? I
descend into my conscience, and I there find the peace that men refuse me!
I have travelled a great deal--I am known over all Europe, and a great
part of Asia and Africa. I have every where shewn myself the friend of my
fellow-creatures. My knowledge, my time, my fortune have ever been
employed in the relief of distress. I have studied and practised medicine;
but I have never degraded that most noble and most consoling of arts by
mercenary speculations of any kind. Though always giving, and never
receiving, I have preserved my independence. I have even carried my
delicacy so far as to refuse the favours of kings. I have given
gratuitously my remedies and my advice to the rich; the poor have received
from me both remedies and money. I have never contracted any debts, and my
manners are pure and uncorrupted." After much more self-laudation of the
same kind, he went on to complain of the great hardships he had endured in
being separated for so many months from his innocent and loving wife, who,
as he was given to understand, had been detained in the Bastille, and
perhaps chained in an unwholesome dungeon. He denied unequivocally that he
had the necklace, or that he had