ecame as expert as himself in the
manufacture of poisons. To try the strength of the first doses, she
used to administer them to dogs, rabbits, and pigeons. Afterwards,
wishing to be more certain of their effects, she went round to the
hospitals, and administered them to the sick poor in the soups which
she brought in apparent charity. [This is denied by Voltaire in his
"Age of Louis XIV;" but he does not state for what reason. His words
are, "Il est faux qu'elle eut essaye ses poisons dans les hopitaux,
comme le disait le peuple et comme il est ecrit dans les 'Causes
Celebres,' ouvrage d'un avocat sans cause et fait pour le peuple."]
None of the poisons were intended to kill at the first dose; so that
she could try them once upon an individual without fear of murder. She
tried the same atrocious experiment upon the guests at her father's
table, by poisoning a pigeon-pie! To be more certain still, she next
poisoned herself! When convinced by this desperate essay of the potency
of the draught, she procured an antidote from Sainte Croix, and all
doubts being removed, commenced operations upon her grey-headed father.
She administered the first dose with her own hands, in his chocolate.
The poison worked well. The old man was taken ill, and his daughter,
apparently full of tenderness and anxiety, watched by his bedside. The
next day she gave him some broth, which she recommended as highly
nourishing. This also was poisoned. In this manner she gradually wore
out his frame, and in less than ten days he was a corpse! His death
seemed so much the result of disease, that no suspicions were excited.

When the two brothers arrived from the provinces to render the last sad
duties to their sire, they found their sister as grieved, to all
outward appearance, as even filial affection could desire: but the
young men only came to perish. They stood between Sainte Croix and the
already half-clutched gold, and their doom was sealed. A man, named La
Chaussee, was hired by Sainte Croix to aid in administering the
poisons; and, in less than six weeks' time, they had both gone to their
long home.

Suspicion was now excited; but so cautiously had all been done, that it
found no one upon whom to attach itself. The Marquise had a sister, and
she was entitled, by the death of her relatives, to half the property.
Less than the whole would not satisfy Sainte Croix, and he determined
that she should die the same death as her father and brothers. Sh