The Sun.
London, England, 1840-09-14 00:00:00

EVENING EDITI

Madame Marie Laffarge denied ever having used a
such threat.
Marie Aime Emma Pouthier, aged niueteen, was th,
next witness. She was afterwards interrogated by the
President, who asked—Did not the prisoner attempt to
give a lesson to her femme de chambre as to ,chat she
was to say ? A. Marie asked her one day, vrhem she
saw that she was under accusation, what she had u''ino
with the arsenic.—Q. Did she seek to give a lesson .1110
her as to her evidence ? A. No. I merely heard her"
once say, " It is dreadful you do not say the same thing
twice."—Q. Did she add," It is different with Alfred ?'
A. Perhaps, but I do not recollect.—Q. Did you not
take a box from the apron of the prisoner ? A. In
the evening of the death of M. Lafarge I saw in her
apron a black agate box. I was a little astonished, I
bad seen such strange things the evening before. I
bad seen Mdlle. Brun looking into a bottle, and the
mother of M. Laffarge, who had a wild air. I asked
Clementine what there was in this box. She reviled, " It
is Madame's gum." I took a little, and gave it to M.
Fleignat, telling him at the same time that I found it at
my mamma's. I would not tell him that I had taken it
from Mad. Laffarge.—Q. Had M. Laffarge been ill
when you arrived at Glandier ?—A. I arrived on the 11th,
and he had arrived on the 3d.—Q. Yeu passed the night
with him. Did you see the prisoner give him any white
powder on the night of the 11th ? You saw her drink
water in a glass from which M. Laffarge bad drunk;
did he do so without reluctance ?A. Yes.—Q. She
gave you some of her hair to put into the hand of her
husband ?A. Yes.---Q. Did you not say to her, "If
you have anything to conceal, arsenic for instance, give
it to me?" A. I did not speak to her of arsenic ; I
asked her if she had any letters that sbe did not wish
seen, and offered to take charge of them. I acted in
this only according to the advice of M. Fleignat.
The President—l thought in a moment of excitement
you had said, " Confide to me anything which could
compromise you ?" A. Poisoning wits talked of. I
said to her, " Cakes are talked of." She replied, "It
is absurd." I then said, " But there is a simple means;
it is to show the letter in which you announce the send-
ing of the cakes." I then took her a packet of letters,
and we examined them, but found nothing. I then ob-
served that she had perhaps others, and, in fact, found
some in an ebony secretaire, and on the table near the
piano. _ _ _

President—You have been twice examined, and you
have never before spoken of the box or the letters ? A.
It is true.

The deposition of this witness, who is a handsomer
young female, was given with propriety, and excited in-
pleasing
rse friend
gme i
smiles
appeared
upo upon
nher he r t
ho
if has e
face
ea happynu d ,sth family,
that
evi-
dence
and theree in-
terest.
e Madameremainedwer
proceeded.
ci t pol e hasLe
After the examination of some other witnetes, from
whom nothing material was elicited, it was announced
to the Court that the chemists appointed to perfoun the
experiments necessary to enlighten the tribunal as to
those.which had already been performed, were ready to
e rt
ermake their report ; they were accordingly introduced.
A profound silence now pervaded the Court, and M.
Dupuytren, brother of the late celebrated physician of
that name, read the report in the nante of the commis-
mission of which he formed part. The report com-
menced by stating that the commission had operated first
upon two-thirds of the liver, weighing, when dried,
120 grammes, 60 of which wets dissolved in pure
azotic acid, which was heated and evaporated until a
friable spongy charcoal, weighing 21 grammes, had been
obtained, which was pulverized and placed in a glass
vessel with 90 grammes of distilled water. This it as
allowed to macerate for a whole night, aid on the
following day was put into a small retort and boiled
for an hour. The liquid was then filtered, and the re-
sult was a brown liquid, to which was added sulphydrio
acid, sharpened by a few drops of clorhydric acid,
which formed a brown precipitate, soluble in ammonia.
When acted upon by the ammoniacal sulphate of cop-
per there was a green colour; by neutral nitrate of
silver there was a yellow precipitate; and the same re-
sult ensued from the action of ammoniacal nitrate. of
silver. All these precipitates become brown in a short
time, and formed a new brown precipitate. The re-
port then proceeds as follows :—" We submitted this
liquid to the teat of the apparatus of Marsh. Whilst
this was doing, some of the chemists fancied that they
recognised for an instant a slight garlic (arsenical)
odour ; others did not perceive it ; some obtained a
brilliant brown stain eafiuitely slight. Dissolved in
azotic acid it gave no brick-red colour by ammoniacal
nitrate of silver. We operated upon a portion of the
stomach, heart, intestines, brain, bladder, and lungs,
with distilled water, and for this purpose boiled the
whole, cut into very small pieces, for six hours, renew.
ing the water as it evaporated. When cold it was
I filtered, and the filtered liquid was evaporated until dry.
What remained in this state was divided into two por-
tions, one of which, weighing seven grammes, was heated
with 31 grammes of azotic acid, as in our first experie
merit. The charcoal which resulted wits exposed for
an hour to the action of boiling distilled water, end the
filtered liquor was submitted to the same tests as for the
first operation by Marsh's apparatus, and we did not
obtain any trace of arsenic." Whilst M. Dupuytren
was reading this report, a breathless attention was fixed
upon him, every word was caught with eagerness, end
even his looks were scrutinised ; but no sooner had he
pronounced the words announcing that no arsenic had
been found, than loud bravos were uttered in every
part of the Court. It is impossible to describe the effect
which they produced. Almost every female present
was in tears, and many men displayed their glad eizio-
tion in a similar way. The countenance of Madame
Laffarge during the reading of the report, was constantly
calm, and her emotion was not displayed by any ex-
ternal sign, except a melancholy sort of smile, which
looked more like resignation than joy. M. Dupaytren
then proceeded—" We formed a new precipitate with
suiphydric acid, sharpened with a few drops of chlorydic
aeid, and filtered. The precipitate which remained
was dissolved in water, slightly ammoniacal, and then
evaporated to dryness. The result was mixed with an
equal weight of black flux, and placed in a reducing
tube. We heated this to a red heat without obtaining
any incrustation of metallic arsenic." The report was
signed by Messrs. Dubois, sen. and jun., chemists of
Limoges ; M. Dupuytren, chemist of Limoges ; M.
Lespinatz, physician of Lubersac ; M. Massenet, phy-
sician of Paris ; M. Tournadour, physician of Uzerches ;
M. Lafasse, jun. of the same place, chemist; and
Messrs. Filial, Pages, and Bori, chemists of Tulle.
The Advocate-General put some questions to the
chemists.

M. Dubois in reply, said, " Let the most celebrated
chemists be employed. Enough of the body remains
to convince the most incredulous."
M. Lospinatz declared that as a physician he had be
lieved there wa, poison, but as a chemist he had not dis-
covered any. He acknowledged his ignorance of the
new process which had been used.
M. Massenat also confessed that he had been in error.
M. Paillet observed—The liver, the bowels, the lungs,
the bladder, the stomach, every matter that it contained,
and had been vomited from it, have been analyzed. I
cannot, therefore, camprehend how any doubt can be
loneer entertained as to the non-existence of poison.
The Advocate-General nevertheless maintained that
the evidence against the prisoner was still strong, and
he should not abandon the prosecution.
The Court adjourned at halt-past six. Soon after it
was announced that the Court had ordered that further
experiments should be performed by chemists of Paris.
A letter from Tulle, written on Thursday morning,
says—" Each of the chemists and physicians has beep
questioned by the Advocate-General.A telegraphic
.
despatch has been sent to Paris ler the threw chemists
appoiuted by the Court to make the final experiments:'

ENGINE DRIVERS.—There can be no doubt
that great improvements still remain to be effected in the
mechanical arrangements of railways, which will greatly
reduce the probabilities of accidents ; but these can only
be determined by experiment and practice. There is,
however, an improvement, apart from the mechanism of
the system, respecting which there can scarcely be two
opinions, and it might be commenced without delay. We
refer to the men who have the management of the trains.
An engineer, or engine-driver as he is termed, who has in
his charge the lives of hundreds, and in soma instances of
thousands of passengers, ranks now in the scale of society
not higher than a stage-coachman. So It as this re-
sponsible office is thus placed beneath the consideration of
men of character and education, it canaot be expected that
persons properly fitted for the discharge of its duties can
be obtained. Improvements in the machinery of railways
will be of little avail unless they be accompanied by an
altered system in the appointment of the men who conduct
the engines. Another accident recorded this week on the
Hull and Selby Railway, shows that the safety of the pas-
sengers on that line depends entirely oa the discretion of
the engineer in regulating the speed which brings the
train to the end of its journey. No mechanical contriv-
ance can he invented as a substitute for knowledge, judg-
ment, and good conduct, and the best means of obtaisisnge
those essential requisites in an engineer, is to make
_b_.
importance and emoluments of the office equal to its re
sponsibilities. Spectator. —DV e are glad to see the
though
ta-
lented Spectator enforcing our recommendatic:.n
gladnopthegs
scribing the engine-driver as not higher in
may
hues tghiavt"joiturfrioartlhmaaskeosn, eweofbehliiseco•ew,n; trillnin
be the
society than a stage-coachman. .
fees, much
stage-coachmen now who arer
no
'Associating, too, with
mistake in
it
tianfl :Lc:
better
rs epnadi d acquirements
thsn engilie.edfr
jay:
resen.sgprei n: :Sri -end:. r.i iulvdei rn,g there
the passengers, they are more
_t
1 having come tick the
ADMIItALTY ORD
eoxftrtahs,e-afitsanarttmero.ddee:it:
officers in some o
petty
. to the discipline of the service,
nvernenee
lead to much inconvenience
hard on those individuals teho have only
knowledgeliving
has
beoef
been
their
p%odrdifsuhEhtißpohrse thatnies
sacn
Majesty's
ships,
which
they
and
that means.
and must be
vcry
rt them,
to support their pay
be intimated commanding
attrileoirrtrheLed orirendsstphheiocpstsei disapproverespective
of Bach extrava-
m y Lordsecsaspest,a
captains
drefore desire it to
may be taken
prevent this occurrence. happening for la t e
future. . •
LoWTIIER CASTL.f.—Lord Lowther left the
fiance rots, that
being allowed
t 0
Castle•for London on Monday 11:st. On the same day the
Duke and Duchess of Buccleuch, who had been on a
visit •
! f.. ! F.! -' . 1; r !dale. lef: I,r their seat, Drumlanrig
C! i i ! •
'!f! t•t, we re.] ,ice to state, in
1 .....c,,.mllit.t.i. vi 6,,b1 ite4th.