Litchfield enquirer., 1872-05-16
No: here Is the key,

-AdS All Oil0 utksl accSAS 10 L12 cup oOafd or recess of which this is the key, except yourself P
 $ The young man shook as if smittenwith agae;; his lips chattered, but no articu- late sound escaped them. fsi need not answer the question,. 2. said the magistrate, unless you choose tolde SO I again warh you that all you say vii, ii necessary, be used against you.
 No one, he at length gasped, master ing his hesitation by 8 strong exertion of the SiH-.'no one can have had access to the placebut myself. have never part ed with the key
 Mrs. Bourbon was now called in. After interchanging glance of intense agony, and, as it seemed to me, of affectionate intelligence with her son. she calmly an swsred the questions put to her. They were unimportant,. except the last, and that acted upon her like a galvanic shock. It was this-'sDi you ever struggle with your son on the landing leading to the bedrdom of the deceased for the posses sion of this bottle?" and held up that which we had found in the recess.
 A slight scream escaped her lips; and then she stood rigid, erect, motionless, glaring alternately at me and at the fatal bottle with eyes that seemed starting from their sockets. I glanced towards the son : he was also affected in terrible manner. His knees smote each other, and a clam my precipitation burst forth and settled upon his pallid forehead
 Again caution yOu,' iterated the magistrate, s'that you are not bound. to answer any of these questions"
 The woman's lips moved. ''No-nev. erp' she almost inaudibly gasped, and fell senseless on the floor.
 As soon as she was removed, Jane With CTS was called She deposed that three days previously, as she was, just before dusk, arranging some linen in a room & few yards distant from. the bedroom of her late mistress, she was surprised at hearing noise just outside the door, as of perons struggling and speaking in low but earnest tones. She drew aside cor ner of the muslin curtain of the window which looked upon the passage or corri- dor, and there saw Mrs. Bourbon striving to wreet something from her sons hand. She heard Mrs. Bourbon say, "You shall not do it, or you shall not have it"-she could not be sure which A noise of some sort seemed to alarm them; they ceased and listened attentively for & few seconds: then Alfred Bourdon stole off on tip-toe, leaving the object ill dis pute, which witness could not see dis tinctly, in his mothers hand. Mrs. Bour- don continued to listen, and presently Miss Armitage, opening the door of her mothers chamber, called her by name She immediately placed what was in her hand on the marble top of side-table standing in the Corridor, and hastened to Miss Armitage. Witness left the room she had been ill few minutes afterwards, and, curious to know what Mrs Bourbon and her son had been struggling for, went to the table to look at it. It was an odd ly-shaped glass bottle, containing good deal of blackish- gray powder, which, as she held it up to the light, looked like black-lead r
 'sWould you be able to swear to the bottle if you saw 1t ?
 Certainly I should"
 By what mark OF token 2"
 ''The name of Valpy or Vulpy was cast into it-that is, the name was in the glass itself.
 els this it?''
 ''It IS: swear most positively"
 A letter was also read which had been taken from Bourdon's pocket. It was much creased, and was proved to be in the handwriting of Mrs. Armitage. It consisted of severe rebuke at the young mans presumption in seeking to address himself to her daughter, which insolent ingratitude, the writer said, she should never, whilst she lived, either forget or forgive. This last sentence was strongly underlined in different ink from that used by the writer of the letter.
 The surgeon deposed to the cause of death. It had been brought on by the action of iodine, which, administered in certain quantities, produced symptoms as of rapid atrophy, such as had appeared in Mrs. Armitage. The glass bottle found in the recess contained iodine in 8 pulver- ized state.
 Ideposed that, on entering the library on the previous evening, l overhead young MT. Bourbon, addressing his moth- CT, say, ''Now that it is done past recall, I will not shrink from any consequences, be they what they may!" a
 This was the substance of the evidence adduced; and the magistrate at once com mitted Alfred Bourbon to Chelmsford jail to take his trial at the next assize for ''wilful murder" A coroner's inquisition & few days after also returned verdict of 'swilful murder" against him on the same evidence
 About an hour after his committal, and just previous to the arrival of the vehicle which was to convey him to the county prison, Alfred Bourbon requested an in- terview with me. very reluctantly con- sented; but steeled as I was against him, Icould not avoid feeling dreadfully shock ed at the change wich SO brief an interval had wrought upon him. It had done the work of years. Despair-black, utter de- spair-was written in every ineament of his expressive countenance
 II have requested to see you" said the unhappy culprit, ''rather than Dr. Cur teis, because he, I know, is bitterly prei- udiced against me. But you will not re- fuse, I think, the solemn request of dy- ing man-for dying man feel myself to be-however long or short the interval which stands between me and the scaffold. It is not with childish hope that any as- sertion of mine can avail before the tribu- nal of the law against the evidence adduc- ed this day, that I, with all the solemnity befitting man whose days are numbered, declare to you that I am wholly innocent of the crime laid to my charge. I have no such expectation; I seek only that you, in pity of my youth and untimely fate, should convey to her whom have madly presumed to worship, this message: Al fred Bourdon was mad but not blood guilty; and of the crime laid to his charge he is innocent as an unborn child"
 The pure and holy passion, young man, 3 said I, somewhat startled by his impress sive manner, sshowever presumptuous, as far as social considerations are concerned, it might be, by which you affect to be in- spired, is utterly inconsistent with the cruel, dastardly crime of which such damning evidence has an hour since been gwen
 ssSay no more, sir, interrupted Bour- don, sinking back in his seat, and bury ing his face in his hands; it were aboot- less errand; she could not, in the face of that evidence, believe my unsupported assertion It were as well perhaps she did not. And yet, sir, it is hard to be trampled into felon's grave, loaded with the maledictions those whom you would coin yoT1r heark &f serve and hless Ah