The National tribune., 1882-04-22

! on. Inc yOUtn ana DeaEty OF tue suspected
murderess, her distinguished social status,
the large sum which was supposed to have
prompted the murder, all these features
combined to invest the affair with a special
attractiveness so that in every place of pub
lie meeting throughout the country Madame
Desplans and her doings supplanted discus
sions about politics, new comedies, and new
fashions. As the doctrine of contempt of
court is unknown in FraDce-at least in the
English latter day application of the same
the newspapers freely commented on the
evidence that had come to light. All that
could be ralled up as to Madame Desplans's
antecedents was broadly published; her
portrait appeared in the illustrated papers
land q sweet portrait it was) and, under the
form Of complexities, longwinded ballads de
scriptive OF the crime were whined in the
streets by itinerant singers. At first public
opinion was, as almost always happens, dead
against the prisoner, but the publication Of
the portrait caused n reaction; and when it
became known that Madame Desplans was
to be defended by Justin yitali, whose voice
had never been lifted up in an unjust cause"
the country divided itself into two equal
camps, the one largely composed Of hus-
bands married ladies, and old ladies, who
trusted that the prisoner would he gull
lotined; the other made up of all gallant
and romantic souls, who enthusiastically,
nay, frantically, proclaimed her innocence.
The theory of the prosecution, as regards
the prisoner, was briefly summed up thus:
Clotlde Despians was person Of extrava-
CANT tastes. Cold-hearted, willful, fond of
tinery and generally frivolous, she had mar
ried Captain Desplans without concern for
his old age, and solely because he was rich.
Once married, her conduct had been ia
grantly irregular. Captain Desplans had
been obliged to forbid Captain Lacroix his
house because the latter had made love TO
Clotlde; and soon Clotilde's reckless ex-
penditure plunged her husband into pc
cuniary embarrassments, which he sought
to override by iniudicious speculations, and
so ruined himself. From this moment,
averred the prosecution, Madame Desplans
had formed the project of marrying Captain
Lacroix; and if no proof existed Of her
having poisoned her husband to compass
this end, there existed a strong presumption
that she had done so, and it was certain that
Captain Lacroix had suspected her Of this
crime. This accounted for his having re-
fused to marry her, though his love for her
had been very great; and also for his having
addicted himself to drink in the grief which
the knowledge of her infamous deed had
caused him. 1t was not denied that during
the closing months of his life Captain La
croix's intellect had been deranged, and
many Of the letters he had written on his
deathbed bore evident traces Of insanity;
but the prosecution argued that though
facts might be exaggerated in these letters,
there was substratum of truth in them,
and that they must be taken in connection
with the finding of the poison in the de-
ceased's body. Madame Desplans had hur-
ried to Captain Lacroixs house Immediately
on his being bedridden, and from that no.
ment she had allowed no one to approach
him. She had discharged two out of his
three servants, and these persons deposed
to her having taken possession OF the cap
tain's house as if she were mistress of it. to
her having been imperious and guick-tem-
pered, and to her having required them to
give up the keys of the captains plate-cub-
board, cellars, etc, which she constantly
kept about her, with the keys of his desk,
bureau, and of a safe that contained his
vauables. The third servant, an old woman,
who had remained with the captain till
his death, stated that Madame Desplans had
nursed the captain with great apparent
kindness, but she confessed that when the
two were alone together she had often over
head the sick mans voice abusing Madame
| Desplans as q wOuld-be murderess More
over, that Madame Desplans had ordered
her 1.-THE servant) on no account to post any
letters the captain might write. A chemist
deposed to Madame DespIans having bought
laudanum at his shop, and the doctor who
'attended the sick man gave evidence that
he died rather suddenly at n moment when
a turn for the better had seemed to super
vene in his condition. From this it was
inferred that Madame Desplans had poisoned
| the captain from fear that he would recover,
and that when once restored to health he
would cancel the testamentary dispositions
| IS HUI III uSI ldNOT dG tHe tlllS WnllSU
her husband was still alive, and while he
| (Lacroix) still deemed her worthy of his
love. AS a criminal Indictment is never
complete in France unless the remotest and
least important circumstances in prisoners
life are laid bare, the examining witness had
summoned a former governess of Clotildes
to prove that the prisoner had as child
been headstrong and often unmanageable
A discharged maid swore to her having
frequently quarTelled with her husband;
discharged valet of Captain Desplans's had
heard her remark Mt dinner-party that
death by laudannm must be a pleasant
death, which clearly pointed to Il long pre-
occupation on the means of taking life and
to a suspicious conversantship with the
properties Of posons.
What Justin Vitali suffered whilst all
these depositions and conjectures, some ter
rible, some absurd, came to him piecemeal
through newspaper reports, it is impossible
to describe. Weeks passed without his being
admitted to see Madame Desplans. Her case
was in the hands of M. Ragot small wien
juge d'inStr~ction, who would turn prisoner
over and over as a dog does a bone and would