The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1899-01-04
Her Kiss was Death.

The art d pni>oning. il we are to
believe an eminent authority, must be
reckoned among the lost arts. It ls
not because we are lers coarse than
our ancestors, and carry our refine
ment even iuto our crimes we are
less unscrupulous or cruel than our
forefathers were. Though the toxi-
cology Of the ancients were necessarily
incomplete, there is every reason to
believe that antiquity was acquainted
with the use Of arsenic, opium, hen
bane and prussic acid. The oldest
paisaa IL use was pso5sSiy IN impor-
tation Of serpent-venom. Theophras-
tus speaks OF o poison made from
aconite, with rapid or slow effects in
accordance with the operator 8 wishes.
During the empire che removal Of in.
convenient people by means OF poison
had become 80 common chat the em-
perors had number Of men in their
service, whose duty il vas to taste oil
dishes put upon the imperial table,
and no dinner was partaken Of With
out one Of the court physioisns being
present. Que Of the most notorious
poisoners Of the day was Locusta, the
mu' dererof Claudius and Britannicus.
About year 331 B. c., large num-
bers Of women, belonging TO the higher
classes Of Roman society, were indict-
ed for poisoning their husbands "a
modern instance Of the epidemic oc-
CURED Of late years in Hungary
One hundred and seventy were con-
vioted and condemned.
The sixteeth and seventeenth cen.
turies we're the halcyon days Of poi
soning. There is no doubt that La
Spara, and the, If possible, still more
wretched hag, La Toffsnia, were as
bad as you make them. The latter 10
said to have caused the death of over
600 persons. She used preparation
Of arsenic, which she sold under the
name Of "Acqua Toffsns,'' It was a
s!ow poison, the victim growing daily
weaker and gradually dying from ply
sical exhaustion. In France the most
notorious female poisoners were NINE.
de Brinvilliers (who was taught the
secret Of the succession power by
Ste. Croix, which she successfully
administered to her father and broth
ers,) and the still more notorious
Lavoisin and Lavigorenx, who, being
ostensibly midwives, carried their
poisoDs to high and low-marrird
couples anxious to hasten the dissolu-
tiou Of the irksome tie or needy heirs
wished to accelerate the departure Of
rich relatives. A veritable mania for
poisoning appears TO have set in to-
ward the middle of the seventeenth
century.
In England poisoning was declared,
by an Act passed in the reign of
Henry VIII, to be high treason, and
those guilty Of it were to be boiled
alive. The most notorious case (the
poisoning of James I, by Bucking-
ham, is only surmise,l Of poisoning
was that Of Sir Thomas Overbnry, in
the year 1913. He had incurred the
displeasure Of Lord Chester and his
wife, and they had both vowed to be
|revenged on him. So after they had
got him committed to the tower, they
set themselves to poison his food by
mixing arsenic and catharides with it.
|rFor many months. though. suffering
intensely, he appears to have fingered
on. Al last stronger dose than US
ual put an end to his miserable exist
ence. The guilty couple, to the kings 8
everlasting diegrace, we're released
after five years imprisonment.
| One;Gf thesmost curious. points con-
neoted with poison 10 the fact that
nations and individuals, have been
known to thrive OMIT. Mithridates,
the king Of Pontus had poison for his
daily. food. In the Gesfa .Romauorum
we read that "the queen Of the north,
having heard Of the gress proficiency
which Alexander the Great made in
learning, under the tuition os Aristo-
,1tle, udurished her daughterg from her
cradle, on a5certain kind Of deadly.
I,poison, ,eand when she grew t p she was
considered so beautiful that The sight
Of her alone affected many with mad.
ness. - The young lady was sent To
| Alexander, who, Of course, fell madly
in love with her. Aristotle, who
knew Of the plot, warned the king,
who, thereupon, commanded crimi-
nal whom be had condemned to death
Il TO kiss the girl. Scarcely bad the
i man touched her ruby, lips before sshis
5sshoso frame Wis impregnated with,