The Savannah morning news., 1902-07-04
TOPPAN'S FAILU RE.
Miss Nissen Alive Because She Re-
fused Dose of Poison.
Boston Letter in Baltimore Sun.

Boston Letter in Baltimore Sun.
One woman Jane Toppan failed to
kill is rejoicing in her narrow escape.
Miss Christine Nissen of Jamaica
Plain, Mass, believes that the nurse
who confessed to numbering persons
tried to poison her in the Massachu-
sets General Hospital in 1889.
Miss Nissen says Miss Toppan gave
her morphine, and she believes she
would not be alive to-day had she
swallowed a second dose of a liquid
which Miss Toppan told her would
enable her to go to sleep.
At the time Miss Nissen was in the
hospital being treated for some trou-
BILE in her right knee. For two nights
Miss Toppan was her nurse.
She was very affectionate," Miss
Nissen said, land seemed all at once
to have a special love for me. The
second night / was under her care
L asked her to summon one of the
house doctors to remove a bandage
on my knee, which was causing me
terrible pain.
II asked her several times to do
this, but she seemed anxious to look
after me herself and finally brought
me a drink which she said would put
me to sleep and relieve the pain. When
/ drank it, it tasted awfully bitter,
but 1 rather liked it because of my
feverish condition, and soon after I
did not feel the pain so much Sud-
denly / began to feel a numbness in
my arms, and l felt as if / were part
ly paralyzed.
Hinged And Kissed Her.
Then Miss Toppan placed her nurses
cap on a stand and lay beside me on
the bed. She placed her arms about
my neck and for five or ten minutes
she stroked my head as if l We're a
baby. Very often she kissed me, and
1 don't know how many times she told
me not to mind the pain, and that
would be all right in a little while.
Every few seconds she would raise
her head and gaze into my eyes with
an expression l could not understand.
All the time her black eyes were blaZ-
ing in the moonlight as if they were
on fire.
Several times after this Miss Top
pan came to my bedside, raised my
eyelids and examined the eyeballs,
and about / o'clock in the morning
she came back and tried to induce
me to take some more of the liquid
which had made me drowsy and feel
queer. But by this time I had de-
cided that the drink was not a good
one for me to take, and I told her
so. She coaXed me to drink it, but
/ was firm, and the next day she
was shifted from night to day duty.
And that, I am satisfied, is how my
life was saved.
Note In Her Album.
THE morning after the first night
she was in charge of me she wrote
! in my autograph album: Life is
worth the earning for it's daily cheer
and 1 have often wondered since her
! arrest if the cheer she meant was not
! killing people. / have no doubt now
but that when she was beside me on
! the bed with her arms about my neck,
| she was satisfying that mania which
! has made her murder so many peo-
| pie.
Ten days after l left the hospital
/ l went back there to have a plaster
cast taken from my knee and met
| Jane in the operating room with a
baby, which was to be operated upon.
| She almost threw the baby from her
| to come and embrace me.
she told me a number of times that
| she was very fond of watching oper-
atoms and perhaps she selected me
as one upon whom she could demon
strate her affections because l was a
| surgical patient"