In the most secret place of all were deposited, ready for use, a few
vials of the crystal liquid, every single drop of which contained
the life of a man, and which, administered in due proportion of time
and measure, killed and left no sign, numbering its victim's days,
hours, and minutes, exactly according to the will and malignity of
his destroyer.
La Corriveau took out the vials, and placed them carefully in a
casket of ebony not larger than a woman's hand. In it was a number
of small flaskets, each filled with pills like grains of mustard-
seed, the essence and quintessence of various poisons, that put on
the appearance of natural diseases, and which, mixed in due
proportion with the aqua tofana, covered the foulest murders with
the lawful ensigns of the angel of death.
In that box of ebony was the sublimated dust of deadly nightshade,
which kindles the red fires of fever and rots the roots of the
tongue. There was the fetid powder of stramonium, that grips the
lungs like an asthma; and quinia, that shakes its victims like the
cold hand of the miasma of the Pontine marshes.
Pages:
671
672
673
674
675
676
677
678
679
680
681
682
683
684
685
686
687
688
689
690
691
692
693
694
695