ENDNOTES
[1] society of Gens de la Courte Épée] ‘Ces grades se composent ordinairement d’écoliers. On les nommait “gens de la courte épée” à cause des ciseaux qu’ils portaient pour couper les bourses.’—Dulaure.
[2] Manna of St. Nicholas de Barri] ‘The Manna of St. Nicholas de Barri’ was the name under which the Aqua Tofana was vended almost publicly.
[3] foul and reeking burial-ground attached to the Église des Innocens] The ill effects which the overcharged Cimetière des Innocens had upon the salubrity of Paris, situated as it was in its most crowded quarter, had been matter of complaint for four hundred years. Yet such was the opposition of the ecclesiastical authorities, and the blind and superstitious obstinacy of the people generally, although the tainted air they breathed was thick with putrefaction and disease, that it was not until 1785 that the Council of State ordered its demolition. It was supposed, up to that time, that there had been one million two hundred thousand bodies forced into its comparatively narrow limits!
[4] they form his flambeaux] Adipocere is the substance alluded to. Its name conveys its properties, and it was first made the subject of an interesting analysis by M. Thouret in 1784, upon the occasion of removing the burial-ground of the Innocents. It has always been found most abundant where the bodies have had the chance of being exposed to inundations of fresh water; its formation being the result of some peculiar decomposition of the human frame hitherto unsatisfactorily accounted for. A piece is in the possession of the author.
[5] Tsa tshen pal!] ‘How are you, brother?’ This is true Gitano, or Gipsy language. Wherever it is used, the reader may be assured of its authenticity.
[6] morro] Bread.
[7] lon] Salt.
[8] ranee] A lady.
[9] blunderbus] Blunderbus is derived from the Dutch donderbus—a thunder-gun.
[10] cachots] ‘The hapless Prince d’Armagnac and his brother were confined in these cachots by Louis XI. They were taken out twice a week to be scourged, in the presence of Phillipe O’Huillier, the governor, and had some teeth drawn every three months. The eldest lost his reason; but the youngest, delivered at the death of Louis, published these facts, which would otherwise have been considered too terrible for belief.’—Hist. de l’Ancien Gouvern. par le compte de Boulainvilliers, tom. iii. Lettre 14.
[11] It is supposed that the fetes of Versailles at the present epoch entirely owed their origin to a desire on the part of Louis XIV. to eclipse the splendour of his surintendant Fouquet. At one of the magnificent entertainments given by this individual every guest invited was presented with a heavy purse of gold.
[12] Halles] Or, in English, ‘Billingsgate.’
‘Le tribut qu’on rend aux traits d’un beau visage,
De la beauté d’une âme est un vrai témoignage;
Et qu’il est malaisé que, sans être amoureux,
Un jeune prince soit et grand et généreux.
C’est une qualité que j’aime en un monarque,
La tendresse du cœur est une grande marque;
Que d’un prince, à votre âge, on peut tout présumer,
Dès qu’on voit que son âme est capable d’aimer.
Oui, cette passion, de toutes la plus belle,
Traîne dans son esprit cent vertus après elle,
Aux nobles actions elle pousse les cœurs,
Et tous les grands héros ont senti ses ardeurs.’
Molière.
[14] A Siamese prince, rejoicing in the name of Tan-oc-cun-srivi-saravacha, who formed part of the Siamese embassy in 1684, thus speaks of this group, in a ‘letter to a friend:’—‘Tu sais quel est le mortel que ce dieu représente: quant aux nymphes, si tu connaissais comme moi l’histoire secrète de la cour, tu comprendrais sans peine à la place de qui on les a mises là. Je ne trouvais pas d’abord que cela fut déraisonnable, parceque je pensais que la polygamie régnait en France comme à Siam.’
[15] Samaritaine] The Samaritaine was a large hydraulic machine just below the Pont Neuf, where the floating Bains de Louvre are moored at present. It was a house erected upon piles, in form somewhat like a church, with a clock at one end. Having fallen to decay, it was entirely demolished in 1813.
[16] the Hôtel de Cluny was… the abode of Mary] The circumstances connected with the residence of Mary of England at the Hôtel de Cluny are somewhat too curious to be passed over at this place, although the freedom of Brantôme and Dulaure, in describing them, may be softened down with advantage. Louis was upwards of fifty when he married; his bride, as we have stated, about sixteen. On his death the crown fell, for want of a direct heir, to the Duke of Valois, afterwards Francis I.; but the young widow, in the hopes of being proclaimed regénte, feigned to be in that condition popularly asserted to be coveted by ladies who are attached to their lawful partners. And indeed the attentions of the gallant Duke of Valois were sufficiently pointed to lead the retailers of court scandal to hint that the fiction might possibly become a fact—so much so, that the ministers remonstrated with him. They told him that he must have the greatest interest in seeing that the Queen lived in honour, instead of attempting to pay his court to her; that if she had a son, nothing could keep that son from ultimately coming to the throne, and that he, Francis, must retire contentedly to Brittany; in fact, that everything, altogether, would be as unpleasant for him as could possibly be. These admonishings appear to have had an effect upon the royal gallant, and somewhat quenched the fire of his passion, which was altogether put out by learning that an intrigue was all this while being carried on between the young Mary and Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, the most accomplished cavalier of his time, and to whom the Princess had shown some partiality before her marriage with Louis. Francis made this discovery under rather awkward circumstances—no matter how—at the Hôtel de Cluny; and by his commands Mary and Suffolk were married immediately in the chapel of the edifice. The happy pair left Paris for London the same afternoon. Thus ended the adventure, by which Francis lost a mistress, but insured to himself the crown of France.
[17] An outrage of this kind was by no means uncommon in the reckless times of Louis Quatorze, nor did its commission excite much attention, if we may credit the memoirs of the Abbe Dubois.
[18] Much has been written upon the Aqua Tofana, especially with respect to its alleged power of killing at any interval of time after it had been administered. No drug is now known that would thus exert any species of action. The only example that can be brought forward to support the possible truth of this statement is the poison from the bite of a mad dog, which will remain dormant in the system, it is well known, for several months.
[19] This, and many of the incidents about to follow, the author has taken from some decayed and mouse-eaten pamphlets in his possession, bearing the date of the trial, which he was fortunate enough to find, some time back, at a bookshop in the neighbourhood of the Rue de l’École de Médecine, Paris. By the similarity of the pages and references, they appear to be the same from time to time referred to by M. Alexandre Dumas, in the Crimes Célèbres; and two bear imprint, ‘A Paris. Chez Pierre Aubouin, Cour du Palais, et, chez Jacques Villery, Rue Vieille Bouclerie.’ One is a memoir of this extraordinary ‘procez;’ the second is a copy of the sentence, much dilapidated; and the third is the defence of M. Nivelle,—‘De l’imprimerie de Thomas Le Gentil,’—in excellent preservation. They were all published before the denouement of the terrible drama. The following extract from the end of the ‘Mémoire’ is not without interest:—‘Le public en attend la décision avec la mesme impatience que chacun a pour ce qui doit contribuer à sa sûreté et à son repos. Il espére que Messievrs qui ont travaillé avec tant de précaution à pénétrer les circonstances d’une affaire aussi importante, en punissant la coupable par leur arrest, préviendront de pareils crimes, d’autant plus dangereux qu’ils sont secrets et inévitables.’
[20] Le Bourget] At this little village of Le Bourget, on the 20th of June 1815, Napoleon, returning from Waterloo, stopped for two hours, that he might not enter Paris until nightfall, and thus diminish in some measure the sensation which his flight from Belgium would produce.
[21] Those who may be inclined to pursue this portion of Marie’s career still further, especially as regards the confession, will find much relating to it in the letters of Madame de Sevigné, particularly Nos. 269 and 270.
[22] Pirot.
[23] The author has endeavoured as much as possible in the course of this romance to render it something more than a mere extension of the facts already known respecting the career of the Marchioness of Brinvilliers; and more especially with regard to the admirable narrative of Dumas, in the Crimes Célèbres. But, since it would be utterly futile to attempt any description of her last hours more graphic or interesting than the manuscript narrative of M. Pirot, he has, in portions of these chapters, availed himself largely of the circumstances therein stated. Besides this, he has taken the sentence from the original parliamentary document in his own possession, before alluded to, merely divesting it of long technicalities, and the repetitions of the names of the principal parties concerned in the affair. The authority for matters respecting the ‘Question’ will be found in a note to the Tableau Moral of the reign of Louis Quatorze, in Dulaure’s History of Paris.
[24] Cour des Miracles] This Cour des Miracles—the principal of those so called—may be recollected by the visitor to Paris at the present day. It adjoins the bureau of the Prefecture, to which he goes to have his passport viséed previous to leaving the city. The nuisance of tramping backwards and forwards from the English Embassy to this point is too well known.
[25] Rue aux Fèves] The Rue aux Fèves, still in existence, has gained some notoriety from having been the street in which M. Eugene Sue has placed the tapis franc of the White Rabbit.