It is stated, that she had committed and attempted so many murders, that they had lost all character of horror to her; that she merely viewed them as petty indiscretions, or the punishing of those who offended her or who stood in her way, till at last, to poison became almost a pastime or a passion; hence, when the poison taken from her at Bayreuth was shown to her some weeks afterwards, in the old castle of Plassenburg at Culmbach, her eyes sparkled and her whole frame seemed to vibrate with delight, as if she saw again, in that deadly white drug, an old and valued friend or servant; but she admitted, that fly-powder was what she chiefly used to revenge herself upon her fellow-servants by mixing it with their beer; and that prior to quitting the house of Gebhard she had frequently poisoned the coffee, wine, and beer of such guests as she chose to dislike. She declared openly, that her death was a fortunate thing for many people, as she felt certain she could not have left off poisoning as long as she lived.
She steadily ascended the scaffold, bowed to the people, with a smile on her old, wrinkled, and, then, hideous face, laid her head on the block, and without shrinking or moving a muscle, had it struck off by the axe of the public scharfrichter, or executioner; and so ended this German cause célèbre.
LAURA WENLOCK'S CHRISTMAS EVE.
CHAPTER I.
"It cannot be that you are about to be married!" exclaimed Jack Westbrook passionately as he held the girl's hands half forcibly and gazed into her shrinking eyes; "I will not believe it—even from your own lips."
But the girl, silent and sad, hesitated to reply.
The glory of an April sunset lay over all the sweet Kentish landscape; a little tarn between two white chalk cliffs shone like molten gold, with black coots swimming, and the pearly clouds reflected on its surface; the emerald green buds were bursting in their beauty in the coppice and hedgerows, where the linnet and the speckled thrush were preparing their nests; the unclosing crocus and the drooping daffodil were making the cottage gardens gay; and every where, there were coming "fresh flowers and leaves to deck the dead season's bier."
It was a period of the opened year when unconsciously the human heart feels hopeful and happy, even the hearts of the old and the ailing; but the souls of those two who lingered, near the old Saxon lichgate, roofed with ancient thatch and velvet moss, and by the old worn stile that led to the village church of Craybourne, were sad indeed; they were on the eve of parting, and—for ever!
"It cannot be, Laura, that you are about to be married, after all," repeated Jack Westbrook, a soldier-like young fellow, not much over five and twenty, dark, handsome and clad in that kind of grey tweed suit, which looks so gentlemanly when worn by one of good bearing and style, and such Jack certainly was.