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                         PRINCES AND POISONERS

                  _BY THE SAME AUTHOR AND TRANSLATOR_

LEGENDS OF THE BASTILLE. BY FRANTZ FUNCK-BRENTANO. With an Introduction
by VICTORIEN SARDOU. Translated by GEORGE MAIDMENT. 1899. Crown 8vo.
Cloth, 6_s._

CONTENTS.--I. The Archives; II. History of the Bastille; III. Life in
the Bastille; IV. The Man in the Iron Mask; V. Men of Letters in the
Bastille; VI. Latude; VII. The Fourteenth of July.

LONDON: DOWNEY AND CO., LIMITED.

[Illustration: PORTRAIT OF GABRIEL NICOLAS DE LA REYNIE

LIEUTENANT-GENERAL OF POLICE

(_Engraved by Van Schuppen, after the painting by Mignard_)]




                         Princes and Poisoners

                   STUDIES OF THE COURT OF LOUIS XIV

                                   BY
                         FRANTZ FUNCK-BRENTANO

                             TRANSLATED BY
                            GEORGE MAIDMENT

                        [Illustration: colphon]

                                 LONDON
                          _DUCKWORTH and CO._
                        3 HENRIETTA STREET, W.C.
                                  1901

                     _Second Impression, May 1901_

                         _All rights reserved._




PREFATORY NOTE


Twelve months ago I had the honour of introducing M. Frantz
Funck-Brentano to the English public by my translation of his _Legendes
et Archives de la Bastille_, and in my preface to that book I gave a
rapid sketch of his career which need not be repeated. If history is to
be continually reconstructed, or rather, perhaps, to undergo a process
of destructive distillation, there is no one more competent than M.
Funck-Brentano to perform the feat. We lose our illusions with our
teeth; the fables that charmed our childhood dissolve in the modern
historian's test-tube, and the mysteries that fascinated our forebears
become clear with a few drops of his critical acid.

In his former book, M. Funck-Brentano solved once for all the mystery
of the Man in the Iron Mask, showed up the impostor Latude in his true
colours, and gave us surprising information about the latter days of the
Bastille. In the present volume, the fruit of several years' research
among the archives at the Arsenal Library, he conclusively dispels the
cloud of suspicion that has hung over the sudden death of Charles I's
winsome and ill-fated daughter Henrietta; gives us for the first time
the authentic history of that beautiful poisoner Madame de Brinvilliers;
suggests a very plausible explanation of Racine's hitherto inexplicable
retirement from dramatic writing; and throws a strange light upon the
private history of Madame de Montespan and other fair ladies of Louis
XIV's Court. If it be objected that some of the details of the 'black
mass' and kindred abominations are too gruesome for print, it may be
urged in reply that these details are related with the cold impartial
pen of a serious historian, not coloured or heightened with a view to
melodramatic effect. 'Truth's a dog that must to kennel,' says Lear's
Fool; Louis the Magnificent tried to stifle the damning evidence against
his jealous, passionate mistress; when Time and patient research among
long-forgotten papers have combined to bring the truth to light, it
would ill become us to blame a scholar like M. Funck-Brentano for not
joining the monarch's conspiracy of silence.

G. M.

_November 1900._




CONTENTS


                                                                    PAGE

MARIE MADELEINE DE BRINVILLIERS--

  I. HER LIFE,                                                         1

 II. HER TRIAL,                                                       36

III. HER DEATH,                                                       76

THE POISON DRAMA AT THE COURT OF
LOUIS XIV--

  I. THE SORCERESSES--

         The Dinner of La Vigoreux,                                  117

         Sorcery in the Seventeenth Century,                         121

         The Practices of the Witches,                               128

         The Alchemists,                                             133

         La Voisin,                                                  144

         The Magician Lesage,                                        159

         The 'Chambre Ardente,'                                      163

         Louis XIV and the Poison Affair,                            180

 II. MADAME DE MONTESPAN,                                            187

III. A MAGISTRATE--GABRIEL NICOLAS DE LA REYNIE,                     265

THE DEATH OF 'MADAME,'                                               313

RACINE AND THE POISON AFFAIR,                                        346

'LA DEVINERESSE,'                                                    361

INDEX,                                                               375




ILLUSTRATIONS


PORTRAIT OF GABRIEL NICOLAS DE LA
REYNIE, LIEUTENANT-GENERAL OF POLICE.
Engraved by Van Schuppen, after the picture by
Mignard,                                                   _Frontispiece_

PORTRAIT OF MADAME DE BRINVILLIERS,
after the sketch by Charles Lebrun,                     _facing page 112_




MARIE MADELEINE DE BRINVILLIERS




I. HER LIFE


In the judicial annals of France there has never been a more striking or
celebrated figure than the Marquise de Brinvilliers. The enormity of her
crimes, the brilliance of her rank, the circumstances accompanying her
trial and death,--the story of which, as told by her confessor, the abbe
Pirot, is one of the masterpieces of French literature,--finally, the
strange energy of her character, which after her execution caused her to
be regarded as a saint by a portion of the population of Paris: all
these things will for long years to come attract to her the attention of
all who are interested in the history of the past.

Michelet devoted to the Marquise de Brinvilliers a study in the _Revue
des Deux Mondes_. But his story is very inaccurate and leaves many
gaps. From the historical point of view, the little novel of Dumas is
much to be preferred. The beautiful criminal has also been dealt with by
Pierre Clement in his _Police of Paris under Louis XIV_, and more
recently by Maitre Cornu, in his discourse at the reopening of the
lecture-term of the advocates to the Court of Cassation. The writer of
the following pages has been able to make use of some fresh documents.

In the trial of the Marquise de Brinvilliers there is much to interest
the historian. It was the first of the terrible poison cases which
caused such a sensation at the court of Louis XIV in the central years
of his reign, and in which the greatest names in France were implicated;
and Madame de Brinvilliers herself represents the most salient and most
easily studied features of a type of woman which, as we shall see,
repeated itself after her even on the steps of the throne.

       *       *       *       *       *

Marie Madeleine--and not Marguerite--d'Aubray, Marquise de Brinvilliers,
was born on July 22, 1630. She was the eldest of the five children of
Antoine Dreux d'Aubray, lord of Offemont and Villiers, councillor of
state, _maitre des requetes_, civil lieutenant of the city, mayoralty,
and viscounty of Paris, and lieutenant-general of the mines of France.
Dreux d'Aubray was himself the son of a treasurer of France, originally
from Soissons. Madeleine d'Aubray received a good education, in a
literary point of view at any rate. The spelling of her letters is
correct, a rare thing with the ladies of her time. Her handwriting is
remarkable: bold, firm, like a man's, and such as the observer would be
disposed to ascribe to an earlier period. But her religious education
was entirely neglected. At her interviews with her confessor on the eve
of her death she displayed an utter ignorance of the most elementary
maxims of religion,--those which people learn as children, and never
during the whole course of their life forget.

Of moral principles she was absolutely destitute. From the age of five
she was addicted to horrible vices. At seven she was only by courtesy a
maiden. These are what Michelet calls 'a young girl's peccadilloes.' As
time went on, she yielded herself to her young brothers. On these points
her own testimony renders mistake impossible. She will show herself to
have been endowed with an ardent, affectionate nature, which gave her
passions command of an amazing energy; but this energy acted only under
the empire of her passions, for she was powerless to resist the
impressions which penetrated and ere long dominated her. She was
extremely sensitive to affronts, and particularly to those which touched
her pride. She was one of those natures which under good guidance are
capable of heroic deeds, but which are also capable of the greatest
crimes when they are wholly abandoned to evil instincts.

In 1651, at the age of one-and-twenty, Marie Madeleine d'Aubray wedded a
young officer of the Norman regiment, Antoine Gobelin de Brinvilliers,
baron of Nourar, the son of a president of the audit office. He was a
direct descendant of Gobelin, the founder of the celebrated manufacture.
Mademoiselle d'Aubray brought her husband a dowry of 200,000 livres, and
as he too was wealthy, the young couple enjoyed what was for that time
a large fortune.

The young marchioness was charming--a pretty, sprightly woman, with
large expressive eyes. She made a great impression by her frank,
decided, and vivacious manner of speaking. She was of an amiable and
cheerful temperament, and dreamed of nothing but pleasure. A priest
endowed with great keenness of judgment, who studied the Marquise de
Brinvilliers in terrible circumstances, has described her as follows:--

'She was naturally intrepid and of a great courage. She appeared to have
been born with inclinations towards good, with an air of complete
indifference, with a keen and penetrating intellect, forming clear views
of things, and expressing them in words few and fit but very precise;
wonderfully ready in finding expedients for getting out of a difficulty,
and quick to make up her mind upon the most embarrassing questions;
frivolous, moreover, with no application, uneven and inconstant,
becoming impatient if the same subject were often talked about.

'Her soul had something naturally great--a composure in face of the most
unexpected emergencies, a firmness that nothing could move, a resolution
to await and even suffer death if need be.

'She had thick and beautiful chestnut hair, with comely and well-rounded
features--her eyes blue, tender, and of perfect beauty, her skin
extraordinarily white, her nose well-shaped enough; nothing in her
countenance was unpleasing.

'Sweet as her face naturally appeared, when some vexatious idea crossed
her imagination she showed it plainly by a grimace that might at first
sight scare you; and from time to time I noticed contortions that
bespoke disdain, indignation, and scorn.

'She was of a very slight and dainty figure.'

To the Marquis de Brinvilliers luxury and large expenditure had become
second nature; he loved gaming and pleasure generally; and his marriage
was very far from banishing his joyous habits. In 1659 he formed a close
intimacy with a certain Godin, known more often as Sainte-Croix, a
captain of horse in the Tracy regiment, originally from Montauban, and
said to be a by-blow of a noble Gascon family. Sainte-Croix was young
and handsome; 'endowed,' says a memoir of the time, 'with all the
advantages of intelligence, and perhaps, too, with those qualities of
heart under whose empire a woman rarely fails, in the long-run, to
fall.' In after days, Maitre Vautier had to sketch the portrait of
Sainte-Croix in the course of an address before the Parlement.
'Sainte-Croix,' he said, 'was in poverty and distress, but he had a rare
and singular genius. His countenance was prepossessing, and gave promise
of intelligence. Such indeed he had, and of such sort as to give
universal pleasure. He took his pleasure in the pleasure of others; he
entered into a religious scheme as joyfully as he accepted the
suggestion of a crime. Keenly sensitive to insult, he was susceptible to
love, and in love jealous to madness, even of persons on whom public
debauchery assumed rights that were not unknown to him. His extravagance
was amazing, and supported by no occupation; for the rest, his soul was
prostituted to every form of crime. He dabbled also in external piety,
and it has been claimed that he wrote devotional books. He spoke
divinely of the God in whom he did not believe, and favoured by this
mask of piety, which he never removed save with his friends, he appeared
to participate in good deeds while really immersed in crime.' Though he
was an officer and married, Sainte-Croix sometimes assumed the garb and
the title of Abbe.

Sainte-Croix was a brilliant and gallant cavalier; and the Marquise de
Brinvilliers, with her blue eyes and dainty figure, was the most
charming creature in the world. 'Lady Brinvilliers,' observes Vautier
the advocate, 'did not make a mystery of her amour; she gloried in it in
society, whence there resulted much _eclat_.' She gloried in it also
before her husband, who responded by boasting of his own love for other
ladies; but as she ventured also to brag about it before her father, the
civil lieutenant, a man of the old school, he, strong in the rights with
which ancient customs endowed a father, obtained a _lettre de cachet_
against his daughter's lover. On March 19, 1663, Sainte-Croix was
arrested 'in the marquise's own carriage as he sat by her side,' and
was thrown into the Bastille.

Various writers who have dealt with these facts depict Sainte-Croix as
the prison companion of the famous Exili, from whom he learnt the secret
of Italian poisons. Restored to liberty, Sainte-Croix is said to have
handed the terrible prescriptions to his mistress and others, who in
their turn spread them through France.

We find this opinion expressed in the documents of the time, among
others in the speech delivered by Maitre Nivelle before the Parlement,
on behalf of Madame de Brinvilliers.

Exili, whose real name was Eggidi or Gilles, was an Italian gentleman
attached to the service of Queen Christina of Sweden. It is true that he
was confined in the Bastille at the same period as Sainte-Croix. He
remained there from February 2 to June 27, 1663; Sainte-Croix was there
from March 19 to May 2. A captain of police named Desgrez--who will play
an important part in the sequel--met Exili on leaving prison with an
order to conduct him to Calais and embark him for England; but, whether
Exili gave him the slip on the way, or that he had no sooner reached
England than he returned to France, we soon find the Italian again in
Paris, and in the house of Sainte-Croix himself, with whom he stayed for
six months. After all, it was not Exili who trained Sainte-Croix in the
'art of poisons,' to adopt the phrase of the time. Long before he
entered the Bastille the young cavalry officer had acquired a knowledge
of poisons which far exceeded that of Exili. He owed it to a celebrated
Swiss chemist named Christophe Glaser, who had set up an establishment
in the Faubourg Saint-Germain, where he had attained a considerable
standing, after the publication in 1665 of a _Treatise on Chemistry_,
which had a noteworthy success at the time, and was often reprinted and
translated. Glaser was apothecary in ordinary to the king and
Monsieur,[1] and demonstrator in chemistry to the Jardin des Plantes. He
was, moreover, a scientist of real merit. Sulphate of potassium, which
he discovered, long bore his name. Glaser was the principal, probably
the only person who furnished Sainte-Croix and his mistress with
poisons. In their correspondence the two lovers call the poisons which
they used 'Glaser's recipe.' These poisons, however, as we shall see,
were very simple; in these days they would appear clumsy. Exili, who
goes out of our story, remained connected with Queen Christina, and in
1681 made an excellent marriage when he wedded the Countess Ludovica
Fantaguzzi, cousin of Duke Francis of Modena.

       *       *       *       *       *

As soon as Sainte-Croix left the Bastille he renewed his relations with
the Marquise de Brinvilliers. Her passion had only been heightened by
the imprisonment of her lover. Wounded in her pride, she felt the birth
within herself of an implacable and violent hatred of her father. Her
dissipations, her gaming, her wild flings in her lover's company (she
paying expenses, after the fashion of that period), had embarrassed her
fortune. 'I accuse myself,' she said in her confession, 'of having given
a great deal of my wealth to this man, and he ruined me.' The desire of
attaining possession of her paternal inheritance, and the yearning,
growing day by day more imperious, for wreaking vengeance on her father
for the affront put upon her, suggested to her a frightful crime. There
might frequently have been seen, drawing up at the market-square of
Saint-Germain, a carriage from which alighted a young officer and a
fashionable lady. They went on foot to the Rue du Petit-Lion, in which
Glaser the chemist lived. Arrived at his house, they sought a retired
room. The neighbours, puzzled by these strange goings-on, spoke of false
money. Soon this young lady might have been seen, under the ed