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had on the river Po, for change of air; he took with him one servant who had the greatest respect for him; and his servant having heard that sudden fear was a sovereign remedy for a quartan fever, resolved to try it on his master. Having observed that the marquis walked every day on the banks of the Po, and knowing it was not very deep, he resolved to push him in. A miller, who lived opposite the place, he acquainted with his design, and, having ordered him to be ready with his boat, to take his master up, if there should be occasion; next morning he threw him in, after which he immediately fled to Padua : in the meantime, the miller took up the marquis, who was indeed thoroughly frightened, and vowed to be revenged. So extraordinary a case was the subject of every body's conversation: the marquis caused his servant to be summoned before the courts of justice, and, not appearing, he was banished Ferrara, and condemned, if he ever returned thither, to be beheaded. This news soon reached Padua, notwithstanding which, the servant, in a few days, came back to Ferrara, and desired admittance to the marquis; which was denied, and instead thereof, he was apprehended, and ordered to prepare for execution. The marquis, however, finding himself cured of his fever, his resentment began to abate, and he was determined to save him, but to seem resolved to let the law take its course. A day was fixed for his execution, and all Ferrara thronged to see it performed. The servant appeared on the scaffold, with his confessor; who, after protesting he had no other motive than the cure of his master, laid his head on the block, and gave the fatal signal. The executioner had his orders, before-hand, at that instant to pour some cold water on his neck, which being done, the colour left his cheeks, his eyes sunk in his head, and he died in a few moments, without speaking a word. Such are the fatal and extraordinary effects of fear on man; not less than the sudden transports of the most affecting joy.

SPANISH DEPRAVITY.

The following narrative is extracted from the travels of a German through Spain, in the years 1797 and 1798.

Donna Antonia, a charming woman, about 29 years of age at most, was married to a merchant, a man of mild temper, but capricious and of weak constitution. This lady had always lived a very retired life, till a young man from Valencia, who came to study the law at Madrid, was recommended to her husband, and thus had access to her. Donna Antonia was pleased with his person, which procured him her favour, and all the privileges attached to it. The husband, however, perceived the intimacy, and by means of the offers and honourable means he employed, succeeded in dismissing the young man, without affording Donna Antonia an opportunity of opposing the

measure.

The letters, however, of Donna Antonia pursued her lover wherever he went, and love and revenge rendered them so eloquent, that the young man, some months after broke his word and returned secretly to Madrid. He then renewed his interview with her at a private house, and his passion daily increased. At length the time arrived, that Antonia ventured to communicate to him a plan she had long since formed of assassinating her husband, and offered him on that condition her hand and fortune. Don Juan shuddered with horror at the proposal, begged her to abandon the idea, shewing her the dreadful consequences of so black an action, which he absolutely refused to perpetrate,

Hereupon, at first, she treated him with the profoundest contempt, and then gave herself up to all the extremes that could be suggested by despair. She employed alternate menaces, prayers, and imprecations, then recurred to all the artifices that revenge or love could contrive, till at length Don Juan consented, and the death of her husband was resolved. They were engaged in contriving the means of effecting this, when the following circumstance occurred to hasten its execution.

Donna Antonia had presented one of her watches to Don Juan, but her husband missing it, soon accused the cook of having stolen it, and under that pretext discharged her. The husband, however, meeting the woman, upbraided her with her conduct; but she justified herself by revealing to him the whole secret. He therefore brought her home, concealed her in an alcove, called his wife, and made the pretended theft the topic of conversation. The remainder of this interview may easily be imagined; and nothing but the death of her husband could save her. The grief of the husband for the infidelity of his wife, brought on a fever, and he was obliged to confine himself to his bed. It was, therefore, determined to send all the servants out on the following Sunday, and leave the patient alone. The opening the door of the balcony was the signal agreed on, and thus the plot was executed. The lover entered the apartment with the poignard in his hand, fell upon the sick man, gave him several stabs in the belly, and made his escape. But the unfortunate husband calling for help, a young girl, who was with her aunt, Donna Antonia, heard him. The noise of Don Juan in escaping also attracted her attention, as she ran to the apartment of her uncle, whom she found weltering in his blood, and immediately called her aunt. It may be easily conceived that the latter did not fail to cry out for help too, and to feign the deepest despair. Meanwhile the young man had gained the gate of Toledo, and was going to quit Madrid, when he recollected he had no money; he, therefore, turned back, and went to his apartment to get some, but strongly impressed with the embarrassment in which he imagined the object of his love to be, he went to a woman of his acquaintance, and there waited to receive some tidings of her.

Two days passed on, the report of this assassination spread over Madrid,. and in the interval the person who was in the secret of their connexion revealed it to her confessor, who advised her to go and inform the alcade-mayor. The suspicion was confirmed by an intercepted letter, and the culprits were arrested. Don Juan immediately confessed, and Donna Antonia, who at first denied her crime, was convicted. The prosecution continued four months, after which they were condemned, and sentenced to suffer death. All the interest and the most considerable offers were made in vain. At first Donna Antonia flew in a rage, when she was informed that her lover had confessed, and loaded him with reproaches and abuse; but in her last moments her love seemed to be renewed with increased ardour, and when her sentence was read to her, she asked, "And will Don Juan suffer the same fate?" which being answered in the affirmative, she replied, "I am much more grieved, gentlemen, for him than myself," and immediately fainted.

The day of execution at length arrived, for which a scaffold had been erected in the Plaza Mayor. The two culprits having received the sacrament in the chapel of the Dominicans, were conducted to execution by the confraternity del Refugio. They were both dressed in black, and Donna Antonia wept. She had begged as a favour to be strangled first, but the sentence was that both should be executed at the same moment. They were each on a separate seat. Don Juan fainted at the moment when the cord was put round him; but Donna

Antonia sat with great decency, casting her eyes upon her lover. They were despatched in about a minute.

It must be here remarked, that in Spain there is a difference between strangling (dar gorotes) and hanging (aborcar), in the former of which a wheel is used, which turns a cord across a beam before which the criminal sits.

According to custom, the bodies remained exposed in the same state until sunset. Twelve bundles of yellow wax burned, near them on black stands, and some of the executioner's attendants kept guard. The observations and judgments, of the spectators all bore the stamp of the national character. The faces of the deceased being black, in consequence of the reflux of blood during the suffocation, the people of course attributed this to the violence the devil had done to their souls. They compared the two countenances. The men made excuses for Don Juan, and the women took up the defence of Donna Antonia. The majority pitied their unhappy fate. This probably it was, that induced a curate some days after, to say in his sermon, "That he knew for certain, that Madrid contained thousands of women, one half of whom had been guilty of similar crimes, and the other meditated the perpetration of them." I am willing to hope, that the pious pastor in his zeal somewhat exaggerated; yet it is certain that the Spanish women are too often led by the manners of the country to rid themselves of their husbands by poison, or any other method.

MURDERERS DISCOVERED BY A CAT.

A physician of Lyons, of the name of Martin, was required by a justice of the peace to examine the body of a person who had recently been murdered. He accordingly went, and found, in a small room, the body of a young pregnant woman bathed in her blood. A spaniel sat at her feet, licked them from time to time, and howled in a most piteous manner. It did not bark when they entered, but shewed the most unequivocal signs of grief. A large white cat also attracted their attention: it was sitting on the top of a chest of drawers at the end of the room; it was immoveable, with its eyes fixed upon the body, and its looks at once denoted horror and fear. After a slight examination of the body, he told the justice of the peace that he would return the next morning atten o'clock with some other medical persons, to open the body in the presence of the persons suspected of having committed the murder. He accordingly went there the next day; the first object that struck his attention was the cat in the same place, in the same attitude in which it had been the preceding evening, and its looks had acquired such a degree of horror and ferocity that some apprehensions were entertained that it was mad. The room was soon filled with officers of justice and others; there was a considerable noise from the rattling of their arms, and from the conversation which ensued, but it neither caused the cat to alter its position, or withdraw its attention from the corpse. He was proceeding to open the body, in order to extract the child from the womb, when the persons suspected of the murder were brought into the room : at that instant the eyes of the cat sparkled with fury, its hair rose up, it sprung into the middle of the room, stopped for an instant, and then laid down by the side of the dog, and seemed to partake in its indignation for the murder, and its fidelity to its mistress. The mute but terrible witnesses did not escape the observation of the persons accused, they appeared greatly shocked, and all their boldness left them. Subsequent circumstances confirmed the suspicion of their guilt, and they were shortly afterwards executed.

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THIS dreadful event is thus related in a letter from a friend of the unfortunate gentleman, dated December 23, 1792.

"To describe the awful, horrid, and lamentable accident I have just been an eye-witness of, is impossible. Yesterday morning, Mr. Downey, of the Company's troops, Lieutenant Pyefinch, and poor Mr. Munro and I, went on shore on Saugur Island, to shoot deer; we saw innumerable tracks of tygers and deer, but still we were induced to pursue our sport, and did the whole day; about half past three we sat down on the jungle to eat some cold meat sent us from the ship, and had just commenced our meal, when Mr. Pyefinch and a black servant told us there was a fine deer within six yards of us; Mr. Downey and I immediately jumped up to take our guns-mine was the nearest; and I had just laid hold of it, when I heard a roar like thunder, and saw an immense royal tyger spring on the unfortunate Munro, who was sitting down; in a moment his head was in the beast's mouth, and he rushed into the jungle with him with as much ease as I could lift a kitten, tearing him through the thickest bushes and trees-every thing yielding to his monstrous strength. The agonies of horror, regret, and I must say fear, (for there were two tygers, a male and female), rushed on me at once; the only effort I could make was to fire at him, though the poor youth was still in his mouth. I relied partly on Providence, partly on my own aim, and fired a musket. I saw the tyger stagger and agitated, and I cried out so immediately; Mr. Downey then fired two shots, and I one more. We retired from the jungle, and a few minutes after, Mr. Munro came up to us, all over blood, and fell; we took him on our backs to the boat, and got every medical assistance for him from the Valentine Indiaman, which lay at anchor near the island, but in vain. He lived twenty-four hours in the extreme of torture: his head and scull were all torn and broken to pieces, and he was wounded by the beast's

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claws all over his neck and shoulders: but it was better to take him away, though irrecoverable, than leave him to be devoured limb by limb. We have just read the funeral service over his body, and committed it to the deep. He was an amiable and promising youth.

"I must observe there was a large fire blazing close to us, composed of ten or a dozen whole trees: I made it myself on purpose to keep the tygers off, as I had always heard it would. There were eight or ten of the natives about us; many shots had been fired at the place, and much noise and laughing at the time, but the ferocious animal disregarded it all.

"The human mind cannot form an idea of the scene; it turned my very soul within me. The beast was about four feet and a half high, and nine long. His head appeared as large as an ox's, his eyes darting fire, and his roar, when he first seized his prey, will never be out of my recollection. We had scarcely pushed our boat from that cursed shore, when the tygress made her appearance, raging mad almost, and remained on the sand as long as the distance would allow me to see her."

THE GUARDIAN SNAKE.

On a journey from Baroche to Dhuboy, a Mr. Forbes stopped at Nurrah, a large ruined town, which had been plundered and burnt by the Mahrattas. The principal house had belonged to an opulent man, who emigrated during the war, and died in a distant country. Mr. Forbes was privately informed that under one of the towers there was a secret cell, formed to contain his treasure; the information could not be doubted, because it came from the mason, who constructed the cell. Accordingly, the man accompanied him through several spacious courts and apartments, to a dark closet in a tower; the room was about eight feet square, being the whole size of the interior of the tower; and it was some stories above the place where the treasure was said to be deposited. In the floor there was a hole large enough for a slender person to pass through: they enlarged it and sent down two men by a ladder. After descending several feet, they came to another floor, composed in like manner of bricks and channam, and here also was a similar aperture. This also was enlarged, torches were procured, and by their light Mr. Forbes perceived from the upper apartment a dungeon of great depth below, as the mason had described. He desired the men to descend and search for the treasure; but they refused, declaring that wherever money was concealed in Hindostan, there was also a demon, in the shape of a serpent, to guard it. He laughed at their superstition, and repeated his orders in such a manner as to enforce obedience, though his attendants sympathised with the men, and seemed to expect the event with more of fear and awe than of curiosity. The ladder was too short to reach the dungeon; strong ropes therefore were sent for, and more torches. The men reluctantly obeyed, and as they were lowered, the dark sides and the moist floor of the dungeon extinguished the light which they carried in their hands. But they had not been many seconds on the ground, before they screamed out that they were enclosed with a large snake. In spite of their screams, Mr. Forbes was incredulous, and declared that the ropes should not be let down to them till he had seen the creature; their cries were dreadful; he however was inflexible; and the upper lights were held steadily, to give him as distinct a view as possible into the dungeon. There he perceived something like billets of wood, or rather, he says, like a ship's

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