Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 05.pdf/514

 Rh This is the most important general legal movement ever set on foot in this country. It has been delayed by waiting for the biennial legislatures to appoint commissioners; but now that nineteen States and Territories, embracing the greatest and most influ ential, except Ohio, have joined in it, satisfactory results may be predicted. The great desideratum now is to press the measures recommended upon the attention of the legislatures. It is to be regretted that only four of the States have made provision for paying even the expenses of the commissioners. Full attendance cannot be expected until this is remedied. The Easy Chair feels like rocking on the toes of the Milwaukee newspapers, not one of which seemed to have any adequate appreciation of the importance and dignity of the purpose and the work of this conference. "RAISING THE DEVIL " WITH ONE'S WIFE. — In his very entertaining volume of reminiscences, "Hic et Ubique," Sir William Fraser thus retells, with some additions, the story of the murder of the Duchess de Praslin : — "Shortly before the fall of Louis Philippe a fearful crime was perpetrated in Paris, which, no doubt, shook the King's already tottering throne. The Duke de Prasliu had led for some years a very unhappy existence, in consequence of the over-attachment of a neglected wife, lie appears to have been a man of a highly nervous tem perament; and his wife, most unfortunately, a woman of great sensitiveness, who deeply felt his abandonment. It was suggested, of course, that the cause of the quarrel was a governess, Mademoiselle de L.; this was proved not to have been the case. It ultimately became clear that the incessant letters written by the unhappy duchess to her husband had so worked upon his nature as to drive him almost to frenzy. The first facts known were that the Duchess de Praslin, the daughter of Marshal Sebas tian!, had been found on the floor of her bedroom, wounded in numerous places, covered with blood; her lx:d, the carpet, the furniture, and the walls of the room all flecked with it; the bell-ropes had been cut, and marks on the wall gave evidence of the unfortunate woman's attempts to escape. At first a carpenter was suspected. Suspicion soon turned upon the duke. It was remarkable that, notwithstanding the desperate conflict which had obviously taken place, there was no trace of blood upon any garment worn by him, nor in his sleeping-room. The evidence, however, was sufficiently strong for him to be committed for trial In a few days we heard of his death, and it was believed that previous to being taken to prison he had swallowed poison; some thought the poison was given to him in the prison. No doubt a public execution would, in the state of political feeling, have done despe rate mischief to the reigning dynasty. One theory was that, having held high office in the household of one of Louis Philippe's family, he had been permitted to escape. "So far the story is well known; what follows is not.

477

I have it on first-rate authority, that of the late Mr. Lau rence Peel, the brother of the Premier, who at the time waa residing in Paris, and was intimate with the best French society. It was well known to the relations and friends of the Duchess de Praslin that from childhood she had had a constant fear of the Devil; that is, the Devil incarnate. Her imagination pictured him with the conventional horns and hoofs of the Middle Ages, — what Cuvier defined him at an interview, 'graminivorous.' A year before her murder she told a few of her mcjst inti mate acquaintances, fearing no doubt ridicule, that on the previous night the Devil had appeared at her bedside; that he placed his right hand upon her throat. She awoke, screamed violently, and the fiend disappeared. This was smiled at by those who heard her story. Some years after her murder, in a secret closet of the Maison Sebastian!, was found a complete masquerade-suit of the devil, having the horns and hoofs and the hairy covering, and drenched in blood. Mr. Peel added that no doubt the Duke de Praslin had contemplated the murder a year earlier, but was prevented from accomplishing it by the awakening of his wife, and her screams, which drove him from the room."

From another entertaining autobiographical book, by T. Adolphus Trollope, the Lawyer's Easy Chair learns two striking facts : that Garibaldi was in favor of killing all priests, on the ground that they were the worst kind of "assassins, — assassins of the soul; " and that Walter Savage Landor dropped his A's. Dickens, in his caricature of this learned man as " Boythorn," in "Bleak House," does not commemorate this singularity.

IN RK GRANDFATHER. — The Lawyer's Easy Chair has discovered, in the last three years, a new and satisfactory occupation for vacation, and that is rocking grandchildren. Victor Hugo said that the best and surest friendship is that between grand father and grandson, and for once Victor was sound. Men live their lives over again in these little crea tures, and can spoil them without feeling any respon sibility. We are carrying on the grandfather business quite successfully, and recommend it to others as very remunerative. Recently we wrote in the " Albany Law Journal " as follows : — "Our amiable friends, Judge and Mrs. Bradwell, of the 'Chicago Legal News,' publish a beautiful little picture of their small grandchildren, boy and girl. We believe the mother of the girl is a lawyer We want it distinctly understood that in the character of grandfather we take water from nobody, and challenge all comers at catch weights, — bar none, not exceeding three years old and three months old respectively. The parties can be inter viewed at Buffalo. Now, by Saint Paul, the work goes bravely on 1 But we grow afraid of kidnappers."

That paragraph was inclosed to us in a letter from one of the reverend justices of the United