SINGULAR POISONING CASE AT EDINBURGH.

Samoa Times and South Sea Gazette, Issue 50, 14 September 1878, Page 4

SINGULAR POISONING CASE AT EDINBURGH.

The Times gives the following particulars of this remorknble caso:—

The trial of M. Chantrcllo, at Edinburgh, for poisoning, his wife, ended on Friday, with a verdict of guilty against the prisoner. The evidenco in tho Co9e was almost wholly circumstantial. M. Chanti-elle was a teacher of languages, who had been living ia Edinburgh for some time past, and had bcon married about ten y«ars ago to the woman he had poisoned. It was at the beginning of the prosont year that the crime was committed. Up to New Year's Day Madame' Chantrcllo had been in good health. On that day she became slightly unwell, and wont very early to bed. The noxt morning she was found by the maid-sorvant in a state of partial insen.•liliilily, unable to speak aud moaning loudly. M. Chautrelle, who had been keeping, as l>e generaly did, in another i partment, was at oaoo summoned to his '•> ife's room. The servant, who had left 1 1 em together for • minute or two, i Lservod on her return that M. Chnntrelle

was near the window of the room. He complained of a strong smell of gas, but lln' servant liu-l perceived bo sueh smell when she first went into the room, and was scarcely able to detect any. M. Chantrelle then went for a physician to attend his wife for what he described as a case of coal-gas poisoning. When the physician arrived, he came at ones to the-conclusion that the case was not what it had been xeported to him, but that Madame Chantrelle'a symptoms were due to narcotie poison. She was taken to the infirmary, and -died on the same day. On the Saturday following her husband was arrested on a charge of wilful murder. He was put en his trial last Tuesday, and has now been fouud guilty by the unanimous verdict of the jury.

With regard to this caso there were two points that needed to be established—the reason of Madame Chant relle's death, and the part, if any, wh:A her husbaml had flayed in causing it. As to the former ef these, the medical evidence left very little room for doubt. There were the symptoms, in the Brat place, which pointed to narcotic p<>:-; using, and not, as the prisoner hj , uggestcd to poisoning from the effect ->i gas. Il is U-uc that no trace of the presence of norcatio poison could be found ia her body when it >vas examined. This, however, was just what might have been expected. A uoreotic poison would speedly be absorbed, and the traces of it would accordingly disappear within a few hours after it was swallowed. If coal gas had been the cause of death, it would have been discovered by the smell of the breath, and still more certainly by the smell of the body when it was opened. Thoro was no such smell, and no possibility, therefore, than the death could be put down to the cause M. Ghantrelle had assigned for it. But, besides, this, there was direct evidence that opium in some form or other had been administered to Madame Chantrelle, or had been taken by her, on the day of her death or on the evening before it The servant who first went to her room observed a stain on the Bheets, apparently from vomit. This stain, when subjected to analysis, was found to contain opium. We may take it, therefore, as certain, from the positive and negative evidence of the case, that the oauso of Madame Chautrelle's death was an excessive dose of opium. This established, it remained only to make out whether or no her husband was the guilty party who had administered it. The evidence on this point-was indirect, but taken altogether it was very strong indeed. Her husband, it was proved, had opium in his possession. He had bought some in the November of last year. That he had administered it to bis wife was a way of accounting for the fact that she had taken it. It was certain, too, that he had endeavored to put the medical witnesses and the police on what wo may fa>rm « fal=o •.«--» T»-- a —r : r- —,*-;- wife's bedroom was found broken, and in such a manner the fracturo could not have been accidental. case for the proseoutlon was that he had broken the pipe himself by way of furnishing what might appear a sufficient cause for his wife's death. His protestations of innocence before he had been accused of anything were, moreover, such as would not have been likely to proceed from an innocent man. We must now look back a little to the previous relations of the husband and wife. The marriage, which, as we have said, was solemnized about ten years ago, had not been a happy one. It had begun badly. Their first child was born when they had married about two months. Long before Madame Chantrelle's death she had been a sufferer from her husband's ill usage. He had abused uei without reason, had Struck heron several occasions, and bad been systematically unfaithful to her" Onoe he had presented a loaded pistoi at her, and threatened to take nor life. The threat that he would poison her he had used several times. It was in his power; he said to administer a fatal dose which no expert could detect afterwards. The poor woman, it appears, hail gone latterly in constint terror of her life. Nor, apart from the bad terms on which husband and wife hod been living, was there wanting a more special motive to the crime of which Chantrelle has been found guilty. In October last he insured his wife'B lifo for tho sum of a thousand pounMs in the Accidental Assurance Association of Scotland. The policy was so framed as to take effect only in the case of her death. There was no provision for compensation for injury, as there usually is in such insurances, and tho policy, accordingly, had beon issued on lower terms. Now, if Madame Chantrelle had really died, as the prisoner wished it to be believed she had, from the occidental breakage of a gaspipe in her bedroom, the sum for which she was insured became his.

Side by side with Chantrellc's case, there has been a trial in course of procedure at Paris for a crime of the same character. DauvaJ, a chemist, who was accused of having murdered his wife by repeated small doses of arsenic, has just been found guilty, but with extenuating circumstances. The finding of the jury is a very singular one. If Danval was guilty of the thing imputed to him, his case was about as bad as oould be imagined. The death Chantrelle intlioted was speedy and comparatively painless, while poisoning by arsenic- is a ]>r rfotUM torture, and involves a degree of cruelty and malice for which DO pnnbhinttttt -ii'h be held excessive. I'liat a ua ■■ l ni boen convicted of it should smp ..... his life in consequence, can be explained only is not very creditable to the Jury who have limught in thj verdict. I bait finding probably represents either a

sentimental horror of the punishment of death or a vague doubt whether the prisoner was really guilty at all. There was some ditference of opinion, it appears, among the medical witnesses at lianval's trial, and he may have had the benefit of it in a side-way. The act of which ho was accased has been brought home to him sufficiently to justify a conviction. The doubt with which the case was surrounded has, so to say, taken of the edge of the sentence. He has been pronounced guilty of a murder the most horrible and the most fiendish but the bagne has been substituted for the guillotine.