THE SCARLET SORCERERS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 304, 19 December 1908, Page 4

THE SCARLET SORCERERS

£lO A PINT FOll WATER. •• Fatal water,", love philtres, jealousy poisons, charms, magic paper, and other wares of witchcraft were sold by a couple of successful charlatans, a wizard and his wife, in a Hat just oil' the boulevards in finis. Both gave consultations free of charge, but their magic medicine was anything but cheap. The. "fatal water "cost 12s (id for a very small phial. But it worked wonders, and a-, little went a long way. If you had an enemy you poured three drops of it on the floor of his house, and thereafter his roof and all beneath it were, accursed, and nothing but evil betel them. A jilted lover could buy two potent beve"ages. He could first try a love philtre

and get the false one to drink it. In nine eases out of ten she became instantly as deeply enamoured of lihu as Isolde'was of Tristan. If. by extraordinary ill-luck, the potion did fail, his prospects were proved hopeless, and' naught «as left to him hut revenge. Three drops of the jealousy poison brought cruel retribution upoa the fickle lady. The method of administerin;,' was a delicate one, as they had to be poured upon her head at the precise moment when she was allowing the other man to imprint a kiss upon her false cheek, lint if that condition -were dnlv fulfilled the poison worked infallibly. The Imlv and her lover instantly

fell mil. however fond thev had been before, and quarrelled violently. The ails! of the wizards, who called themselves flic "Scarlet Sorcerers,'' seem not lo have been of a kind generally to spread peace in the neighbourhood. However, they were not. a, a rule, as effectual as advertised, and For Hint reason the magicians got into trouble. Vindictive customer- who spent money on the fatal water and the jealousy portion found that their enemies prospered all the sain-, and (hat false ladies wvre jusf as happv as before with other lips and other hearts. So last month they coniiiiuuicafed with the police. A muss of correspondence was seized at lliin wizard-' flat, and it contains some

furious mutter, fur eviniplc, a lar«e order for fatal water for a person about to leave for St. Petersburg, who proposed on arriviiie: there to rust a spell over the Czar. The nianician, against; whom ' proceedings have been instituted, confessed to the police that thev obtained their fatal water, which thev sold at the rule of CIO a pint, merely by liirniiis; on their kitchen tap. At on? time the couple loured all over Europe, I where they have been thought-rending in ! music Mis, '