THE OLD POISON-LORE. 
9 
§ 7-1 
wholly opposed to the Anglo-Saxon method of thought. To what anger 
the people were wrought on detecting poisoners is seen in the fact that, 
in 1542, a young woman was boiled alive in Smithfield for poisoning 
three households. 1 
§ 7. Two great criminal schools arose from the fifteenth to the 
seventeenth centuries in Venice and Italy. The Venetian poisoners are 
of earlier date than the Italian, and flourished chiefly in the fifteenth 
century. Here we have the strange spectacle, not of the depravity of 
individuals, but of the government of the State formally recognising 
secret assassination by poison, and proposals to remove this or that 
prince, duke, or emperor, as a routine part of their deliberations. Still 
more curious and unique, the dark communings of “ the council of ten ” 
were recorded in writing, and the number of those who voted for and 
who voted against the proposed crime, the reason for the assassination, 
and the sum to be paid, still exist in shameless black and white. Those 
who desire to study this branch of secret history may be referred to a 
small work by Carl Hoff, which gives a brief account of what is known 
of the proceedings of the council. One example will here suffice. On 
the 15th of December 1513 a Franciscan brother, John of Ragubo, 
offered a selection of poisons, and declared himself ready to remove any 
objectionable person out of the way. For the first successful case he 
required a pension of 1500 ducats yearly, which was to be increased on 
the execution of future services. The presidents, Girolando Duoda and 
Pietro Guiarina, placed the matter before the “ ten ” on the 4th of 
January 1514, and on a division (10 against 5) it was resolved to accept 
so patriotic an offer, and to experiment first on the Emperor Maximilian. 
The bond laid before the “ ten ” contained a regular tariff—for the great 
Sultan 500 ducats, for the King of Spain 150 ducats, but the journey 
and other expenses were in each case to be defrayed ; the Duke of Milan 
was rated at 60, the Marquis of Mantua at 50, the Pope could be removed 
at 100 ducats. The curious offer thus concludes :—“ The farther the 
journey, the more eminent the man, the more it is necessary to reward 
the toil and hardships undertaken, and the heavier must be the pay¬ 
ment.” The council appear to have quietly arranged thus to take away 
the lives of many public men, but their efforts were only in a few cases 
successful. When the deed was done, it was registered by a single 
marginal note, “factum” 
What drugs the Venetian poisoners used is uncertain. The Italians 
became notorious in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries for their 
knowledge of poisons, partly from the deeds of Toffana and others, and 
1 “ This yeare, the 17th of March, was boyled in Smithfield one Margaret Davie, 
a mayden, which had pouysoned 3 householdes that sho dwelled in. One being her 
mistress, which dyed of the same, and one Darington and his wyfo, which she also 
dwelled with in Coleman Street, which dyed of the same, and also one Tinleys, which 
dyed also of the same.”—Wriothesloy’s Chronicle , a.d. 1542. 
