“FATAL WATER.”

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2389, 2 January 1909, Page 11 (Supplement)

“FATAL WATER.”

AT £lO A PINT.

Tho sweet uses of advertisement and the fact that human credulity always finds somebody to play upon it are once more exemplified by a case which has just transpired in Paris. “Fatal water/’ love philtres, jealousy, poisons, charms, magi© paper, /.and other waTes of Avitchcraft were sold by a couplo of successful charlatans, a wizard and his wife, in a flat just; off the boulevurds. Both gave consultations free of charge, but their magio medicine avas anything but cheap. “The “fatal water” cost 12s 6d for a very' small phial. But it worked wonders, a fid a' little went a long way. If .you had an enemy, you poured three drops of it on to the floor of his house, and thereafter his roof and all beneath it Avere accursed, and nothing but evil befell them. A jilted lover could buy two potent beverages. He could first try love philtre and get tho false one to drink it. In ‘nine cases out of ten she became instantly as deeply enamoured of him as Isolde was of Tristan. If,_ by extraordinary ill luck, the potion did fail, his prospects wero proved 'hopeless, and naught avus left to him but 1 revenge. Three drops of the jealousy poison brought cruel retribution upon the fickle lady. The method of administering them 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. But if that condition avere duly fulfilled the poison Avorked infallibly. Tho lady and her lover instantly fell out, hoAA r ever fond they had been before, and quarrelled violently. The arts of the wizards, who allied themselves the “Scarlet Sorcerers,” seem not to have been of a kind generally to spread peace in the neighborhood. However, they were not, as a rule, as effectual as advertised, land for that reason \ho magicians have got into trouble. Vindictive customers who spent money on the fatal water and the jealousy potion found that their enemies prospered all the same, and that false ladies AA-ere just as happy as befo're Avith other lips and other hearts. So they communicated Avith the police. A mass of correspondence has been seized at the wizard’s flat, and it contains some curious matter, for example a large order for fatal water from a person übout to leave for St. Petersburg, who proposes on arriving there, to cast a spell over the Tsar. The magicians, against A\-liom proceedings have been instituted, confessed' to the poGice that they obtained their fatal water, .which they sold nt the rate of about £lO a pint, merely by turning on their kitchen tap. At one time the couple toured all over Europe, where they gave thought-reading performances in music halls.