For some five or six years the Duke and Duchess, who had a large family, had had in their service as governess a certain Mademoiselle de Luzy. Of this lady the Duchess, with or without reason, but most probably with very good reason, at any rate so far as the transfer of her husband’s affections was concerned, had become furiously jealous: so much so that her father, Marshal Sebastiani, insisted upon Mademoiselle de Luzy’s dismissal. This, however, did not put an end to the intimacy, of whatever nature it may have been, between her and the Duke, for it was shown that on the arrival of the family in Paris from the country, he drove at once to her house. That night the murder was committed. When the servants entered the bedroom, they had to face a sight so appalling that M. Delessert, the Prefect of Police, whose business made him familiar with the horrors of crime, told Mr. Henry Greville that in all his experience he had not come across so ghastly a spectacle. There were signs of a desperate struggle, for the unhappy Duchess, a short but stout woman, had evidently fought fiercely for her life. Suffice it to say here that the evidence against the Duke was damning. A pistol known to belong to him had been used as a bludgeon, and was clotted with blood and hair—some of the hair was his own, pulled out in the cruel fight! He had opened the window in order to excite the belief that the crime was the work of burglars; but it was pointed out to him that nothing had been stolen, and that a figure resembling his had been seen from the outside opening the casement—upon which he observed that the matter assumed a grave aspect. He was arrested and carried to prison, but managed to take a dose of poison which proved insufficient; a second dose was smuggled, as it was averred, into his cell, and of this he died; but there were many people who believed that the poison was a farce, and that he was spirited away to England, where he is supposed to have lived for many years in hiding somewhere in the Lake district. The possibility of this escape was strenuously denied both by M. Delessert and the Procureur-Général; but it is significant that the former did not himself see the Duke’s body, although it was his duty to do so. He was prevented by other business. Mademoiselle de Luzy was arrested and kept in solitary confinement. But when she was examined she gave her evidence clearly and simply. Nothing was elicited to show that she was _particeps criminis_, or even that her relations with the Duke had gone beyond the bounds of propriety. She was of course released, and afterwards married very respectably. All France was moved to the core by the horror of the crime; but what aroused even more indignation than the murder itself was, as I well recollect, the widespread idea that for political reasons there had been a miscarriage of justice and that the murderer, owing to his exalted position, had been allowed to disappear scot-free.