Maria Louisa, daughter of Louis XIV, who married Charles II, King of Spain, is said to have died from the effects of poison in 1689. Voltaire states: "It was undoubtedly believed that the Austrian Ministers of Charles II would get rid of her, because she loved her country and might prevent the king, her husband, from declaring for the allies against France; they even sent her from Versailles what they believed to be a counter-poison." This did not arrive until after her death. In the memoirs of the Marquis de Dangeau, he says: "The king announced the death of his daughter at supper in these words--'The Queen of Spain is dead, poisoned by eating of an eel pye; and the Countess de Pernits and the Cameras, Zapeita, and Nina, who eat of it after her, are also dead of the same poison.'" It is more than probable the unfortunate queen and her ladies succumbed to some putrefactive poison in the fish itself, and were not killed by intent. Nothing was known of animal poisons in those days, and such was the state of the public mind that nearly every sudden death was at once attributed to poison. The close of the reign of Louis XIV was marked by the sudden deaths of no less than six members of the royal family in close succession. The public sorrow and excitement were great, and rumours and suspicions of poisoning were revived with fury unexampled. The prince had a laboratory, and among other arts studied chemistry. This was considered by the ignorant to be sufficient proof, and the public outcry became terrible. On a visit of the Marquis de Canellae, the prince was found extended on the floor shedding tears, and distracted with despair. His chemist and fellow worker, Homberg, ran to surrender himself at the Bastille, but they refused to receive him without orders. The prince was so beside himself on hearing the public outcry and suspicions that he demanded to be put in prison so that his innocence might be cleared by judicial forms. The _lettre de cachet_ was actually made out, but not signed. The marquis alone kept his head, and prevailed upon the prince's mother to oppose the _lettre de cachet_. "The monarch who granted it, and his nephew who demanded it, were both equally wretched," says the historian. The "poudre de succession," famous in Paris as a secret poison, was at one time supposed to consist of diamond dust, but, according to Haller, was really composed of sugar of lead. This was used by several notorious criminals during the seventeenth century. [2] Hoffmann, _Medecina Rationalis Systematica_, i. 198. CHAPTER V POISONING PLOTS THE use of poison as an instrument for political purposes during the Middle Ages soon spread over Europe, and the dread of wholesale poisoning caused numerous panics. Some of these alarms may probably have been circulated by unscrupulous traders who had articles to sell, or some business interest to forward, but of others authentic records exist.