lady in France.  In vain she fell upon her knees, and with all that tender elocution so natural to their sex when in distress, besought them that they would spare her life, which, as she said, could be of no benefit to them, and could only serve to increase the number of their sins; but they were too much flushed in cruelty and blood to give any attention to her entreaties, and so without respect either to the softness of her sex, or to her tender age, with a shower of blows from their clubs they laid her dead upon the floor.  Being thus become master of the house, Perrier took the keys, and opening the several apartments, disclosed to them all the riches of his deceased master.  They immediately brought away all the ready money they found in the house, which amounted to little less than ten thousand crowns.  All the rich movables they conveyed away to a boat which they had prepared for that purpose, and had fastened in a creek of the river on a bank of which the house stood.  They loaded and unloaded this vessel five or six times, for there was no hurry in carrying away the goods, seeing it was the dead time of the night, and when they had thoroughly plundered it of everything that would yield money, they then came away and went to the place where they laid up their spoils.  There it was resolved to divide the booty, and Perrier claimed the largest share, as well in right of his having put them upon that project, as that he had assisted more strenuously in the execution of it than any of them; for when men associate themselves to commit wickedness, he who surpasses the rest in villainy claims the same reward, and from the same reasons, as he who in another society surpasses all his neighbours in virtue.  When this execrable fact was over, and he had secured his share in the plunder, he returned home to the house of his master, and remained in carrying on the ordinary course of business of his master.

About two days after, it happened that a man who had business with the old gentleman called at his country house, and after knocking a good while at the door, finding that nobody answered, he went to town, and meeting with Jacques Perrier at his master’s house, he told him of his calling upon him in the country, and that he found nobody there.  Jacques counterfeited the greatest surprise at the news, and calling many assistants, went down immediately to his master’s seat, and with all the seeming horror imaginable, became a second time a witness of those barbarities which he and his villainous associates had committed.  At the sight of the murdered maid in the kitchen, he cried out with the greatest vehemence, and seemed in an agony of sorrow; but when he saw the body of his master, he roared and stamped, he cried out, tore his hair and threw himself upon the body as if he had never more intended to have drawn breath.  All the persons he had carried with him were effectually deceived by his behaviour, and were under apprehensions lest his too violent grief should throw him into a fever or prompt him to lay hands upon himself.  He was not contented with acting thus upon the spot, but resolved to play it over again when he came back to Paris.  There abundance of people pitied him, and looked on him as one whom the sincere love he had for his master had drawn to the utmost despair by reason of his unfortunate death.