POISON REVELATIONS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20366, 21 September 1929, Page 11

POISON REVELATIONS.

MURDER FOB LOAD. QfciHAY*

DISCLOSURES IN HUNGARY.

Investigation into the monster " poison cult" in the province of Szalnok, in Hungary, continues to reveal astonislivng facts. A mass of evidence has been pouring in as a result of the suicide Of the midwife, Mme. Fazekas, whose arsenic phiitres were so popular in her neighbourhood. ' 1 ' i

It was shown that Mme. Fazekas could be persuaded to concoct one of those philtres for a waggon-load of hay. She had a little farm of her own and a'load of hay came in very handy now and then. Her usual price, however, was from "150 to 200 pengoes (from £6 to The latest investigations spread from three villages already involved "to . the neighbouring hamlets of Kunszenmarton. &

Keen observers attribute, this monstrous business, and the other evils of -the district to the fact that the feudal system has never been quite broken up iu Hungary, and that more than half the country is still in the hands of the hig land-* owners. In the vicinity of Tiszakwert one man owns 30,000. acresof the /fattesti lands, while the peasants are forced to eke out a meagre living on tiny-plot«« Their gifced of the land which keeps them alive is comparable to others® greed <of money. One woman invoked the services of th«i übiquitous midwife because her father-in-law refused to give his fields to his son, and she feared he would remarry. An« other woman,: aged 20, married a penniless youth and pleaded with her parent to give her nine acres, so that the young couple could call the plot their own. "Wait until' we ar» dead; you can Have everything then," said the old folks. So she went to Mme. Fazekas.