The White Perfumery Bottle;

or,

The Murder Detected

by Dr. S. Compton Smith

A few years ago the good citizens of Alexandria were greatly excited, in consequence of an extraordinary murder which had been perpetrated in the immediate vicinity of their little town. It was a circumstance the like of which had never occurred there since the settlement of the place; and there were old men living in the town whose fathers had been born there.

It was true that men had shot each other down in the streets of Alexandria; but it was either to recent insults, in self-defense, in some individual or family quarrel, some misunderstanding at the card table, some political difference of the parties, or from some other equally reasonable cause. But a downright, cold-blooded murder, where the only apparent object was robbery,—a murder attended as this was with the most marked inhumanity, was really astounding!

The facts were these:—

For many years a Jew peddler named Abrams had been in the habit of frequenting the town, where he usually laid in his assortment of goods, consisting of every imaginable article likely to be required by the customers whom he regularly supplied.

He had a particular district of the country, to which for years he had confined himself; and always made his circuits with such regularity that the people of the different neighborhoods knew, to an hour, when to look for him. Abrams had become so well known, as an honest dealer, that he was frequently entrusted with many, and sometimes important, commissions.

If there were any watches or jewelry to be repaired, they were laid aside ’till the visit of “honest Abrams,” as he was familiarly called, who would have them put in order by a fellow countryman in Alexandria, and bring them home… Read More