The Laboratory
In The Laboratory, the courtesan chooses poison as her murder weapon. Poison is often the weapon of choice for female killers. It requires little or no physical strength to administer, and can be done secretly. It also leaves little evidence thus making it difficult to detect the culprit. We believe the act of murder is because of another woman that her lover is with and she feels physically inferior to her rival. We know this because she starts saying ‘What a drop! She’s not little, no minion like me.’ The murderer is also fascinated and excited about the poison and power of the poison, she says ‘And yonder soft phial, the exquisite blue sure to taste sweetly’ She thinks that her rival who she is out to kill will think nothing of it and will believe it’s just an ordinary beverage. She then also goes onto say ‘to carry pure death in an earring, a casket.’ Meaning she is so excited about the whole aspect of being able to carry death in such a small item. So she plans to slip her rival only known as ‘Pauline’ and give her thirty minutes to live until ‘her breast and her arms and her hands should drop dead!’ This is what she believes will happen in her head, she believes the murder will happen quickly and she also chose poison because she didn’t want to see it happen. Browning writes ‘The delicate droplet, my whole fortunes fee’ showing that she’s incredibly dedicated in getting this guy and she’s spent her whole fortune on the poison and she’s not going to give up until the deed is complete. The character is quite evil in a way; not only has she murdered someone but she says ‘ Not that i bid you spare her the pain; Let death be felt and the proof remain; Brand, burn up, bite into its grace- He is sure to remember her dying face!’ Which is almost saying that he is going to remember this moment for a long time and this is her perfect revenge on him for leaving her for this other woman. The character is also quite optimistic about the whole thing as she doesn’t feel