Kaspar was taken home and put to bed, when it was discovered that there was a deep stab in his left side. For some hours he was too ill to be questioned, but on the 15th he was able to tell his story. On the 14th, as he was coming out of the government buildings to go home to dinner, he was accosted by a man who promised to tell him who his parents were, if he would come to a spot in the public gardens. He refused, as he was going home to dinner, but made an appointment for that afternoon. After dinner he called on the clergyman's wife, and then went to the gardens, where he found the man waiting for him. The man led him to the Uz monument, which was at a little distance from the main path, and shut in by trees. Here he made him take a solemn oath of secrecy and handed him the little purse, which Kaspar, in his hurry to seize it, let drop. As he stooped to pick it up he was stabbed, and when he lifted himself up the stranger was gone. Then he ran home. For two days he was not supposed to be in any danger, but fever set in; the doctors gave no hope of his recovery, and on the 17th he died. His death caused great excitement, not only in Ausbach and Nuremberg, but throughout all Germany. The question as to whether he was an impostor or not was hotly debated; those who favoured the former theory insisting that he had killed himself accidentally when he only meant to wound himself and so excite sympathy. Some of the doctors declared, however, that that was quite impossible, for the wound was meant to kill, and could only have been self-inflicted by a left-handed person of great strength, for it had pierced through a padded coat. A large reward (1,200_l._) was offered for the capture of the assassin, but in vain; and the spot of the murder was marked by an inscription in Latin: HIC OCCULTUS OCCULTO OCCISUS EST (Here the Mystery was mysteriously murdered). The same idea is repeated on his tombstone. 'Here lies K. H., the riddle of the age. His birth was unknown, his death mysterious.' His death was the signal for a violent paper-war between his friends and his enemies. It raged hotly for years; but his friends have never succeeded in proving who he was; why, after having been shut up for so long, he was at last set free; or why his death was, after all, necessary; while his enemies have utterly failed to prove that he was an impostor.[11] FOOTNOTES: [10] Probably the man had tied a piece of black crape over his face as a mask. [11] This is rather a picturesque than a critical story of Kaspar Hauser. The evidence of the men who first met him shows that he could then speak quite rationally. The curious will find a brief but useful account of him in the Duchess of Cleveland's 'Kaspar Hauser' (Macmillans, 1893.) _AN ARTIST'S ADVENTURE_