740 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



was the Count of Vermandois, a natural son of Louis XIV, who died, 

 to the knowledge of the public, in the army, of small-pox, in 1683, and 

 that they buried a stake to personate him, over which Louis XIV had 

 a solemn service performed. It is easier to believe in this stake than 

 to contemn a grandmother. 



An improbable story will not make its way in the world unless it 

 is patronized by some grand personage, who has an interest in accred- 

 iting it. No one contributed more to propagate the legend of Caspar 

 Kauscr than King Louis I of Bavaria, who bore little good-will to his 

 neighbors in the west. His father, Maximilian Joseph, had promised 

 himself to annex the Badenese palatinate to his states, and had con- 

 cluded for that purpose a secret treaty with Austria in 1815. Men 

 always dislike those whom they have not succeeded in despoiling. 

 King Louis would have been very ready to discredit the descendants 

 of the second marriage, who had mounted the throne in 1830, in the 

 person of the Grand-duke Leopold I. The occasion seemed a good 

 one for him to question the validity of their rights, and to insinuate 

 to Europe that they had come to power through an abominable con- 

 spiracy, and that the legitimate heir was the stout boy whom he had 

 harbored in his good city of Nuremberg. To please him, it was neces- 

 sary to swallow the story with the eyes shut and the mouth wide open. 

 Skeptics and cavilers evidently disobliged him. 



Whether by compliance or for love of the marvelous, some persons 

 in high circles were inclined to believe in Caspar. The painter Greil 

 painted his portrait in pastel ; he represented him as he saw him — that 

 is, as an unprepossessing rustic of low physiognomy. The portrait 

 was engraved, and the engraver transformed the rustic into a Prince 

 Charming. The Princess Royal of Prussia, who was only acquainted 

 with the engraving, wrote, in 1832, to Queen Caroline of Bavaria, sis- 

 ter of the Grand-duke Charles : "The portrait of this young man has 

 vividly interested me. ... I do not know whether it may not be the 

 effect of my smitten imagination, but it seems that I find some re- 

 semblance between Hauser's features and those of your poor brother. 

 . . . This face troubles me like a specter." But it was, above all, im- 

 portant to persuade the mother, the Grand-duchess Stephanie, and 

 win her over to the good cause. Suffering greatly from the effects of 

 a severe labor, she had seen little of her child ; she had not witnessed 

 his death ; and it is very tempting to a mother to believe that her 

 son is not dead. Caspar Ilauser was frequently spoken of to her, and 

 she was persuaded to have him brought to her, in the hope that her 

 heart might tell her something. She shook her head, and continued 

 incredulous. The celebrated jurist, Mittermaier, Professor of Law at 

 Heidelberg, had a conversation with her on the subject. She declared 

 to him that the abduction of her son and the substitution of another 

 child was "a pure impossibility." "My mother," wrote the Duchess 

 of Hamilton, " never believed a word of that story. That King Louis 



