56 
Kaspar Hauser. 
sudden and unexpected that some persons believed he was 
poisoned, while others talked of a fatal shock, caused by a ghost 
which appeared to him in the royal chapel. 
The story ran that one night the guard whose beat lay near the 
chapel reported that the windows were brilliantly illuminated at 
midnight. 
The next night another guard made the same statement, and 
Ludwig being told of it, went himself to the chapel to discover 
the cause. 
There he saw, seated upon the throne in a blaze of light, his 
predecessor, Kail, holding by the hand a young child, and the 
sight affected the guilty Grand-Duke so powerfully that he fell ill 
and died in a few hours. 
It was said also that on his accession to the throne he was 
visited by Karl’s spectre, accompanied by two children. 
Whatever other worth such rumours may have, they show at 
least that a suspicion of foul play concerning the infant children of 
Grand-Duke Karl had taken firm root in the public mind. 
Another significant circumstance connected with the death of 
Ludwig was the fact that, in conformity to his express command, 
he was not buried with his ancestors in the royal vault at Pforz 
heim, although the last of the regular line, but was interred in a 
new vault, which he had caused to be built in Karlsruhe some time 
SYefore his death. 
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The decease of the ruling Prince was a great embarrassment to 
he Government, as the rumours concerning his legitimate 
successor could no longer be ignored. The chief officials of the 
State met in secret council on the very day of the Grand-Duke’s 
death, the session being opened by a speech from the Minister of 
Foreign Affairs, Herr von Berstett,who declared in plain words what 
probably all of them knew in their secret thoughts, namely, that 
‘he successor to the Crown was living in ignorance of his rights, 
and that the question before the Council was to determine 
whether the abducted Prince or the presumptive heir was to be 
yroclaimed as the ruler of Baden. The rightful claimant of the