HAUSER, KASPAR (c. 1812-1833), a German youth whose origin is surrounded with mystery. The first record of him is in May 1828, when he appeared in Nuremberg, dressed as a peasant, and with a helpless and bewildered air that attracted attention. In his possession was found a letter purporting to be written by a labourer, stating that the boy was given into his custody on Oct. 7, 1812, and that according to agreement he had instructed him in reading, writing and the Christian religion, but had kept him in close confinement. With this letter was enclosed another purporting to be written by the boy's mother, stating that he was born on April 3o, 1812, that his name was Kaspar, and that his father, an ex-cavalry officer in the 6th regiment at Nuremberg, was dead. For some time the lad was detained at Nuremberg as a vagrant; Professor Daumer then undertook his guardianship and the charge of his education. Earl Stanhope became interested in his history, and sent him in 1832 to Ansbach to be educated. He became clerk in the office of Feuerbach, president of the court of appeal; and his strange history was almost forgotten when interest in it was revived by his death as the result of a wound received on Dec. 14, 1833. Whether the wound was self-inflicted or whether, as he alleged, it was dealt by a stranger, is unknown. Kaspar Hauser's story has been used by Jakob Wassermann in a novel and by Kurt Martens in a play The theory of Daumer and Feuerbach and other pamphleteers (see E. E. Evans, Story of Kaspar Hauser from Authentic Rec ords, 1892) was that the youth was the crown prince of Baden, the legitimate son of the grand-duke Charles of Baden, and that he had been kidnapped at Karlsruhe in Oct. 1812 by emissaries of the countess of Hochberg (morganatic wife of the grand-duke) in order to secure the succession to her offspring; but this theory was answered in 1875 by the publication in the Augsburg Allge meine Zeitung of the official record of the baptism, post-mortem examination and burial of the heir supposed to have been kid napped. See Kaspar Hauser and sein badisches Prinzentum (Heidelberg, 1876). The evidence was analyzed by Andrew Lang in his Historical Mysteries (1904), with results unfavourable to the "romantic" version of the story. Lang's view was that pos sibly Kaspar was a sort of "ambulatory automatist," an instance of a phenomenon, known by other cases to students of psychical abnormalities, of which the characteristics are a mania for stray ing away and the persistence of delusions as to identity; but he inclines to regard Kaspar as simply a "humbug." The "authentic records" purporting to confirm the kidnapping story Lang stig matizes as "worthless and impudent rubbish." See also J. Mayer, Authentische Mitteilungen fiber Kaspar Hauser (1913) ; and H. Pies, Kaspar Hauser, Augenzeugenberichte and Selbst zeugnisse (2 vols., 1925) .