No attempt, however, was made to prove that he had any accomplices; it was not even suggested that he was carrying out the wishes of the party.

It was one of those cases which will always occur in political struggles, when a young and inexperienced man will be excited by political speeches to actions which no one would foresee, and which would not be the natural result of the words to which he had listened.

Nevertheless, Bismarck was not ashamed publicly in the Reichstag to taunt his opponents with the action, and to declare that whether they would or not their party was Kuhlmann's party; "he clings to your coat-tails," he said.

A similar event had happened a few years before, when a young man had been arrested on the charge that he intended to assassinate the Chancellor.

No evidence in support of the charge was forthcoming, but the excuse was taken by the police for searching the house of one of the Catholic leaders with whom the accused had lived.