I do not care whether or not he owes me his regeneration, but I am glad to have effected it. If he had been grateful to me, I should have felt myself paid; it seems to me much better that he should carry the burden of his debt on his shoulders, which from time to time he ought to find heavy. He does not deserve a worse punishment. To-day, in the seventy-third year of my life, my only desire is to live in peace and to be far from any person who might imagine that he has rights over my moral liberty, for it is impossible that any kind of tyranny should not coincide with this imagination."
Early in February, 1798, Casanova was taken sick with a very grave bladder trouble of which he died after suffering for three-and-a-half months. On the 16th February Zaguri wrote: "I note with the greatest sorrow the blow which has afflicted you." On the 31st March, after having consulted with a Prussian doctor, Zaguri sent a box of medicines and he wrote frequently until the end.
On the 20th April Elisa von der Recke, whom Casanova had met, some years before, at the chateau of the Prince de Ligne at Teplitz, having returned to Teplitz, wrote: "Your letter, my friend, has deeply affected me. Although myself ill, the first fair day which permits me to go out will find me at your side." On the 27th, Elisa, still bedridden, wrote that the Count de Montboisier and his wife were looking forward to visiting Casanova. On the 6th May she wrote, regretting that she was unable to send some crawfish soup, but that the rivers were too high for the peasants to secure the crawfish. "The Montboisier family, Milady Clark, my children and myself have all made vows for your recovery." On the 8th, she sent bouillon and madeira.
On the 4th June, 1798, Casanova died. His nephew, Carlo Angiolini was with him at the time. He was buried in the churchyard of Santa Barbara at Dux. The exact location of his grave is uncertain, but a tablet, placed against the outside wall of the church reads:
JAKOB CASANOVA Venedig 1725 Dux 1798