and
warm on that little lamp there, and it will do you good. I won't hear a
word more until you have swallowed it!"

"A soldier should always obey the orders of his commanding officer,"
said Fritz with a smile, as he slowly gulped down the broth, spoonful by
spoonful, as Madaleine placed it in his mouth, for he could not feed
himself.

"That will do," she remarked, when he had taken what she thought
sufficient. "And now you can tell me about the dog. Here he is," she
continued, as the retriever came into the room; and, going up to the
side of the bed where Fritz was lying, put up his paws on the
counterpane and licked his master's face, in the wildest joy,
apparently, at his recovery and notice of him. "He must have heard his
name spoken, as I only just sent him out for a run with one of the men,
for all the time you were so ill we could not get him to leave the room.
Now, doggie, lie down like a good fellow, and let us hear all about
you."

The retriever at once obeyed the girl, stretching himself on the floor
at her feet, although close beside his master all the while.

Fritz then narrated the sad little episode of the battle of Gravelotte,
and how he had found the dead body of the French officer with the dog
keeping guard over it.

The girl wept silently as he went on.

"It must have been poor Armand," she said presently through her tears.
"Did you find nothing about him to tell who he was?"

"There was a little bag I saw round his neck," said Fritz; "I took it
off the poor fellow before we buried him, and suspended it on my own
breast afterwards for security, thinking that I might restore it some
day to his friends, if I ever came across them."

"Ah, that must be the little packet which got driven into your wound,
and, stopping the flow of blood, saved your life, the doctor says. I
have kept it carefully for you, and here it is," cried the girl, hastily
jumping up from her seat and bringing the article in question to Fritz.

"Open it," he said; "I haven't got the strength to do it, you know."

Madaleine unfastened the silken string that confined the mouth of the
bag, now stained with Fritz's blood; and then she pulled out the little
silver ring it contained.

One glance was enough for her.

"Yes," she faltered through her sobs. "It is the ring I gave him; but
that was months before the date engraved upon it, `July 18th, 1870,'
which was the day he said he would come back to Bingen, as then he wo