arly breakfast at our Pension in
Vevey, I saw that a stranger had arrived. He was a tall youth, of
eighteen or twenty, with a thin, intelligent face, and the charmingly
polite manners of a foreigner. As the other boarders came in, one by
one, they left the door open, and a draught of cold autumn air blew in
from the stone corridor, making the new-comer cough, shiver, and cast
wistful glances towards the warm corner by the stove. My place was
there, and the heat often oppressed me, so I was glad of an opportunity
to move.

A word to Madame Vodoz effected the change; and at dinner I was rewarded
by a grateful smile from the poor fellow, as he nestled into his warm
seat, after a pause of surprise and a flush of pleasure at the small
kindness from a stranger. We were too far apart to talk much, but, as he
filled his glass, the Pole bowed to me, and said low in French--

'I drink the good health to Mademoiselle.'

I returned the wish, but he shook his head with a sudden shadow on his
face, as if the words meant more than mere compliment to him.

'That boy is sick and needs care. I must see to him,' said I to myself,
as I met him in the afternoon, and observed the military look of his
blue and white suit, as he touched his cap and smiled pleasantly. I have
a weakness for brave boys in blue, and having discovered that he had
been in the late Polish Revolution, my heart warmed to him at once.

That evening he came to me in the salon, and expressed his thanks in the
prettiest broken English I ever heard. So simple, frank, and grateful
was he that a few words of interest won his little story from him, and
in half an hour we were friends. With his fellow-students he had fought
through the last outbreak, and suffered imprisonment and hardship rather
than submit, had lost many friends, his fortune and his health, and at
twenty, lonely, poor, and ill, was trying bravely to cure the malady
which seemed fatal.

'If I recover myself of this affair in the chest, I teach the music to
acquire my bread in this so hospitable country. At Paris, my friends,
all two, find a refuge, and I go to them in spring if I die not here.
Yes, it is solitary, and my memories are not gay, but I have my work,
and the good God remains always to me, so I content myself with much
hope, and I wait.'

Such genuine piety and courage increased my respect and regard
immensely, and a few minutes later he added to both by one of the little
acts that show chara