out
proof--absolute proof." Then he leaned closer. "To me he made no such
absurd claim, but from the way he talked--from his grandiose ideas, his
strange philosophy, his fabulous hopes for humanity--I formed the
opinion that the man is mad--not wholly mad, you understand, but
touched, in one corner of the brain, by a wild hallucination. His
daughter, naturally, believes in him. She is a most attractive girl.
Polish women are always attractive, at least when they are young. There
is, in their faces, in their eyes, an appearance of tragedy, of mystery,
which piques the imagination. And they are all great patriots--it is
born in the blood--oh, far greater patriots than the men. I have
travelled in Poland," he added, seeing Dan's glance; "my business
sometimes calls me there."

"And is there really such oppression as Miss Vard described?"

"I do not know what she told you--it was only at the end she raised her
voice; but she could not exaggerate the sufferings of her people. They
are little better than slaves. All careers are closed to them, and over
them constantly is the shadow of Siberia."

"You mean they are banished sometimes?"

"They are banished often--for one year, two years, three years. And they
are compelled to walk to and from the place of banishment. It takes a
year sometimes. I knew a man who returned home one day to find a Cossack
attacking his daughter. There was a struggle, and the Cossack shot the
man in the leg. The wound festered and the leg was amputated; then the
man was sentenced to the mines at Yakutsk. It was I know not how many
thousand miles--it took him two years to walk there on his wooden
leg--walking, walking every day."

Dan felt a strange weakness running through his veins.

"But is there no way to put an end to such things?" he asked.

Chevrial rolled himself another cigarette.

"Poland has no friends," he answered. "She has been forgotten. The Poles
themselves have come to be regarded as fools, as charlatans, as
irresponsible children. France was supposed to be the friend of Poland;
Napoleon promised to reconstitute her, and the Poles fought by thousands
in his armies and won many victories for him. Then came the campaign of
Russia and ended all that. To-day, Poland is remembered in France only
by a proverb, '_Saoul comme un Polonais_,' 'Drunk as a Pole.' It is so
we think of them, when we think of them at all, which is not often. This
disdain, this forgetfulness, has been careful