grow quite close to the
windows, so that an active man or a boy might without great risk leap
from the eaves below the dormer window into the topmost branches of the
linden, which here grows strong and tough, as it surely should do in the
fatherland.

A young soldier, seeking lodgings, who happened to knock at the door of
Number Thirteen less than thirty hours after the arrival of Napoleon at
Dantzig, looked upward through the shady boughs, and noted their growth
with the light of interest in his eye. It would almost seem that the
house had been described to him as that one in the Neuer Markt against
which the lindens grew. For he had walked all round the square between
the trees and houses before knocking at this door, which bore no number
then, as it does to-day.

His tired horse had followed him meditatively, and now stood with
drooping head in the shade. The man himself wore a dark uniform, white
with dust. His hair was dusty and rather lank. He was not a very tidy
soldier.

He stood looking at the sign which swung from the doorpost, a relic
of the Polish days. It bore the painted semblance of a boot. For in
Poland--a frontier country, as in frontier cities where many tongues are
heard--it is the custom to paint a picture rather than write a word. So
that every house bears the sign of its inmate's craft, legible alike to
Lithuanian or Ruthenian, Swede or Cossack of the Don.

He knocked again, and at last the door was opened by a thickly-built
man, who looked, not at his face, but at his boots. As these wanted no
repair he half closed the door again and looked at the newcomer's face.

"What do you want?" he asked.

"A lodging."

The door was almost closed, when the soldier made an odd and, as it
would seem, tentative gesture with his left hand. All the fingers were
clenched, and with his extended thumb he scratched his chin slowly from
side to side.

"I have no lodging to let," said the bootmaker. But he did not shut the
door.

"I can pay," said the other, with his thumb still at his chin. He had
quick, blue eyes beneath the shaggy hair that wanted cutting. "I am very
tired--it is only for one night."

"Who are you?" asked the bootmaker.

The soldier was a dull and slow man. He leant against the doorpost with
tired gestures before replying.

"Sergeant in a Schleswig regiment, in charge of spare horses."

"And you have come far?"

"From Dantzig without a halt."

The shoemaker looked him up and dow