t and not a fit abode
for Christian virtues.

"You may be surprised that I should remember all this so well. What is
a passing emotion or half-formed thought to last in so many years of a
man's changing, inconsequential life? But what has fixed the emotion
of that evening in my recollection so that the slightest shadows remain
indelible was an event of strange finality, an event not likely to be
forgotten in a life-time--as you shall see.

"I don't suppose I had been entertaining those thoughts more than five
minutes when something induced me to look over my shoulder. I can't
think it was a noise; the snow deadened all the sounds. Something it
must have been, some sort of signal reaching my consciousness. Anyway, I
turned my head, and there was the event approaching me, not that I knew
it or had the slightest premonition. All I saw in the distance were two
figures approaching in the moonlight. One of them was our Tomassov. The
dark mass behind him which moved across my sight were the horses which
his orderly was leading away. Tomassov was a very familiar appearance,
in long boots, a tall figure ending in a pointed hood. But by his side
advanced another figure. I mistrusted my eyes at first. It was amazing!
It had a shining crested helmet on its head and was muffled up in a
white cloak. The cloak was not as white as snow. Nothing in the world
is. It was white more like mist, with an aspect that was ghostly and
martial to an extraordinary degree. It was as if Tomassov had got hold
of the God of War himself. I could see at once that he was leading this
resplendent vision by the arm. Then I saw that he was holding it
up. While I stared and stared, they crept on--for indeed they were
creeping--and at last they crept into the light of our bivouac fire and
passed beyond the log I was sitting on. The blaze played on the helmet.
It was extremely battered and the frost-bitten face, full of sores,
under it was framed in bits of mangy fur. No God of War this, but a
French officer. The great white cuirassier's cloak was torn, burnt full
of holes. His feet were wrapped up in old sheepskins over remnants
of boots. They looked monstrous and he tottered on them, sustained by
Tomassov who lowered him most carefully on to the log on which I sat.

"My amazement knew no bounds.

"'You have brought in a prisoner,' I said to Tomassov, as if I could not
believe my eyes.

"You must understand that unless they surrendered in large bodies we