Thus it was that these two first met,--the little Nello and the big
Patrasche.
The upshot of that day was, that old Jehan Daas, with much laborious
effort, drew the sufferer homeward to his own little hut, which was a
stone's-throw off amidst the fields, and there tended him with so much
care that the sickness, which had been a brain-seizure, brought on by
heat and thirst and exhaustion, with time and shade and rest passed away,
and health and strength returned, and Patrasche staggered up again upon
his four stout, tawny legs.
Now for many weeks he had been useless, powerless, sore, near to death;
but all this time he had heard no rough word, had felt no harsh touch,
but only the pitying murmurs of the little child's voice and the
soothing caress of the old man's hand.
In his sickness they two had grown to care for him, this lonely old man
and the little happy child. He had a corner of the hut, with a heap of
dry grass for his bed; and they had learned to listen eagerly for his
breathing in the dark night, to tell them that he lived; and when he
first was well enough to essay a loud, hollow, broken bay, they laughed
aloud, and almost wept together for joy at such a sign of his sure
restoration; and little Nello, in delighted glee, hung round his rugged
neck with chains of marguerites, and kissed him with fresh and ruddy
lips.
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