It was a warm night, and I had left open the window overlooking the park. I did not feel ready for sleep after I finished my letter, so I set to work to rehearse the irregular Lithuanian verbs, and to look into Sanskrit to find the origins of their different irregularities. In the middle of my absorbing labours a tree close to my window shook violently. I could hear the dead branches creak, and it seemed as though some heavy animal were trying to climb it. Still engrossed with the bear stories that the doctor had told me, I got up, feeling rather uneasy, and saw, only a few feet from my window, a human head among the leaves of the tree, lit up plainly by the light from my lamp. The vision only lasted a second, but the singular brilliance of the eyes which met my gaze struck me more than I could say. Involuntarily I took a step backwards; then I ran to the window and demanded in severe tones what the intruder wanted. Meanwhile he climbed down quickly, and, seizing a large branch between both hands, he swung himself off, jumped to the ground, and was soon out of sight. I rang the bell and told the adventure to a servant who answered it. "Sir," he said, "you must be mistaken." "I am certain of what I tell you," I replied. "I am afraid there is a burglar in the park." "It is impossible, sir." "Well, then, is it someone out of the house?" The servant opened his eyes wide without replying, and in the end asked me if I wanted anything. I told him to fasten my window, and I went to bed. I slept soundly, neither dreaming of bears nor of thieves. In the morning, while I was dressing, someone knocked at my door. I opened it and found myself face to face with a very tall and finely built young man in a Bokhara dressing-gown, holding in his hand a long Turkish pipe. "I come to beg your pardon, Professor," he said, "for having welcomed such a distinguished guest so badly. I am Count Szémioth." I hastened to say that, on the contrary, my humble thanks were due to him for his most courteous hospitality, and inquired if he had lost his headache. "Very nearly," he said. "At all events, until the next crisis," he added, with a melancholy expression. "Are you comfortable here? You must not forget that you are among barbarians; it would be difficult to think otherwise in Samogitia." I assured him I was most comfortably entertained. All the time I was speaking I could not prevent myself from studying him with a very impolite curiosity; there was something strange in his look which reminded me, in spite of myself, of the man whom I had seen climbing the tree the night before.... "But what probability," I said to myself, "is there that Count Szémioth would climb trees by night?"