It was in this part of the country, in the vicinity of the village tavern, that I found people who were poor, even by the very moderate standard of comfort that prevails in rural Poland. We passed on the drive up the valley a number of little huddling straw-thatched huts. One of these, which did not seem to be inhabited, I determined to explore. The building was of the prevailing type, with the cowshed in one end and the living-room in the other, but the thatch was no longer green, and age had imparted to the whole of the outside of the building a very dismal, weather-worn appearance. The windows were evidently of skins, of the same brown colour as the building itself. The entrance was through what would evidently have been the cowshed, but this was empty. The door into the living-room was open, and, as I entered, I saw at first only a cow tied to a manger. At the other end of the room, hovering about a little stone hearth, on which a little fire of twigs burned, were an old man and woman. As is frequently the case in many parts of Poland, there was no chimney, and the rafters of the house were deeply incrusted with the smoke which had accumulated in the peak of the roof and filtered out through the thatch or through an opening at the end of the building. The old people seemed very poor and helpless and, as I was about to leave the room, they held out their hands and begged for alms. I should like to have stayed and talked with them, but unfortunately I had no one with me at the time who was able to speak the Polish language. As I learned that a number of people had gone to America from this valley I suspected that these old people were some of those who had been left behind and perhaps forgotten by the younger generation who had gone across the seas. I made some attempt later to learn if my suspicions were well founded, but no one whom I afterward met seemed to know anything about the history of the old people. The wealthiest landlord in the vicinity was, as I learned, a Polish priest, who owned four different farms, and most of the people in the neighbourhood seemed to be his tenants. He lived in a big, bare, rambling house, surrounded by great barns filled with cattle and produce of various kinds. I stopped to call at this house, thinking that I might learn something from him about the poor people I have referred to, but the good priest was not at home and the people whom I found at this house did not seem to be able to tell me anything.