The good fathers of the monastery had been warned beforehand of the march, and they had furnished every soldier as he passed with a luncheon of bread and cheese and a glass of wine; for which seasonable kindness, they now received the warm acknowledgments of the chief.[35] It was here that he took his leave of a peasant youth, who had walked by him, as his guide, all the way from the convent of St.
Maurice.

Napoleon conversed freely with the young man, and was much interested with his simplicity.

At parting, he asked the guide some particulars about his personal situation; and, having heard his reply, gave him money and a billet to the head of the monastery of St.Maurice.
The peasant delivered it accordingly, and was surprised to find that, in consequence of a scrap of writing which he could not read, his worldly comforts were to be permanently increased.

The object of his generosity remembered, nevertheless, but little of his conversation with the Consul.

He described Napoleon as being "a very dark man" (this was the effect of the Syrian sun), and having an eye that, notwithstanding his affability, he could not encounter without a sense of fear.