Count Frederick, while hunting, meets Lucy, the daughter of Masone, a gamekeeper on his father's estate and a tender romance unfolds. Later. Lucy is tenderly rocking the cradle of her baby, dreaming of her lover's return and her approaching wedding, Frederick has confessed to his father and has asked his permission to marry, but the proud old nobleman refuses to let his son marry beneath his station in life and sends him off to France, dismissing Lucy's father from his estate. Lucy and her father journey to Polain where the former game-keeper gets a position in the stable, and after eight years loses it through old age. Starvation stares them in the face and little Tony, the son of Count Frederick and Lucy, is apprenticed to Gaspard, a chimney-sweep, who is buying poor little boys for his work in Turin. In the meantime, Frederick has returned from France and traced Lucy and the boy to Polain, but cannot marry her because of his father's opposition.