y, he pitched half forward and half aside, like a
falling horse, and with a deep groan he fell with his face to the floor.

The midwife and the slave lifted him up and moistened his lips with
water; but his enemies turned and left him, muttering among themselves,
"The Lord killeth and maketh alive, He bringeth low and lifteth up, and
into the pit that the evil man diggeth or another He causeth his foot to
slip."

CHAPTER III

THE CHILDHOOD OF NAOMI

Throughout Tetuan and the country round about Israel was now an object
of contempt. God had declared against him, God had brought him low,
God Himself had filled him with confusion. Then why should man show him
mercy?

But if he was despised he was still powerful. None dare openly insult
him. And, between their fear and their scorn of him, the shifts of the
rabble to give vent to their contempt were often ludicrous enough. Thus,
they would call their dogs and their asses by his name, and the dogs
would be the scabbiest in the streets, and the asses the laziest in the
market.

He would be caught in the crush of the traffic at the town gate or at
the gate of the Mellah, and while he stood aside to allow a line of
pack-mules to pass he would hear a voice from behind him crying huskily,
"Accursed old Israel! Get on home to your mother!" Then, turning quickly
round, he would find that close at his heels a negro of most innocent
countenance was cudgelling his donkey by that title.

He would go past the Saints' Houses in the public ways, and at the sound
of his footsteps the bleached and eyeless lepers who sat under the white
walls crying "Allah! Allah! Allah!" would suddenly change their cry to
"Arrah! Arrah! Arrah!" "Go on! Go on! Go on!"

He would walk across the Sok on Fridays, and hear shrieks and peals of
laughter, and see grinning faces with gleaming white teeth turned in his
direction, and he would know that the story-tellers were mimicking his
voice and the jugglers imitating his gestures.

His prosperity counted for nothing against the open brand of God's
displeasure. The veriest muck-worm in the market-place spat out at sight
of him. Moor and Jew, Arab and Berber--they all despised him!

Nevertheless, the disaster which had befallen his house had not crushed
him. It had brought out every fibre of his being, every muscle of his
soul. He had quarrelled with God by reason of it, and his quarrel with
God had made his quarrel with his fellow-man the fiercer.