. Don't you hear me?

RACHEL. Yes, I hear thee.

ISAAC. Hear, and linger

RACHEL. Hear, yet linger!

ISAAC. Oh, Oh, Oh! Why doth God try me?
To the poor I've given my portion,
I have prayed and I have fasted,
Unclean things I've never tasted
Nay! And yet God tries me thus.

RACHEL (_to_ ESTHER).

Ow! Why dost thou pull my arm so?
I will stay, I am not going.
I just wish to see the King and
All the court and all their doings,
All their gold and all their jewels.
He is young, they say, and handsome,
White and red, I want to see him.

ISAAC. And suppose the servants catch thee

RACHEL. Then I'll beg until they free me!

ISAAC. Yes, just like thy mother, eh?
She, too, looked at handsome Christians,
Sighed, too, for Egyptian flesh-pots;
Had I not so closely watched her
I should deem-well, God forgive me!--
That thy madness came that way,
Heritage of mean, base Christians;
Ah! I praise my first wife, noble!

(_To_ ESTHER.)

Praise thy mother, good like thee,
Though not wealthy. Of the second
Did the riches aught avail me?
Nay, she spent them as she pleasured,
Now for feasts and now for banquets,
Now for finery and jewels.
Look! This is indeed her daughter!
Has she not bedeckt herself,
Shines she not in fine apparel
Like a Babel in her pride?

RACHEL (_singing_).

Am I not lovely,
Am I not rich?
See their vexation,
And I don't care-la, la, la, la.

ISAAC. There she goes with handsome shoes on;
Wears them out--what does it matter?
Every step costs me a farthing!
Richest jewels are her earrings,
If a thief comes, he will take them,
If they're lost, who'll find them ever?

RACHEL (_taking off an earring_).

Lo! I take them off and hold them,
How they shine and how they shimmer!
Yet how little I regard them,
Haply, I to thee present them

(_to_ ESTHER.)

Or I throw them in the bushes.

[_She mak