Guedalyah, I and you are the only two men
in England who can write Holy Language grammatically. And yet these
miserable stockbrokers, Men-of-the-Earth, they dare to say I cannot
write English, and they have given me the sack. I, who was teaching the
boy true Judaism and the value of Hebrew literature."

"What! They didn't let you finish teaching the boy his Portion because
you couldn't write English?"

"No; they had another pretext--one of the servant girls said I wanted to
kiss her--lies and falsehood. I was kissing my finger after kissing the
_Mezuzah_, and the stupid abomination thought I was kissing my hand to
her. It sees itself that they don't kiss the _Mezuzahs_ often in that
house--the impious crew. And what will be now? The stupid boy will go
home to breakfast in a bazaar of costly presents, and he will make the
stupid speech written by the fool of an Englishman, and the ladies will
weep. But where will be the Judaism in all this? Who will vaccinate him
against free-thinking as I would have done? Who will infuse into him the
true patriotic fervor, the love of his race, the love of Zion, the land
of his fathers?"

"Ah, you are verily a man after my own heart!" said Guedalyah, the
greengrocer, overswept by a wave of admiration. "Why should you not come
with me to my _Beth-Hamidrash_ to-night, to the meeting for the
foundation of the Holy Land League? That cauliflower will be four-pence,
mum."

"Ah, what is that?" said Pinchas.

"I have an idea; a score of us meet to-night to discuss it."

"Ah, yes! You have always ideas. You are a sage and a saint, Guedalyah.
The _Beth-Hamidrash_ which you have established is the only centre of
real orthodoxy and Jewish literature in London. The ideas you expound in
the Jewish papers for the amelioration of the lot of our poor brethren
are most statesmanlike. But these donkey-head English rich people--what
help can you expect from them? They do not even understand your plans.
They have only sympathy with needs of the stomach."

"You are right! You are right, Pinchas!" said Guedalyah, the
greengrocer, eagerly. He was a tall, loosely-built man, with a pasty
complexion capable of shining with enthusiasm. He was dressed shabbily,
and in the intervals of selling cabbages projected the regeneration of
Judah.

"That is just what is beginning to dawn upon me, Pinchas," he went on.
"Our rich people give plenty away in charity; they have good hearts but
not Jewish hearts. As the