matter,' said the _Bube_ indignantly. 'For I
know well how Yossel longed to go with me to die in Jerusalem. And at
last the All-High sent him the fare, and he was able to come to me and
invite me to go with him.'

Here the artist became aware that Yossel's eyes and lips were
signalling silence to him. As if, forsooth, one published one's good
deeds! He had yet to learn on whose behalf the hunchback was
signalling.

'So! You came into a fortune?' he asked Yossel gravely.

Yossel looked the picture of misery. The _Bube_ unconsciously cut
through the situation. 'A wicked man gave it to him,' she explained,
'to pray away his sins in Jerusalem.'

'Indeed!' murmured the artist. 'Anyone you know?'

'Heaven has spared her the pain of knowing him,' ambiguously
interpolated her anxious protector.

'I don't even know his name,' added the _Bube_. 'Yossel keeps it
hidden.'

'One must not shame a fellow-man,' Yossel urged. 'The sin of that is
equal to the sin of shedding blood.'

The grandmother nodded her head approvingly. 'It is enough that the
All-High knows his name. But for such an Epicurean much praying will
be necessary. It will be a long work. And your first prayer, Yossel,
must be that you shall not die very soon, else the labourer will not
be worthy of his hire.'

Yossel took her yellow withered hand as in a lover's clasp. 'Be at
peace, Yenta! He will be redeemed if only by _your_ merits. Are we not
one?'

ELIJAH'S GOBLET

ELIJAH'S GOBLET

I

Aaron Ben Amram removed from the great ritual dish the roasted
shankbone of lamb (symbolic residuum of the Paschal Sacrifice) and the
roasted egg (representative of the ancient festival-offering in the
Temple), and while his wife and children held up the dish, which now
contained only the bitter herbs and unleavened cakes, he recited the
Chaldaic prelude to the _Seder_--the long domestic ceremonial of the
Passover Evening.

'This is the bread of affliction which our fathers ate in the land of
Egypt. Let all who are hungry come in and eat; let all who require
come in and celebrate the Passover. This year here, next year in the
land of Israel! This year slaves, next year sons of freedom!'

But the Polish physician showed nothing of the slave. White-bearded,
clad in a long white robe and a white skullcap, and throned on white
pillows, he made rather a royal figure, indeed for this night of
nights conceived of himself as 'King' and his wife as 'Queen.'