she cried, "that he should ever leave me; my precious
boy." And she embraced him again and again.

Meanwhile, the husband had crossed the room to where a little fellow,
scarcely six years of age, lay upon a sofa.

"Well, Jacob, my boy; how do you feel?" he asked, gently.

"A little better, father," murmured the child. "My arm and ear still
pain me, but not so much as yesterday."

The boy sat up and attempted to smile, but sank back with a groan.

"Poor child, poor child," said the father, soothingly, "Have patience.
In a few days you will be about again."

"Is uncle here? I want to see uncle," cried the boy.

Hirsch Bensef obeyed the call, and, going to the sufferer, kissed his
burning brow.

"Why, Jacob; how is this?" he said. "I did not know that you were sick.
What is the trouble, my lad?" The child turned his face to the wall and
shuddered.

Reb Mordecai shook his head mournfully, while a tear he sought to
repress ran down his furrowed cheek.

"It is the old story," he said. "Prejudice and fanaticism, hatred and
ignorance."

And while the Sabbath meal waited, the father told his tale in a simple,
unaffected manner, and the uncle listened with clenched hands and
threatening glances.

The day following the events in the _kretschma_, little Jacob had
wandered, in company with some Christian playmates, through the village,
and seeing the door of a barn wide open, his childish curiosity got the
better of his discretion, and he peeped in. A brindled cow, with a
pretty calf scarcely three days old, attracted his attention, and for
some minutes he gazed upon the pair in silent ecstasy. Then, knowing
that he was on forbidden ground, he retraced his steps and endeavored to
reach the lane where he had left his companions. The master of the farm,
however, having witnessed the intrusion from a neighboring window, did
not lose the opportunity to vent his anger against the whole tribe of
inquisitive Jews. On the following day the cow ran dry. In vain did the
calf seek nourishment at the maternal breast; there was nothing to
satisfy its cravings.

The farmer, slow as he was in matters of general importance, was far
from slow in tracing the melancholy occurrence to its supposed source.

"That accursed Jew has bewitched my cow," was his first thought, and his
second was to find the author of the deed and mete out punishment to
him.

Throughout the whole of Russia, and even in parts of civilized Germany,
Jews are