ther world, may he forgive me--and not be very
angry with me, if he is still living in Mezkez!

He was an orthodox and pious Jew, but when you gave him a book to bind,
he never kept his word.

When he took a book and even the whole of his pay in advance, he would
swear by beard and earlocks, by wife and children, and by the Messiah,
that he would bring it back to you by Sabbath, but you had to be at him
for weeks before the work was finished and sent in.

Once, on a certain Friday, I remembered that next day, Sabbath, I should
have a few hours to myself for reading.

A fortnight before I had given Seinwill a new book to bind for me. It
was just a question whether or not he would return it in time, so I set
out for his home, with the intention of bringing back the book, finished
or not. I had paid him his twenty kopeks in advance, so what excuses
could he possibly make? Once for all, I would give him a bit of my mind,
and take away the work unfinished--it will be a lesson for him for the
next time!

Thus it was, walking along and deciding on what I should say to
Seinwill, that I turned into the street to which I had been directed.
Once in the said street, I had no need to ask questions, for I was at
once shown a little, low house, roofed with mouldered slate.

I stooped a little by way of precaution, and entered Seinwill's house,
which consisted of a large kitchen.

Here he lived with his wife and children, and here he worked.

In the great stove that took up one-third of the kitchen there was a
cheerful crackling, as in every Jewish home on a Friday.

In the forepart of the oven, on either hand, stood a variety of pots and
pipkins, and gossipped together in their several tones. An elder child
stood beside them holding a wooden spoon, with which she stirred or
skimmed as the case required.

Seinwill's wife, very much occupied, stood by the one four-post bed,
which was spread with a clean white sheet, and on which she had laid out
various kinds of cakes, of unbaked dough, in honor of Sabbath. Beside
her stood a child, its little face red with crying, and hindered her in
her work.

"Seinwill, take Chatzkele away! How can I get on with the cakes? Don't
you know it's Friday?" she kept calling out, and Seinwill, sitting at
his work beside a large table covered with books, repeated every time
like an echo:

"Chatzkele, let mother alone!"

And Chatzkele, for all the notice he took, might have been as deaf as
th