he repeated
the blessing for which, although he had not recited it for so many
years, he need no prompting from the worn black book beside his plate.

"Blessed art thou, O Lord our God, King of the universe, who bringest
forth bread from the earth," he said in Hebrew.

Becky, as her husband called her, stood in the background as silent as
a bronze statute until the little ceremony was over. If she was
impressed by the strangeness of it all, she gave no sign. For so many
of the customs of her husband's alien race were strange to her that
she had long ago ceased to wonder or desire any explanation. Now at a
sign from Mordecai, she took away the bowl of water, and, filling a
plate with the savoury stew, took it to the corner of the hut, here,
crouched upon the blankets, she ate her supper, quite content to
watch the white strangers from a distance.

Mordecai served his guests, then himself, and over the stew and corn
bread the men exchanged stories of their experiences in the
wilderness. The host told a little of his own adventures since leaving
the east, of his life as a trader with the Indians, of the peace
treaty he had brought about with the Chickasaw nation, of his journeys
south to New Orleans and Mobile, his furs and medicinal barks piled
high in the barge with no companions but the painted savages to assist
him. A life of highly-colored adventure with variety enough to satisfy
any spirit, but even now Mordecai was growing restless and longed for
another enterprise to occupy him after the cotton gin should be
completed.

Then, the meal being over, Mordecai, with the same shamefaced
bashfulness he had shown when speaking of the _Sidurim_, turned the
pages of the book, saying almost wistfully: "I know that tonight is
not a festival or Sabbath with us, gentlemen, but if you would care to
go over the psalm with me----"

"We've been waiting a long time for this and we'll give good measure,"
laughed little Barrett, but his eyes did not jest as Mordecai in the
quaint old sing-song of the synagogue began "When the Lord turned
again the captivity of Zion" and Lyon gravely followed.

"And now," Mordecai's face fairly glowed with pleasure, "now we will
have the special grace, since there are three of us at the table."

"Let us say grace," he began, with hardly a look at the Hebrew.

"Blessed be the name of the Lord from this time forth and forever,"
responded his guests.

"With the permission of those present," went