has already written him a speech.  Good English!  Gideon has as much knowledge or style as the Rev. Elkan Benjamin of decency.  Ah, I will shoot them both.  I know I do not speak English like a native—­but what language under the sun is there I cannot write?  French, German, Spanish, Arabic—­they flow from my pen like honey from a rod.  As for Hebrew, you know, 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.