“Ah, but we are not all strong enough to wield Moses’s Rod; it weighed forty seahs,” said Sugarman.

“How many seahs do you think one could safely carry?” said Meckisch.

“Five or six seahs—­not more,” said Sugarman.  “You see one might drop them if he attempted more and even sapphire may break—­the First Tables of the Law were made of sapphire, and yet from a great height they fell terribly, and were shattered to pieces.”

“Gideon, the M.P., may be said to desire a Rod of Moses, for his secretary told me he will take forty,” said Shmendrik.

“Hush! what are you saying!” said Sugarman, “Gideon is a rich man, and then he is a director.”

“It seems a good lot of directors,” said Meckisch.

“Good to look at.  But who can tell?” said Sugarman, shaking his head.  “The Queen of Sheba probably brought sapphires to Solomon, but she was not a virtuous woman.”

“Ah, Solomon!” sighed Mrs. Shmendrik, pricking up her ears and interrupting this talk of stocks and stones, “If he’d had a thousand daughters instead of a thousand wives, even his treasury couldn’t have held out.  I had only two girls, praised be He, and yet it nearly ruined me to buy them husbands.  A dirty Greener comes over, without a shirt to his skin, and nothing else but he must have two hundred pounds in the hand.  And then you’ve got to stick to his back to see that he doesn’t take his breeches in his hand and off to America.  In Poland he would have been glad to get a maiden, and would have said thank you.”

“Well, but what about your own son?” said Sugarman; “Why haven’t you asked me to find Shosshi a wife?  It’s a sin against the maidens of Israel.  He must be long past the Talmudical age.”

“He is twenty-four,” replied Peleg Shmendrik.

“Tu, tu, tu, tu, tu!” said Sugarman, clacking his tongue in horror, “have you perhaps an objection to his marrying?”

“Save us and grant us peace!” said the father in deprecatory horror.  “Only Shosshi is so shy.  You are aware, too, he is not handsome.  Heaven alone knows whom he takes after.”

“Peleg, I blush for you,” said Mrs. Shmendrik.  “What is the matter with the boy?  Is he deaf, dumb, blind, unprovided with legs?  If Shosshi is backward with the women, it is because he ‘learns’ so hard when he’s not at work.  He earns a good living by his cabinet-making and it is quite time he set up a Jewish household for himself.  How much will you want for finding him a Calloh?”

“Hush!” said Sugarman sternly, “do you forget it is the Sabbath?  Be assured I shall not charge more than last time, unless the bride has an extra good dowry.”

On Saturday night immediately after Havdalah, Sugarman went to Mr. Belcovitch, who was just about to resume work, and informed him he had the very Chosan for Becky.  “I know,” he said, “Becky has a lot of young men after her, but what are they but a pack of bare-backs?  How much will you give for a solid man?”