“Hullo!  Can that be you, Betsy?” some grizzled shabby old man would observe in innocent delight to Mrs. Arthur Montmorenci; “Why so it is!  I never would have believed my eyes!  Lord, what a fine woman you’ve grown!  And so you’re little Betsy who used to bring her father’s coffee in a brown jug when he and I stood side by side in the Lane!  He used to sell slippers next to my cutlery stall for eleven years—­Dear, dear, how time flies to be sure.”

Then Betsy Montmorenci’s creamy face would grow scarlet under the gas-jets, and she would glower and draw her sables around her, and look round involuntarily, to see if any of her Kensington friends were within earshot.

Another Betsy Montmorenci would feel Bohemian for this occasion only, and would receive old acquaintances’ greeting effusively, and pass the old phrases and by-words with a strange sense of stolen sweets; while yet a third Betsy Montmorenci, a finer spirit this, and worthier of the name, would cry to a Betsy Jacobs: 

“Is that you, Betsy, how are you?  How are you?  I’m so glad to see you.  Won’t you come and treat me to a cup of chocolate at Bonn’s, just to show you haven’t forgot Olov hasholom times?”

And then, having thus thrown the responsibility of stand-offishness on the poorer Betsy, the Montmorenci would launch into recollections of those good old “Peace be upon him” times till the grub forgot the splendors of the caterpillar in a joyous resurrection of ancient scandals.  But few of the Montmorencis, whatever their species, left the Ghetto without pressing bits of gold into half-reluctant palms in shabby back-rooms where old friends or poor relatives mouldered.

Overhead, the stars burned silently, but no one looked up at them.  Underfoot, lay the thick, black veil of mud, which the Lane never lifted, but none looked down on it.  It was impossible to think of aught but humanity in the bustle and confusion, in the cram and crush, in the wedge and the jam, in the squeezing and shouting, in the hubbub and medley.  Such a jolly, rampant, screaming, fighting, maddening, jostling, polyglot, quarrelling, laughing broth of a Vanity Fair!  Mendicants, vendors, buyers, gossips, showmen, all swelled the roar.

“Here’s your cakes!  All yontovdik (for the festival)! Yontovdik—­”

“Braces, best braces, all—­”

“Yontovdik!  Only one shilling—­”

“It’s the Rav’s orders, mum; all legs of mutton must be porged or my license—­”

“Cowcumbers!  Cowcumbers!”

“Now’s your chance—­”

“The best trousers, gentlemen.  Corst me as sure as I stand—­”

“On your own head, you old—­”

“Arbah Kanfus (four fringes)! Arbah—­”

“My old man’s been under an operation—­”

“Hokey Pokey! Yontovdik!  Hokey—­”

“Get out of the way, can’t you—­”

“By your life and mine, Betsy—­”