of a single letter had led to the mistake.  It was a striking testimony to his fine sense of honour that Rosenblatt insisted that Jacob, Paulina, and indeed the whole company, should make the fullest investigation of his books and satisfy themselves of his unimpeachable integrity.  In a private interview with Paulina, however, his rage passed all bounds, and it was only Paulina’s tearful entreaties that induced him to continue to act as her agent, and not even her tears had moved him had not Paulina solemnly sworn that never again would she allow her blundering crudity to insert itself into the delicate finesse of Rosenblatt’s financial operations.  Thenceforward all went harmoniously enough, Paulina toiling with unremitting diligence at her daily tasks, so that she might make the monthly payments upon her house, and meet the rapacious demands of those terrible English people, with their taxes and interest and legal exactions, which Rosenblatt, with meritorious meekness, sought to satisfy.  So engrossed, indeed, was that excellent gentleman in this service that he could hardly find time to give suitable over-sight to his own building operations, in which, by the erection of shack after shack, he sought to meet the ever growing demands of the foreign colony.

Before a year had gone it caused Rosenblatt no small annoyance that while he was thus struggling to keep pace with the demands upon his time and energy, Paulina, with lamentable lack of consideration, should find it necessary to pause in her scrubbing, washing, and baking, long enough to give birth to a fine healthy boy.  Paulina’s need brought her help and a friend in the person of Mrs. Fitzpatrick, who lived a few doors away in the only house that had been able to resist the Galician invasion.  It had not escaped Mrs. Fitzpatrick’s eye nor her kindly heart, as Paulina moved in and out about her duties, that she would ere long pass into that mysterious valley of life and death where a woman needs a woman’s help; and so when the hour came, Mrs. Fitzpatrick, with fine contempt of “haythen” skill and efficiency, came upon the scene and took command.  It took her only a few moments to clear from the house the men who with stolid indifference to the sacred rights of privacy due to the event were lounging about.  Swinging the broom which she had brought with her, she almost literally swept them forth, flinging their belongings out into the snow.  Not even Rosenblatt, who lingered about, did she suffer to remain.

“Y’re wife will not be nadin’ ye, I’m thinkin’, for a while.  Ye can just wait till I can bring ye wurrd av y’re babby,” she said, pushing him, not unkindly, from the room.

Rosenblatt, whose knowledge of English was sufficient to enable him to catch her meaning, began a vigorous protest: 

“Eet ees not my woman,” he exclaimed.

“Eat, is it!” replied Mrs. Fitzpatrick, taking him up sharply.  “Indade ye can eat where ye can get it.  Faith, it’s a man ye are, sure enough, that can niver forget y’re stomach!  An’ y’re wife comin’ till her sorrow!”