adorned all his conversation. "He hates us."

"But why, why?" demanded Miss Bailey.

"He hates the childrens," the still candid Morris explained, "the whiles
they is Sheenies. He hates you the whiles you is Krisht."

"Rather an unfriendly attitude altogether," commented Teacher. "And how
do you know he hates me because I'm a Christian?"

"My mamma tells me how it is. She says he has mads the whiles you is
Krisht und makes all things what is loving mit Sheenies. My mamma says
he is Russians; und Russians they don't makes like that mit Sheenies.
Teacher, no ma'am, loving ain't what Russians makes mit us. They makes
all things what is fierce."

"I know, I know," said Constance Bailey, and then--"What is the little
boy's business?"

"Teacher, he's a fire-lighter."

"A fire-lighter," echoed Miss Bailey, with visions of arson before her
eyes. "A fire-lighter, did you say?"

"Teacher, yiss, ma'am, he is a fire-lighter, but sooner he wants he
could to come on the school the whiles he ain't got no bizzness on'y
Saturdays."

And then Miss Bailey understood. She had heard of certain stranded waifs
left high and dry when the ebb of Christianity receded before the flood
of Judaism, and New York's great East Side, once a fashionable
district, then claimed by a thrifty Irish element, became a Ghetto. It
was the Jewish Sabbatical Law which gave the derelicts an opportunity to
earn a few pennies every Saturday, for no orthodox Jew may kindle fire
on the Sabbath. And no frugal Jew, even in the impossible circumstance
of being able to afford it, will keep the stove alight all through
Friday night. Hence he employs a Christian to do the work he would not
stoop to.

And this was the occupation of that amazing new boy! Miss Bailey clearly
saw the path of her duty, and it led her, the lighter of fires in tow,
straight to the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. For
some days, however, this path was closed to her conscientious feet. The
boy was lost again, and Miss Bailey, who took the welfare of her charges
very much to heart, was seriously distressed and uneasy. The First
Readers were enlisted as a corps of detectives, but though they prowled
in likely and unlikely spots, they brought no news of the stranger.

A week went by. The Principal, the Truant Officer, Patrick Brennan's
father, were all informed and enlisted in the quest. But day followed
day empty of news. Mr. Eissler could offer no suggestion, though he