tongue. But
Yossel replied simply:

'May the blessings of the Eternal be upon you for ever and for ever,
and by the merit of my prayers in Jerusalem may your sins be
forgiven.'

The artist was moved. Surely, he thought, struggling between tears and
laughter, no undesirable lover had ever thus been got rid of by the
head of the family. Not to speak of an undesirable grandfather.

IV

The news that Yossel was leaving the village bound for the Holy Land,
produced a sensation which quite obscured his former notoriety as an
aspirant to wedlock. Indeed, those who discussed the new situation
most avidly forgot how convinced they had been that marriage and not
death was the hunchback's goal. How Yossel had found money for the
great adventure was not the least interesting ingredient in the cup of
gossip. It was even whispered that the grandmother herself had been
tapped. Her skittish advances had been taken seriously by Yossel. He
had boldly proposed to lead her under the Canopy, but at this point,
it was said, the old lady had drawn back--she who had led him so far
was not to be thus led. Women are changeable, it is known, and even
when they are old they do not change. But Yossel had stood up for his
rights; he had demanded compensation. And his fare to Palestine was a
concession for his injured affections. It was not many days before the
artist met persons who had actually overheard the bargaining between
the _Bube_ and the hunchback.

Meantime Yossel's departure was drawing nigh, and all those who had
relatives in Palestine besieged him from miles around, plying him with
messages, benedictions, and even packages for their kinsfolk. And
conversely, there was scarcely a Jewish inhabitant who had not begged
for clods of Palestine earth or bottles of Jordan water. So great
indeed were the demands that their supply would have constituted a
distinct invasion of the sovereign rights of the Sultan, and dried up
the Jordan.

With his grandmother's future thus off his mind, the artist had
settled down to making a picture of the ruined castle which he
commanded from his bedroom window. But when the through ticket for
Jerusalem came from the agent at Vienna, and he had brazenly endured
Yossel's blessings for the same, his artistic instinct demanded to see
how the _Bube_ was taking her hero's desertion. As he lifted the latch
he heard her voice giving orders, and the door opened, not on the
peaceful scene he expected of the sp