with us."

As Recha read, she turned deadly pale and the paper almost fell from her
hands.

"What will you do?" she faltered at length, while the great tears stood
in her eyes.

Mendel's heart throbbed with wild delight as he saw her evident emotion,
and her eyes fell under his ardent gaze. Seizing her hand, he asked, in
a low voice:

"What would you have me do?"

Recha gazed fondly into Mendel's eyes, and said:

"I should be very unhappy if you left home. What would my father do
without you? Think of the void it would create in the lives of your
parents and of your uncle. What would the congregation do without you,
whom they already regard as an oracle? Stay with us in Kief."

"God bless you, my dear," replied the young man, fervently. "I will
remain; I shall never leave this place unless you go with me as my
wife."

It was simple and unromantic.

The lovers, happy and contented, sat side by side, discussing their
roseate future, and when the Rabbi and his wife returned, the young
folks advanced to meet them.

"Rabbi," said the student, bravely, "Recha has promised to be my wife."

"_Mazal tov_," ejaculated both Jeiteles and his wife. "May the Lord of
Israel bless you."

The messenger from Odessa was dismissed with a negative reply.

There was a merry gathering the following Saturday afternoon to
congratulate the betrothed couple. Sincere were the wishes for their
future happiness that were showered upon them. It is a characteristic of
Israelites the world over to feel a lively interest in whatever befalls
their co-religionists, high or low. "Despised and rejected" by their
gentile neighbors, they sought for consolation and found it in the
society of their own kin, and thus arose this sympathy, this love for
one another which has so strongly cemented the hearts of the Jews.

"Clannish" has been hurled at them as a term of reproach. So are the
frightened sheep clannish when they huddle together in the shelterless
field, for protection against the blasts of the pitiless storm.

The interval between the betrothal and the wedding is usually short, and
the happy day that made Mendel and Recha man and wife was not long in
coming.

"I have a request to make," said the student to the Rabbi, a few days
before the all-important event took place.

"Name it, my son," replied the Rabbi.

"I do not wish Recha to have her hair cut off. Her tresses are her
crowning beauty, and it would grieve me to the heart t