e. The left hand
caught hold of the right lapel of his coat, and the right hand at once
tore off the left lapel, from top to bottom. The left hand pulled the
right earlock. The right hand gave the left ear a terrible bang.

"Let go of my earlock, Getzel. Take my advice, and let go of my
earlock!"

"A plague!"

"Then you'll have no earlock, Getzel."

"Then you, Goyetzel, will have no ear."

"Oh!"

"Oh! Oh!"

* * *

EPILOGUE

For several minutes our Getzel rolled on the ground. Now he lay right
side up, and now he lay left side up. He held his pocketful of nuts with
both hands.... One minute Goyetzel was victorious. The next it was
Getzel, until he got up from the ground covered with dirt, like a pig.
He was torn to pieces, had a bleeding ear, and a torn earlock. He took
all the nuts from his pocket, and threw them into the mud of the river,
far away, behind the mill. He muttered angrily:

"That's right. It's a good deed."

"Neither you--nor me."

A Lost "L'Ag Beomer"

Our teacher, "_Reb_" Nissel the small one--so called on account of his
size--allowed himself to be led by the nose by his assistants. Whatever
they wanted they got. When the first assistant said the children were to
be sent home early that day, he sent them home early. The second
assistant said that the boys would turn the world upside down, and ought
to be kept at school, and he kept them at school. He could never decide
anything for himself. That was why his assistants controlled the school,
and not he. At other schools the assistants teach the children to wash
their hands and say the blessing. At our school, the assistants would
not do this for us, nor fetch us our meals, nor take us to school on
their shoulders. No, they liked to go for our meals. They ate them
themselves on the road. We did not dare to tell the master of this. The
assistants kept us in fear and trembling. If a boy whispered a word of
their doings to the teacher, he would be flogged, his skin would be cut.
Once, a daring boy told the master something; and the assistant beat him
so terribly that he was laid up in bed for months. He warned the boys
never to tell the master anything, no matter what the assistants did.

This period of our schooldays might be called the Tyranny of the
Assistants.

* * *

And it came to pass that we were under the yoke of the assistants. One
year, we had a cold "_L'ag Beomer_." It was a cold, wet May, such as we
sometimes had