l on a Sabbath that year.

Fishel reached the Bug in a Gentile conveyance Thursday evening.
According to his own reckoning, he should have got there Tuesday
morning, because he left Balta Sunday after market, the spirit having
moved him to go into the market-place to spy after a chance conveyance.
How much better it would have been to drive with Yainkel-Shegetz, a
Balta carrier, even at the cart-tail, with his legs dangling, and shaken
to bits. He would have been home long ago by now, and have forgotten the
discomforts of the journey. But he had wanted a cheaper transit, and it
is an old saying that cheap things cost dear. Yoneh, the tippler, who
procures vehicles in Balta, had said to him: "Take my advice, give two
rubles, and you will ride in Yainkel's wagon like a lord, even if you do
have to sit behind the wagon. Consider, you're playing with fire, the
festival approaches." But as ill-luck would have it, there came along a
familiar Gentile from Chaschtschevate.

"Eh, Rabbi, you're not wanting a lift to Chaschtschevate?"

"How much would the fare be?"

He thought to ask how much, and he never thought to ask if it would take
him home by Passover, because in a week he could have covered the
distance walking behind the cart.

But as Fishel drove out of the town, he soon began to repent of his
choice, even though the wagon was large, and he sitting in it in
solitary grandeur, like any count. He saw that with a horse that dragged
itself along in _that_ way, there would be no getting far, for they
drove a whole day without getting anywhere in particular, and however
much he worried the peasant to know if it were a long way yet, the only
reply he got was, "Who can tell?" In the evening, with a rumble and a
shout and a crack of the whip, there came up with them Yainkel-Shegetz
and his four fiery horses jingling with bells, and the large coach
packed with passengers before and behind. Yainkel, catching sight of the
teacher in the peasant's cart, gave another loud crack with his whip,
ridiculed the peasant, his passenger, and his horse, as only
Yainkel-Shegetz knows how, and when a little way off, he turned and
pointed at one of the peasant's wheels.

"Hallo, man, look out! There's a wheel turning!"

The peasant stopped the horse, and he and the teacher clambered down
together, and examined the wheels. They crawled underneath the cart, and
found nothing wrong, nothing at all.

When the peasant understood that Yainkel