stillness, the old Rav started in
his chair, and when they rushed forward to assist him, they found that
his knotted, knobbly stick had broken in two.

Pale and bent for the first time, but a tall figure still, the old Rav
stood up among his startled flock. He made a leisurely motion with his
hand in the direction of the town, and remarked quietly to the young
Charif:

"Nu, now you can go into the town!"

That Friday night the old Rav came into the house-of-study without his
satin cloak, like a mourner. The congregation saw him lead the young Rav
into the corner near the ark, where he sat him down by the high old
desk, saying:

"You will sit here."

He himself went and sat down behind the pulpit among the strangers, the
Sabbath guests.

For the first minute people were lost in astonishment; the next minute
the house-of-study was filled with wailing. Old and young lifted their
voices in lamentation. The young Rav looked like a child sitting behind
the tall desk, and he shivered and shook as though with fever.

Then the old Rav stood up to his full height and commanded:

"People are not to weep!"

All this happened about the Solemn Days. Mouravanke remembers that time
now, and speaks of it at dusk, when the sky is red as though streaming
with fire, and the men stand about pensive and forlorn, and the women
fold their babies closer in their aprons.

At the close of the Day of Atonement there was a report that the old Rav
had breathed his last in robe and prayer-scarf.

The young Charif did not survive him long. He died at his father's the
tailor, and his funeral was on a wet Great Hosannah day. Aged folk said
he had been summoned to face the old Rav in a lawsuit in the Heavenly
Court.

A FOLK TALE

THE CLEVER RABBI

The power of man's imagination, said my Grandmother, is very great.
Hereby hangs a tale, which, to our sorrow, is a true one, and as clear
as daylight.

Listen attentively, my dear child, it will interest you very much.

Not far from this town of ours lived an old Count, who believed that
Jews require blood at Passover, Christian blood, too, for their Passover
cakes.

The Count, in his brandy distillery, had a Jewish overseer, a very
honest, respectable fellow.

The Count loved him for his honesty, and was very kind to him, and the
Jew, although he was a simple man and no scholar, was well-disposed, and
served the Count with heart and soul. He would have gone through fire