e ventured to say, "Our son is back. Hast thou not seen
him?"

"Son? What son? We have no son." He finished his meal.

III

The scholarly apostle, thus disowned by his kith and kin, was eagerly
welcomed by Holy Church, the more warmly that he had come of his own
inward grace and refused the tribute of annual crowns with which the
Popes often rewarded true religion--at the expense of the Ghetto,
which had to pay these incomes to its recreants. It was the fashion to
baptize converted Jews in batches--for the greater glory--procuring
them from without when home-made catechumens were scarce, sometimes
serving them up with a proselyte Turk. But in view of the importance
of the accession, and likewise of the closeness of Epiphany, it was
resolved to give Joseph ben Manasseh the honor of a solitary baptism.
The intervening days he passed in a monastery, studying his new faith,
unable to communicate with his parents or his fellow Jews, even had he
or they wished. A cardinal's edict forbade him to return to the
Ghetto, to eat, drink, sleep, or speak with his race during the period
of probation; the whip, the cord, awaited its violation. By day Rachel
and Miriam walked in the precincts of the monastery, hoping to catch
sight of him; nearer than ninety cubits they durst not approach under
pain of bastinado and exile. A word to him, a message that might have
softened him, a plea that might have turned him back--and the offender
was condemned to the galleys for life.

Epiphany arrived. A great concourse filled the Basilica di Latran. The
Pope himself was present, and amidst scarlet pomp and swelling music,
Joseph, thrilled to the depths of his being, received the sacraments.
Annibale de' Franchi, whose proud surname was henceforth to be
Joseph's, stood sponsor. The presiding cardinal in his solemn sermon
congratulated the congregants on the miracle which had taken place
under their very eyes, and then, attired in white satin, the neophyte
was slowly driven through the streets of Rome that all might witness
how a soul had been saved for the true faith. And in the ecstasy of
this union with the human brotherhood and the divine fatherhood, and
with Christ, its symbol, Giuseppe de' Franchi saw not the dark,
haggard faces of his brethren in the crowd, the hate that smouldered
in their dusky eyes as the festal procession passed by. Nor while he
knelt before crucifix and image that night, did he dream of that other
ceremonial in the