e. A children's service is held in the
synagogues, and cakes and sweets are distributed. The dark, vivid beauty
of these children shows marvellously against the greys of Whitechapel.
Every Saturday of the year the streets are filled with them, for then
all shops are shut, all work suspended, and the little ones are in those
best frocks and velvet suits in which even the poorest parents are so
proud to clothe their offspring. They love colour; and ribbons of many
hues are lavished on the frocks and tunics. One of my London moments was
when I first saw, in Whitechapel High Street, a little Jewess, with
masses of jet-black hair, dressed in vermilion and white. I wonder, by
the way, why it is that the children of the genteel quarters of London,
such as Kensington Gardens, have no hair, or at any rate, only skimpy
little twigs of it, while the children of the East are loaded with curls
and tresses of an almost tropical luxuriance, and are many times more
beautiful. Does that terrifying process called Good Breeding kill all
beauty? Does careful feeding and tending poison the roots of loveliness?
I wonder.... Anyway, the Jews, beautiful alike in face and richness of
tresses, stand to the front in two of the greatest callings of the
world--art and fighting. Examine the heroes of the prize-ring; at least
two-thirds of them are Jews. Examine the world's greatest musicians and
singers, and the same may be said.

On Sundays, of course, only the rags of everyday are seen, for then the
work of the week begins again. At about the time of our Easter the Feast
of the Passover is celebrated. Then, if you walk down Middlesex Street
any Sunday morning you will notice an activity even more feverish than
that which it mostly presents. Jews of every nationality flock to it;
and for the week preceding this Feast the stall-holders do tremendous
business, not, as is customary, with the Gentiles, but among their own
people. The Feast of the Passover is one of the oldest and quaintest
religious ceremonies of the oldest religion in the world. Fasting and
feasting intermingle with observances. Spring-cleaning is general at
this season, for all things must be _kosher-al-pesach_, or clean and
pure. At the cafes you will find a special kosher bar, whereon are wines
and spirits in brand new decanters, glasses freshly bought and cleansed,
and a virgin cloth surmounting the whole. The domestic and hardware
shops are busy, for the home must be replenished w