made a strong appeal to my sympathies (somehow his martyrdom was linked in my mind to his futility as a speaker). I warmed to him

He was followed by Yeffim, and the scene of wild enthusiasm was repeated

When Minsker had finished the chairman declared the meeting closed. There was a rush for the platform. It was quite high above the auditorium floor; unless one reached it by way of the committee-room, which was a considerable distance to the right, it had to be mounted, not without an effort, by means of the chairs in the press inclosure. After some hesitation I made a dash for one of these chairs, and the next minute I was within three or four feet from Matilda, but with an excited crowd between us. Everybody wanted to shake hands with the heroes. The jam and scramble were so great that Doctor Gorsky, Yeffim, and Matilda had to extricate themselves and to escape into the spacious committee-room in the rear of the platform

Some minutes later I stood by her side in that room, amid a cluster of revolutionists, her husband and Yeffim being each the center of another crowd in the same room

"I beg your pardon," I began, with a sheepish smile. "Do you know me."

Her glittering brown eyes fixed me with a curious look. "My name is David Levinsky," I added. "'Dovid,' the Talmudic student to whom you gave money with which to go to America."

"Of course I know you," she snapped. taking stock of my mink overcoat. "And I have heard about you, too. You have a lot of money, haven't you? I see you are wearing a costly fur coat." And she brutally turned to speak to somebody else

My heart stood still. I wanted to say something, to assure her that I was not so black as the socialists painted me. I had an impulse to offer her a generous contribution to the cause, but I had not the courage to open my mouth again. The bystanders were eying me with glances that seemed to say, "The idea of a fellow like this being here!" I was a despicable "bourgeois," a "capitalist" of the kind whose presence at a socialist meeting was a sacrilege

I slunk out of the room feeling like a whipped cur. "Why, she is a perfect savage!" I thought. "But then what else can you expect of a socialist?"

I thought of the scenes that had passed between her and myself in her mother's house and I sneered. "A socialist, a good, pure soul, indeed!" I mused, gloatingly. "That's exactly like them. A bunch of hypocrites, that's all they are."

At the same time I was nagging myself for having had so little sense as to sport my prosperity before a socialist, of all the people in the world

A few days later the episode seemed to have occurred many years before. It did not bother me. Nor did Matilda

CHAPTER VIII IT was an afternoon in April. My chief bookkeeper, one of my stenographers, Bender, and myself were hard at work at my Broadway factory amid a muffled turmoil of industry. There were important questions of credit to dispose of and letters to answer. I was taking up account after account, weighing my data with the utmost care, giving every detail my closest attention. And all the while I was thus absorbed, seemingly oblivious to everything else, I was alive to the fact that it was Passover and the eve of the anniversary of my mother's death; that three or four hours later I should be solemnizing her memorial day at the new Synagogue of the Sons of Antomir; that while there I should sit next to Mr. Kaplan, a venerable-looking man to whose daughter I had recently become engaged, and that after the service I was to accompany Mr. Kaplan to his house and spend the evening in the bosom of his family, by the side of the girl that was soon to become my wife. My consciousness of all this grew keener every minute, till it began to interfere with my work.

I was getting fidgety. Finally I broke off in the middle of a sentence

I washed myself, combed my plentiful crop of dark hair, carefully brushed myself, and put on my spring overcoat and derby hat--both of a dark-brown hue

"I sha'n't be back until the day after to-morrow," I announced to Bender, after giving him some orders

"Till day after to-morrow!" he said, with reproachful amazement

I nodded

"Can't you put it off? This is no time for being away," he grumbled

"It can't be helped."

"You're not going out of town, are you?"

"What difference does it make?" After a pause I added: "It isn't on business. It's a private matter."

"Oh!" he uttered, with evident relief. Nothing hurt his pride more than to suspect me of having business secrets from him.

He was a married man now, having, less than a year ago, wedded a sweet little girl, a cousin, who was as simple-hearted and simple-minded as himself, and to whom he had practically been engaged since boyhood. His salary was one hundred and twenty-five dollars a week now. I was at home in their well-ordered little establishment, the sunshine that filled it having given an added impulse to my matrimonial aspirations

I betook myself to the new Antomir Synagogue. The congregation had greatly grown in prosperity and had recently moved from the ramshackle little frame building that had been its home into an impressive granite structure, formerly a Presbyterian church. This was my first visit to the building.

Indeed, I had not seen the inside of its predecessor, the little old house of prayer that had borne the name of my native town, years before it was abandoned. In former years, even some time after I had become a convinced free-thinker, I had visited it at least twice a year-on my two memorial days--that is, on the anniversaries of the death of my parents. I had not done so since I had read Spencer. This time, however, the anniversary of my mother's death had a peculiar meaning for me. Vaguely as a result of my new mood, and distinctly as a result of my betrothal, I was lured to the synagogue by a force against which my Spencerian agnosticism was powerless

I found the interior of the building brilliantly illuminated. The woodwork of the "stand" and the bible platform, the velvet-and-gold curtains of the Holy Ark, and the fresco paintings on the walls and ceiling were screamingly new and gaudy. So were the ornamental electric fixtures. Altogether the place reminded me of a reformed German synagogue rather than of the kind with which my idea of Judaism had always been identified. This seemed to accentuate the fact that the building had until recently been a Christian church. The glaring electric lights and the glittering decorations struck me as something unholy. Still, the scattered handful of worshipers I found there, and more particularly the beadle, looked orthodox enough, and I gradually became reconciled to the place as a house of God

The beadle was a new incumbent. Better dressed and with more authority in his appearance than the man who had superintended the old place, he comported well with the look of things in the new synagogue. After obsequiously directing me to the pew of my prospective father-in-law, who had not yet arrived, he inserted a stout, tall candle into one of the sockets of the "stand" and lit it. It was mine. It was to burn uninterruptedly for my mother's soul for the next twenty-four hours. Mr.

Kaplan's pew was in a place of honor--that is, by the east wall, near the Holy Ark. To see my memorial candle I had to take a few steps back. I did so, and as I watched its flame memories and images took possession of me that turned my present life into a dream and my Russian past into reality.

According to the Talmud there is a close affinity between the human soul and light, for "the spirit of man is the lamp of God," as Solomon puts it in his Parables. Hence the custom of lighting candles or lamps for the dead. And so, as I gazed at that huge candle commemorating the day when my mother gave her life for me, I felt as though its light was part of her spirit. The gentle flutter of its flame seemed to be speaking in the sacred whisper of a grave-yard

"Mother dear! Mother dear!" my heart was saying. And then: "Thank God, mother dear! I own a large factory. I am a rich man and I am going to be married to the daughter of a fine Jew, a man of substance and Talmud. And the family comes from around Antomir, too. Ah, if you were here to escort me to the wedding canopy!"

The number of worshipers was slowly increasing. An old woman made her appearance in the gallery reserved for her sex. At last Mr. Kaplan, the father of my fiancée, entered the synagogue--a man of sixty, with a gray patriarchal beard and a general appearance that bespoke Talmudic scholarship and prosperity. He was a native of a small town near Antomir, where his father had been rabbi, and was now a retired flour merchant, having come to America in the seventies. He had always been one of the pillars of the Synagogue of the Sons of Antomir. In the days when I was a frequenter at the old house of prayer the social chasm between him and myself was so wide that the notion of my being engaged to a daughter of his would have seemed absurd. Which, by the way, was one of the attractions that his house now had for me

"Good holiday, Mr. Kaplan!" some of the other worshipers saluted him, as he made his way toward his pew

"Good holiday! Good holiday!" he responded, with dignified geniality

I could see that he was aware of my presence but carefully avoided looking at me until he should be near enough for me to greet him. He was a kindly, serious-minded man, sincerely devout, and not over-bright. He had his little vanities and I was willing to humor them