The Maccabaean

dignified its universal humanitarian symbol. The Puritans remembered in so many points the Jewish life in the ghetto. They were merchants and capitalists in the beginning of capitalism, as were the Jews through the centuries of the middle ages,

and they developed many virtues and ideals of life which are peculiarly Jewish. The devotion to the Bible and the holiness of this Sabbath have a striking resemblance to the spiritualized life of the Jews in the Ghetto.

(To be Concluded)

I.

ONE fine afternoon, about the middle of June, Mr. Sigmund (Selig) Rodman's small portly figure was comfortably seated in a large cushioned chair in the private office of his department store,—one of the largest and handsomest in Los Angeles—and thick clouds of fragrant smoke were issuing from his well-fed lips. On the brightly polished mahogany table before him lay some balance sheets, but, in reality, Mr. Rodman was deeply engaged in musing over the future of his only son Harry, whom he was expecting home after the completion of his college studies in the Great City on the other side of the continent.

The young man was now twenty-one years old, and Mr. Rodman in his visions saw him married to Mathilda Nathan, the daughter of his competitor, and then,—the consolidation of both department stores. Yes, he, Selig, who only twenty-five years ago had been a poor traveling pack-pedler, would become the mechutan of the Nathans whose German-Jewish ancestors had landed in America generations ago! And then, again, if you consider the matter rightly, what think you is the yichus of these German Yahudim? In America all men are equal! Selig exclaimed to himself, and with his Harry he need not at all feel fallen. But, in spite of these assurances, Mr. Rodman experienced a fine feeling of satisfied pride, mingled, also, with a slight

tinge of satisfied revenge at the prospect of an alliance with the Nathans.

Sigmund Rodman doated on his son. The young man's life had ever been under his own watchful care, and he had spared nothing to remove from his path all pains and disappointments. He knew that although the young man was sincere, manly and good-intentioned, he nevertheless possessed a streak of obstinacy, which the father ascribed not to his indulgent bringing up, but to the fact that he belonged to the stiffnecked race. Sigmund Rodman, whose eventful life had taught him that in this world, at least, it was not at all an advantage to be a member of that race, had given that fact little prominence in the education of his son. In the course of experiences religious scruples which had at first tormented Selig, had gradually worn away, so that in spite of an occasional twinge which he generally felt on the advent of the holydays, no religious considerations prevented him from keeping the fact of his membership to the stiff-necked race entirely in the background. He was resolved that his son should be exempt from his share of the burden which the Almighty has alotted to His Chosen.

As he leaned back in his cushioned chair, the feeling that Mr. Rodman experienced was one of impatience for the speedy return of his son. He foresaw no serious obstacles to his plans. His son was handsome and he was rich, and he felt sure that