The Barnow of the tale is a gloomy little town, and the houses of its ghetto small and dirty. Yet it boasts the great white mansion of its millionaire; it has its real spring days when the air is deliciously soft and warm. And it knows how to keep the Sabbath, how to welcome the bride with an emotion which stirs its spirit to the very depths. But all the passion is expended on the adoration of the Divinity. “The same race whose genius gave birth to the Song of Songs--the eternal hymn of love--and to whom the world owes the story of Ruth, the most beautiful idyl of womanhood ever known--has now, after a thousand years of the night of oppression and wandering, learned to look on marriage as a mere matter of business, by which to secure some pecuniary advantage, and as a means of preventing the chosen of the Lord from dying off the face of the earth.” The author grows more and more indignant as he writes: “These men know not what they do--they have no suspicion of the sin of which they are guilty in thus acting.” This, for Franzos, was the tragedy of Barnow. It is the theme of several of his tales. Sometimes it is the boy, sometimes the girl, who rides a-tilt against the paternal choice of a mate. The father selects for his son or daughter the most pious and wealthy partner available. They will not know each other, but what of that? They will have plenty of time to make acquaintance after marriage. One Barnow father thus defends the system: “We don’t look upon the chicken as wiser than the hen. And, thank God, we know nothing of love and all that kind of nonsense. We consider that two things are alone requisite when arranging a marriage, and these are health and wealth. The bride and bridegroom in this case possess both.” Franzos obviously regards this justification as one of the “outlandish” features of Barnow’s manners. But were he alive to-day, he would recognize that Moses Freudenthal, the Barnow father who thus argues, was anticipating the latest formula of Eugenics! The novelist, however, remorselessly sees only the tragedy and not the amenities of the system. From the side of the man, in the story _Nameless Graves_, Franzos put it thus: “As a general rule, the long-haired Jewish youth never even thinks of any girl until his father tells him that he has chosen a wife for him. He sometimes sees his bride for the first time at betrothal, but in a great many cases he does not see her until his marriage-day; and then, whether she pleases him or not, he makes up his mind to get used to her, and generally succeeds.” But the Barnow young men turn and look at Lea as she walks down the street--“a thing hitherto unknown.” Even in the _Klaus_, when “quiet, dreamy, and very dirty Talmudists bent over their heavy folios, her name was sometimes mentioned, followed by many a deep sigh.” A revolution in male manners, undoubtedly.