“Retain your seats, gentlemen,” he said, “and do not interrupt your game. Our honored rabbi has come here this evening impelled by a desire to see for himself how modern society amuses itself. He does not wish to disturb or interfere with you in any way. Resume your playing, therefore, and we shall remain here as mere spectators.” The effect of these words was that the players resumed their seats and began again their interrupted games. The ban of the rabbi’s presence rested, however, heavily on all, and the playing, like the dancing in the ball-room under the same influence, became spiritless and perfunctory in the extreme. The players removed their cigars from their mouths, the erstwhile boisterous voices became subdued, and all animation departed from the scene. After silently watching the proceedings for a few moments the rabbi said to Herr Pringsheim: “Do you know, friend Pringsheim, I do not seem to gain any insight into a gambler’s feelings from merely looking on. To me the whole thing seems a merely mechanical proceeding. One makes one move and the other another move. I cannot make out what it is all about, and I believe that I shall never have any conception of what card-playing is, or wherein the fascination lies unless I play a game or two myself. Would you mind playing with me?” “Not at all, rabbi,” said Pringsheim, highly amused at the request. “What game shall it be?” “That is all the same to me,” answered the rabbi. “I do not know one from the other. You choose any one you please and you will be kind enough to teach it me. I think I shall be able to learn it.” “Very well,” said Pringsheim, laughing heartily. “I don’t doubt but you will make a famous card-player. Where there is _Torah_ there is _Chochmah_.” “But one thing I must tell you,” said the rabbi. “We must play for money. I could never get the real feeling of the gambler, the thrill and the tension which he feels, unless there was the hope of gain and the risk of loss. So we must not play a mere formal game, but there must be a real stake involved.” “Very well, rabbi,” said Pringsheim, still smiling. “How large shall the stake be, a gulden or five gulden?” “Oh, that would never do,” said the rabbi. “I could not get the right idea with such a trifling sum, which is of no consequence whether won or lost. Let us play for a thousand gulden. I shall put my five hundred gulden on the game and you put in five hundred gulden also.” [Illustration: THE GAME WHICH ENSUED WAS HIGHLY INTERESTING _Page 287_] The effect of this proposition was naturally startling. Pringsheim stared at the rabbi for a moment as though he could not trust his ears. But he was, to put it in modern parlance, game. “As you wish, rabbi,” he said, quietly. “We shall play for a stake of a thousand gulden.”