It is recorded of a worthy Nordheim _Baal Habbayis_ that he once saw some flies rise from his boots and settle upon some hay, which was later on eaten by his cows. Now that in itself is a trifling and insignificant incident; but it so happened that the boots, in accordance with German village custom, had been smeared with tallow, which, from the viewpoint of the Jewish religious law is _Trefah_—that is, ritually unclean, and forbidden to be eaten. Our worthy Nordheimer at once felt himself burdened in his conscience and despatched a special messenger post-haste to the rabbi at Gersfeld with an inquiry as to whether the milk of those cows might lawfully be drunk. This pious scrupulosity did not, however, as might be thought, involve any gloomy or dreary harshness of sentiment. What we are accustomed to call the Puritanical frame of mind was utterly unknown in Nordheim. On the contrary, a cheerful and pleasant disposition, which made the tone of social intercourse extremely agreeable, was the all prevalent mood. In individual instances this mental tendency was emphasized into pronounced joviality, and the happy possessors thereof became the “_Spass macher_,” the jesters and fun-makers of the community. Woe betide the unfortunate individual who acquired a reputation for sourness and unsociability. He was considered a legitimate victim for the gibes and jests of the official jokers, and small indeed was the meed of sympathy which he received. Another instance of the prevailing jocoseness was the custom of attaching nicknames to persons, which were then used instead of their proper appellations. It was rarely that any one was referred to in Nordheim by his given name, the nickname being so universally used as almost to displace the real and legal cognomen. These nicknames were derived from some personal characteristic or some peculiarity arising from vocation or experience in life, which had struck the village wags as humorous. It was “the black Elias,” or “the long Moses,” or “the bold Isaac,” or “the gentle Sarah,” the last two appellations being, of course, mildly ironical. One individual, who had an undue amount of audacity in his psychological make-up, was known as “der _Baishan_,” that is, “the bashful or timid one,” while another who had failed in nearly everything he had undertaken was universally dubbed “der _Mazzeldige Shmuel_,” that is, “lucky Sam.” A family, some remote ancestor of which had once been imprisoned in a tower and escaped therefrom by leaping from the window of his cell, was generally known as “_die Thurm hüpfer_,” “the tower-hoppers,” while six brothers, all of whom were over six feet tall and stout in proportion, bore the strikingly apposite designation of “_die Kinderlich_,” that is, “the babies.” The swineherd, who called his charges together by means of a long tin trumpet, from which he emitted shrill and piercing, though hardly melodious notes, was styled by the Jews “_der Baal Tokea_,” that