Indeed, the putting before the world of truthful pictures of Jewish life is in itself a good and useful work. It is extraordinary, considering that the Jews have lived in the midst of all civilized peoples for almost twenty centuries, what ignorance concerning the teachings of their religion and their characteristics as a people still prevails. They have sojourned in the midst of mankind and have wandered from land to land, stamped everywhere with the seal of mystery, looked upon by all not of their creed and kin as a “peculiar,” enigmatical, incomprehensible people. The fact that their Book, which most thoroughly reveals their innermost spirit, has become the cherished property of the world, should have made such misconception impossible; but it has not done so. Whatever, therefore, helps to show Jewish life in its true aspect, to reveal the poetry and the romance, the sorrow and the wretchedness, but also the joy and the beauty, the glory and the heroism of Jewish existence even in the unheroic present, performs a most useful, truly religious work. Nothing can do this more effectively than fiction, which appeals to multitudes to whom works of formal learning, of profound and scholarly research, could never find access. This is the excuse of the writer for departing for a time from those domains of Jewish learning which should, perhaps, more properly employ his energies, and becoming, in a measure, a rival of those who have in recent years tilled the field of Jewish fiction. In a ministry now of many years’ duration he has naturally had the opportunity of becoming acquainted with many interesting types of Jewish character, and with many incidents which speak eloquently of the trials and tribulations which still form a part of Jewish experience, of the evils and good which result therefrom, and of the influence of Jewish teachings working under such conditions. It has seemed to him desirable to present some of these to the world in this easily grasped and popular form in order to assist in the attainment of that comprehension of the Jews and their life which is so necessary, if they are ever to cease from their present abnormal state of mystery and be recognized in their natural relation to the general life and religion of mankind. Whether he has performed his task properly his readers shall judge. THE AUTHOR. NEW YORK, Ellul, 5665—September, 1905. LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE THE VILLAGE, _Frontispiece_ THE VERY SPIRIT OF SABBATH PERVADED THE NOISELESS AIR, 20 THERE THEY SAT AND STOOD, IN VARIOUS ATTITUDES, WHILE THE DEEPENING SHADOWS MADE THEIR FIGURES EVER VAGUER AND MORE INDISTINCT, 21 THEY HONORED THE COMMUNITY FREQUENTLY WITH THEIR VISITS, 28