Once on a time, our synagogue had appeared in my eyes like a small copy of King Solomon's Temple. Now the small temple was leaning slightly to one side. Ah, what has become of the brilliance, and the holy splendour of our little old synagogue? Where now are the angels which used to flutter about, under the carved wings of the Holy Ark on Friday evenings, when we were reciting the prayers in welcome of the Sabbath, and on Festival evenings when we were reciting the beautiful Festival prayers? And the members of the congregation were also very little changed. They were only grown a little older. Black beards were now grey. Straight shoulders were stooped a little. The satin holiday coats that I knew so well were more threadbare, shabbier. White threads were to be seen in them and yellow stripes. Melech the Cantor sang as beautifully as in the olden times, years ago. Only today his voice is a little husky, and a new tone is to be heard in the old prayers he is chanting. He weeps rather than sings the words. He mourns rather than prays. And our rabbi? The old rabbi? He has not changed at all. He was like the fallen snow when I saw him last, and today is like the fallen snow. He is different only in one trifling respect. His hands are trembling. And the rest of his body is also trembling, from old age, I should imagine. Asreal the Beadle--a Jew who had never had the least sign of a beard--would have been exactly the same man as once on a time, years before, if it were not for his teeth. He has lost every single tooth he possessed; and with his fallen-in cheeks, he now looks much more like a woman than a man. But for all that, he can still bang on the desk with his open hand. True, it is not the same bang as once on a time. Years ago, one was almost deafened by the noise of Asreal's hand coming down on the desk. Today, it is not like that at all. It seems that he has not any longer the strength he used to have. He was once a giant of a man. Once on a time, years ago, I was happy in the little old synagogue; I remember that I felt happy without an end--without a limit! Here, in the little synagogue, years ago, my childish soul swept about with the angels I imagined were flying around the carved wings of the Holy Ark. Here, in the little synagogue, once on a time, with my father and all the other Jews, I prayed earnestly. And it gave me great pleasure, great satisfaction. * * * And now, here I am again in the same old synagogue, praying with the same old congregation, just as once on a time, years ago. I hear the same Cantor singing the same melodies as before. And I am praying along with the congregation. But my thoughts are far from the prayers. I keep turning over the pages of my prayer-book idly, one page after the other. And--I am not to blame for it--I come upon the pages on which are printed the "Song of Songs." And I read: "Behold, thou art fair, my love; behold, thou are fair; thou hast dove's eyes within thy locks."