Kissing the Rod: A Novel. (Vol. 1 of 3)Yates, Edmund
General
Kissing the Rod: A Novel. (Vol. 1 of 3)
Yates, Edmund
England -- Fiction
out right; but underthand one thing, ma tear,--you may change your
name if you like, but you'll never be able to change your nothe." Mr.
Simeon Hart was right; nothing short of cutting off that feature
could have disguised Mr. Daniel Thacker's nationality. He was as
distinctly marked as is the African; and though, with the addition of
splendid sparkling black eyes, bright scarlet lips, a quantity of
tightly-curling hair, and a fine flowing beard, he passed for a
handsome man among certain of the other sex, there was no man to
whom he had ever rendered a service--and he was in the main a
kindly-disposed fellow so far as his profession permitted--but set him
down for a "d--d Jew."
He never forgot this, it was never absent from his thoughts. If he saw
any one regarding him attentively, he felt at once what they were
thinking about; it haunted him in the theatre, in society, wherever
there was a chance of casual mention of his forsworn race. He had
tried to laugh it over in his business discount-dealings with
money-borrowers, asking them in a light and airy manner "why they came
to the Jews," of whom they must have had such serious warnings: but
the raillery always fell flat and heavy; and sometimes, from cubs of
fashion, produced unintentional clumsy sarcasms which stung him to the
quick. The renegade paid the penalty of his cowardice. With the
blunted notions of an unrefined mind, he thought that the prejudice
was levelled at his race, not at the character which the dealings of
some of his nation had won for it, and which he himself was
supporting. In his blindness he ignored the fact that amongst all
those whose good word was worth having, the prejudice had died out;
that the names of certain proud old Jewish families, who could trace
their pedigree far beyond the barber-surgeon or border-robber founders
of Norman or Scottish families, were honoured amongst the honoured;
and that in any case a man who, brought into contact with a set
socially superior to his own, took up his position calmly on the
strength of his own acquirements, be these what they might, was
received with a courtesy and a kindness which were naturally
refused to the most glowing impostor. With Mr. Guyon Thacker had
long had extensive dealings--dealings which had extended over a long
course of years; but of late he had been a little doubtful of his
client's solvency, a little delicate in the matter of renewals and
holdings-over; and with a clouded brow he heard from his clerk the
announcement that Mr. Guyon was waiting to see him in the ante-room.
He reflected for a moment, and seemed half disposed to deny himself to
his visitor; then carefully shutting the right-hand drawer of his
desk, in which he kept his checkbook, and placing the morocco-bound
volume, which was a ledger, but looked like a diary, close by him, he
said, "Show Mr. Guyon in, James; I've just five minutes at his
disposal."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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