This was the most recent tragedy of the Seraï Bournou, and perhaps one of the saddest; and, as I glanced around me, and remembered how many of his works had outlived him, I forgot my own disappointment in commiserating the fate of a Sovereign, who, sensual and supine though he was, yet possessed qualities both of the heart and the head, which should have arrested the weapons of his assassins, and secured to him the affections of his adherents. CHAPTER XXV. Social Condition of the Eastern Jews—Parallel between the Jews of Europe and the Levant—Cruelty of the Turkish Children to Jews—A Singular Custom—Religious Strictness of the Jews—National Administration—The House of Naim Zornana of Galata—Costume of the Jewish Women—Hebrew Hospitality. I never saw the curse denounced against the children of Israel more fully brought to bear than in the East; where it may be truly said that “their hand is against every man, and every man’s hand against them,”—Where they are considered rather as a link between animals and human beings, than as men possessed of the same attributes, warmed by the same sun, chilled by the same breeze, subject to the same feelings, and impulses, and joys, and sorrows, as their fellow mortals. There is a subdued and spiritless expression about the Eastern Jew, of which the comparatively tolerant European can picture to himself no possible idea until he has looked upon it. The Israelite of Europe has a peculiar physiognomy; a crouching, self-humbling, constrained manner; but there is “a lurking devil in his eye,” which at once convinces you that it is the hope of gain rather than the fear of insult, which teaches him that over-acted subserviency of carriage. You may detect the internal chuckle of self-gratulatory success; the stealthy glance of calculating caution; the sudden flashing out of the spirit’s triumph, as transitory as it is vivid. But the Jew of Turkey knows not even the poor enjoyment of these momentary outbreaks of our common nature; “he eats his bread in bitterness,” and comes forth from beneath his own roof-tree with fear and trembling, to pursue his calling; and to mingle, even unequally, in the avocations of his task-masters. It is little to be wondered at, therefore, that the bitterness of hatred is blent with the terror of the Jew, in his commerce with his Moslem lords; nor that his heart burns as he treads their highways, and wanders through their cities. But this is a secret and impotent revenge; and, even while his spirit pours forth “curses not loud, but deep,” he only crouches the more servilely beneath the power that crushes him, lest the yoke should be pressed down yet more heavily, and the burthen be doubled.