Tremendous enthusiasm throughout the house. Several dozen deputies, hurriedly leaving their seats, dashed to the telephones to give their banks orders to sell foreign money. The switchboard could hardly manage the rush of calls for “Karpeles & Co.,” “Veilchenfeld & Son,” “Rosenstrauch & Butterfrass,” “Kohn, Cohn, & Kohen” and all the rest of the great banking-houses. And while the Finance Minister, who had wasted an entire minute to free his imprisoned tongue, went on with his speech, Holborn, the Englishman, grinned as he told the other newspapermen: “Jonathan Huxtable is a fine fellow! He’s been raving and ranting against the Jews ever since his wife eloped with a Jewish prize fighter. He’s a strict prohibitionist, but he gets drunk every day on a cordial he buys from his druggist. Drinking a whole bottle of Eau de Cologne in one breath is said to be nothing unusual for him. And if he’s going to invest twenty million dollars here, he surely expects to make fifty.” Dr. Wiesel’s face expressed disapproval, while the Jewish reporters quickly took down notes for some last malicious items. Speakers, _pro_ and _con_, came forward. The Social-Democrats attacked the law; but when Weitherz, their leader, in calm and measured terms expressed his indignation and called the proposed measure a disgrace to humanity, a terrific uproar arose, the galleries threw keys and crumpled paper at the Social-Democrats, a fist fight ensued, and the small opposition left the hall under protest. Pastor Zweibacher lauded Dr. Schwertfeger as a modern apostle who deserved canonization; the Pan-German deputies Wondratschek and Jiratschek, however, discussed the law from the racial point of view only, and Jiratschek, who spoke with a pronounced Bohemian accent, wept with emotion and closed with the words: “Wotan is among us!” The last speaker, received with cries of “Hep! Hep!” and jeering “Ai-wai” calls, was the solitary Zionist deputy, the engineer Minkus Wassertrilling. With folded arms the tall, slender, handsome young man waited until order was restored, and then said: “My dear disciples of the Jew who, in order to save humanity, was foolish enough to let himself be crucified!” Vehement interjections of “Throw out the Jews!” “Yes, gentlemen, I join your cry of ‘Throw out the Jews!’ And I will gladly cast my vote in favor of this law. We Zionists welcome it, for it falls in line with all our aims and tendencies. About half of the five hundred thousand Jews expelled by this law will unite under the Zionist standard, and I know that the others will be received with open arms in France and England, Italy and America, Spain and the Balkan countries. I am not worried about the fate of my people--what your spiteful malice and stupidity intend as a curse will become a blessing.” The hooting that again broke out drowned the rest of his speech, and finally the Zionist also was pushed out of the hall.