Carovius told all about this at the reserved table in the Crocodile. His companions were in a position to tell him a great deal more about the ancestry and past life of the Bendas. They were said to have been very rich once, to have lost their money in the great panic, and to be living at present in quite moderate circumstances. Benda’s father was said to have shot himself, and his mother was reported to have taken the boy to school every morning. Solicitor Korn had been told that, despite his youth, Dr. Benda had written a number of scientific books on biology, but that this had not enabled him to reach his desired goal. “What goal?” the table companions asked in unison. “Why, he wanted to be made a professor, but people had objected.” Why had they objected? came the question from more than one throat. “Well, you see it was this way: the man is a Jew, and the authorities are not going to appoint a Jew to an official position in a university without raising objections. That is to be taken as a matter of course.” That this was in very truth to be taken as a matter of course was also the opinion of Herr Carovius, who, however, insisted that Benda didn’t exactly look like a Jew; he looked more like a tolerably fat Dutchman. He was in truth not quite blond, but he was not dark either, and his nose was as straight as a rule. “That is just the point: that’s the Jewish trick,” remarked the Judge, and took a mighty draught from his beer glass. “In olden times,” he said, “the Jews all had the yellow spots, aquiline noses, and hair like bushmen. But to-day no Christian can be certain who is Jew and who is Gentile.” To this the whole table agreed. Herr Carovius at once began a system of espionage. He studied the faces of the new tenants, and was particularly careful to note when they went out and when they came in and with whom they associated. He knew precisely when they turned the lights out at night and when they opened the windows in the morning. He could tell exactly how many rugs they had, how much coal they burned, how much meat they ate, how many letters they received, what walks they preferred, what people they spoke to, and who recognised them. As if this were not enough, he went down to the bookstore, bought the complete works of Dr. Benda, and read these heavy scientific treatises in the sweat of his brow. He was annoyed at the thought that they had not been critically reviewed. He would have embraced any one who would have told him that they were all perfectly worthless compilations.