"Epicurean!" shrieked the _Schnorrer_. "Blasphemer! Is it thus you would palter with the sacred texts? Do you forget what the next verse says: 'Bloodthirsty and deceitful men shall not live out half their days'? Shame on you--you a _Gabbai_ (treasurer) of the Great Synagogue. You see I know you, Joseph Grobstock. Has not the beadle of your Synagogue boasted to me that you have given him a guinea for brushing your spatterdashes? Would you think of offering _him_ a packet? Nay, it is the poor that are trodden on--they whose merits are in excess of those of beadles. But the Lord will find others to take up his loans--for he who hath pity on the poor lendeth to the Lord. You are no true son of Israel." The _Schnorrer's_ tirade was long enough to allow Grobstock to recover his dignity and his breath. "If you really knew me, you would know that the Lord is considerably in my debt," he rejoined quietly. "When next you would discuss me, speak with the Psalms-men, not the beadle. Never have I neglected the needy. Even now, though you have been insolent and uncharitable, I am ready to befriend you if you are in want." "If I am in want!" repeated the _Schnorrer_ scornfully. "Is there anything I do not want?" "You are married?" "You correct me--wife and children are the only things I do _not_ lack." "No pauper does," quoth Grobstock, with a twinkle of restored humour. "No," assented the _Schnorrer_ sternly. "The poor man has the fear of Heaven. He obeys the Law and the Commandments. He marries while he is young--and his spouse is not cursed with barrenness. It is the rich man who transgresses the Judgment, who delays to come under the Canopy." "Ah! well, here is a guinea--in the name of my wife," broke in Grobstock laughingly. "Or stay--since you do not brush spatterdashes--here is another." "In the name of my wife," rejoined the _Schnorrer_ with dignity, "I thank you." "Thank me in your own name," said Grobstock. "I mean tell it me." "I am Manasseh Bueno Barzillai Azevedo da Costa," he answered simply. "A Sephardi!" exclaimed the philanthropist. "Is it not written on my face, even as it is written on yours that you are a Tedesco? It is the first time that I have taken gold from one of your lineage." "Oh, indeed!" murmured Grobstock, beginning to feel small again. "Yes--are we not far richer than your community? What need have I to take the good deeds away from my own people--they have too few opportunities for beneficence as it is, being so many of them wealthy; brokers and West India merchants, and--" "But I, too, am a financier, and an East India Director," Grobstock reminded him.