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115 THE KING OF SCHNORRERS. 115

" Stand up, sir. These chairs are for the gentlemen of the Mahamad."

" And being gentlemen," added Manasseh crushingly, " they know better than to keep an old man on his legs any longer."

" If you were a gentleman," retorted the Chancellor, " you would take that thing off your head."

" If you were not a Man-of-the-Earth," rejoined the beggar, " you would know that it is not a mark of disrespect for the Mahamad, but of respect for the Law, which is higher than the Mahamad. The rich man can afford to neglect our holy religion, but the poor man has only the Law. It is his sole luxury."

The pathetic tremor in his voice stirred a confused sense of wrong-doing and injustice in the Councillors' breasts. The President felt vaguely that the edge of his coming impressive rebuke had been turned, if, indeed, he did not sit rebuked instead. Irritated, he turned on the Chancellor, and bade him hold his peace.

" He means well," said Manasseh deprecatingly. " He cannot be expected to have the fine instincts of the gentle- men of the Mahamad. May I ask you, sir," he concluded, " to proceed with the business for which you have sum- moned me? I have several appointments to keep with clients."

The President's bediamonded fingers recommenced their ill-tempered tattoo ; he was fuming inwardly with a sense of baffled wrath, of righteous indignation made unrighteous. "Is it true, sir," he burst forth at last in the most terrible accents he could command in the circumstances, " that you meditate giving your daughter in marriage to a Polish Jew?"

" No," replied Manasseh curtly.