“Mein Gott, wo bin ich? My God, where am I?”
The old woman sprang with one bound to the middle of the chamber; brother Gabriel let fall the books, and remained petrified after opening his eyes as large as his spectacles.
“In what language have you spoken?” she demanded.
“It must be Hebrew, like these books,” answered brother Gabriel. “Perhaps he is a Jew, as you said, good Maria.”
“God help us!” she cried. “But no, if he were a Jew, would we not have seen it on his back when we undressed him?”
“Good Maria,” replied the brother, “the holy father said that this belief which attributes to a Jew a tail at his back is nonsense, a piece of bad wit, and that the Jews laugh at it.”
“Brother Gabriel,” replied the good Mama Maria, “since this holy constitution, all is changed, all is metamorphosed. This clique, who govern to-day in place of the king, wish that nothing should remain of what formerly existed; it is for that they no longer permit the Jews to wear tails on their backs, although they always before carried them, as does the devil. If the holy father said to the contrary it is because it is obligatory, as they are obliged to say at Mass, ‘Constitutional king.’ ”
“That may be so,” said the monk.
“He is not a Jew,” pursued the old woman; “rather is he a Turk or a Moor, who has been shipwrecked on our coast.”
“A pirate of Morocco,” replied the good brother, “it may be.”