He is small, thin, dried-up, hideously ugly. He hasn't even the signs of a moustache or beard or eyebrows. Not because he shaved. God forbid, but simply because they would not grow. But for that again he had a pair of lips and a nose. Oh, what a nose! It was curved like a ram's horn. And he had a voice like a bull. He growled like a lion. Where did such a creature get such a terrible roar? And where did he get so much strength? When he took hold of you by the hand with his cold, bony fingers, you saw the next world. When he boxed your ears, you felt the smart for three days on end. He hated arguing. For the least thing, guilty or not guilty, he had one sentence: "Lie down."
"'Rebbe,' Yossel-Yakov-Yossels thumped me."
"Lie down."
"'Rebbe,' it's a lie. He first kicked me in the side."
"Lie down."
"'Rebbe,' Chayim-Berrel Lippes put out his tongue at me."
"Lie down."
"'Rebbe,' it's a lie of lies. He made a noise at me."
"Lie down."
And you had to lie down. Nothing would avail you. Even Elya the red one, who is already "Bar-mitzvah," and is engaged to be married, and wears a silver watch—do you think he is never flogged? Oh yes! And how? Elya says he will be avenged for the floggings he gets. Some day or other he will pay back the "Rebbe" in such a way that his children's children will remember it. That's what Elya says after each flogging. And we echo his words.