"Who told you that?"
"The teacher."
"The teacher?"
She exchanged glances with the cook who was helping her, and they both laughed aloud.
"You are a fool, and your teacher a still greater fool. Ha! ha! Scrape the horse-radish, scrape away."
That I was a fool I knew. My mother told me that frequently, and my brothers and my sisters too. But that my teacher was a greater fool than I—that was news to me.
. . . . .
I have a comrade, Pinalle, the "Shochet's" son. I was at his house one day, and I saw how a little girl carried a fowl, a huge cock, its legs tied with a string. My comrade's father, the "Shochet," was asleep, and the little girl sat at the door and waited. The cock, a fine strong bird, tried to get out of the girl's arms. He drove his strong feet into her, pecked at her hand, let out from his throat a loud "Cock-a-doodle-doo!" protested as much as he could. But the girl was no weakling either. She thrust the head of the rooster under her arm and dug her elbows into him, saying:
"Be still, you wretch!"
And he obeyed and remained silent.