Next morning I arrived at "Cheder" with my Bible in one hand and my dinner in the other. The boys were excited, jolly. Why? The teacher was not there. What had happened? He had gone off to a Circumcision with his wife. That is to say, not with her, God forbid! A teacher never walks with his wife. The teacher walks before, and his wife after him.
"Let us make a bet," cried a boy with a blue nose. His name was Hosea Hessel.
"How much shall we bet?" asked another boy, Koppel Bunnas. He had a torn sleeve out of which peeped the point of a dirty elbow.
"A quarter of the locust-beans."
"Let it be a quarter of the locust-beans. What for? Let us hear."
"I say he will not stand more than twenty-five."
"And I say thirty-six."
"Thirty-six. We shall soon see. Boys, take hold of him."
This was the order of Hosea Hessel, of the blue nose. And several boys took hold of me, all together, turned me over on the bench, face upwards. Two sat on my legs, two on my arms, and one held my head, so that I should not be able to wriggle. And another placed his left forefinger and thumb at my nose. (It seemed he was left-handed.) He curled up his finger and thumb, closed his eye, and began to fillip me on the nose. And how, do you think? Each time I saw my father in the other world. Murderers, slaughterers! What had they against my nose? What had it done to them? Whom had it bothered? What had they seen on it—a nose like all noses.
"Boys, count," commanded Hosea Hessel. "One, two, three—"