THE KADDISH 423
"A boy, Eeb Selig, a Kaddish!" announced the "grandmother." "As soon as I have bathed him, I will show him you !"
"A boy ... a boy ..." stammered Eeb Selig in the same bewilderment, and he leant against the wall, and burst into tears like a woman.
The seven girls took alarm.
"That is for joy," explained the "grandmother," "I have known that happen before."
"A boy . . a boy !" sobbed Eeb Selig, overcome with happiness, "a boy ... a boy ... a Kaddish !"
The little boy received the name of Jacob, but he was called, by way of a talisman, Alter.
Eeb Selig was a learned man, and inclined to think lightly of such protective measures; he even laughed at his 'Cheike for believing in such foolishness; but, at heart, he was content to have it so. Who could tell what might not be in it, after all? Women sometimes know better than men.
By the time Alterke was three years old, Eeb Seng's cough had become worse, the sense of oppression on his chest more frequent. But he held himself morally erect, and looked death calmly in the face, as though he would say, "Now I can afford to laugh at you I leave a Kaddish !"
"What do you think, Cheike," he would say to his wife, after a fit of coughing, "would Alterke be able to say Kaddish if I were to die to-day or to-morrow?"
"Go along with you, crazy pate !" Cheike would exclaim in secret alarm. "You are going to live a long while ! Is your cough anything new ?"
