She
sold feed for horses and she rejoiced in the thought that she was
married to a man of learning. True, she has a tongue. That she
always had, but over there it was not so bad. She has become a
different woman here. Alas! America is a topsy-turvy country."
He went on to show how the New World turned things upside
down, transforming an immigrant shoemaker into a man of
substance, while a former man of leisure was forced to work in a
factory here. In like manner, his wife had changed for the worse,
for, lo and behold! instead of supporting him while he read
Talmud, as she used to do at home, she persisted in sending him
out to peddle. "America is not Russia," she said. "A man must
make a living here." But, alas! it was too late to begin now! He
had spent the better part of his life at his holy books and was fit
for nothing else now. His wife, however, would take no excuse.
He must peddle or be nagged to death. And if he ventured to slip
into some synagogue of an afternoon and read a page or two he
would be in danger of being caught red-handed, so to say, for,
indeed, she often shadowed him to make sure that he did not play
truant.
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