stands before God and pleads: 'Dost Thou forget that these children no
longer have a mother?'... and the evil is averted. ..."

Gudule's voice had sunk to a mere whisper. Her eyes closed, her head
fell back, her breathing became slower and more labored. "Are you still
there, children?" she softly whispered.

Anxiously they bent over her. Then once again she opened her eyes.

"I see you still"--the words came with difficulty from her blanched
lips--"you, Ephraim, and you, my little Viola ... I am sure my Sechus
will plead for you ... for you and your father." They were Gudule's last
words. When her children, whose eyes had never as yet been confronted
with Death, called her by her name, covering her icy hands with burning
kisses, their mother was no more ...

Who can tell what influence causes the downtrodden blade to raise itself
once more! Is it the vivifying breath of the west wind, or a mysterious
power sent forth from the bosom of Mother Earth? It was a touching sight
to see how those two children, crushed as they were beneath the weight
of a twofold blow, raised their heads again, and in their very
desolation found new-born strength. And it filled the Ghetto with
wonder. For what were they but the offspring of a gambler? Or was it the
spirit of Gudule, their mother, that lived in them?

After Gudule's death, her eldest brother, the then owner of the grange,
came over to discuss the future of his sister's children. He wished
Ephraim and Viola to go with him to his home in Lower Bohemia, where he
could find them occupation. The children, however, were opposed to the
idea. They had taken no previous counsel together, yet, upon this point,