What he wanted was a broader view. His purpose was not so much to give
individual help as to formulate some general plan and to work upon those
lines.

And yet he wished an intimate view of the things he meant to devote his
life to bettering. So the clean little room over the quiet hardware
store seemed to suit his wants.

The thin, sharp-featured Jew and his fat, homely wife who kept it had
lived in that neighborhood for many years, and Philip found them a mine
of useful information regarding the things he wished to know.

The building was narrow and but three stories high, and his landlord
occupied all of the second story save the one room which was let to
Philip.

He arranged with Mrs. Levinsky to have his breakfast with them. He soon
learned to like the Jew and his wife. While they were kind-hearted and
sympathetic, they seldom permitted their sympathy to encroach upon their
purse, but this Philip knew was a matter of environment and early
influence. He drew from them one day the story of their lives, and it
ran like this:

Ben Levinsky's forebears had long lived in Warsaw. From father to son,
from one generation to another, they had handed down a bookshop, which
included bookbinding in a small way. They were self-educated and widely
read. Their customers were largely among the gentiles and for a long
time the anti-semitic waves passed over them, leaving them untouched.
They were law-abiding, inoffensive, peaceable citizens, and had been for