The _Takif_, or man of substance, was as accustomed to the palm of the mendicant outside the Great Synagogue as to the rattling pyx within.

They lived in Bury Street, and Prescott Street, and Finsbury--these aristocrats of the Ghetto--in mansions that are now but congeries of "apartments." Few relations had they with Belgravia, but many with Petticoat Lane and the Great _Shool_, the stately old synagogue which has always been illuminated by candles and still refuses all modern light.

The Spanish Jews had a more ancient _snoga_, but it was within a stone's throw of the "Duke's Place" edifice.

Decorum was not a feature of synagogue worship in those days, nor was the Almighty yet conceived as the holder of formal receptions once a week.

Worshippers did not pray with bated breath, as if afraid that the deity would overhear them.