It is said
of these gallant rovers of the seas that they were subject to a
peculiar malady when on shore. It caused them to stagger and swagger,
use violent language, and deport themselves not unlike people who are
seized with mal de mer, or sickness of the sea. When attacked by this
failing, their wives would cast them bodily into the holds of their
ships and start them out to sea, where they soon recovered their
usual health and equilibrium and continued on their rounds. They were
the first of all commercial travelers and the hardiest, jolliest and
most prosperous--but they did not hoard their earnings.
My uncle conducted a store, selling merchandise of every description.
Dutch uncle though he was to me, I must give him thanks for the
careful business training he bestowed on me. I say with pride that I
proved to be his most apt and willing pupil. He taught me how the
natives, by nature simple-minded and unsophisticated, had lost all
confidence in their fellow-men in general and merchants in particular
through the, to say the least, very dubious and suspicious dealings
of the tribes of Israel. My uncle said he was an old timer in New
Mexico, but the Jew was there already when he came and, added he,
thoughtfully, "I believe the Jews came to America with Columbus.
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