The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, July 3, 1904, Page 3

THE SAN FRANCISCO SUNDAY CALL. san to cie: ). I was invited to din- ner that da; ith our editor-in-chief, and we were leisurely enjoying our time over a cigar when the tumult of the rioters reached us. The first thing that occurred to my mind was the pos- sible danger of my uncle and his daughter, who lived in Libedski. He kept a jewelry store and lived above it. When I reached the place I found everything destroyed and plundered, and in the gutter in fremt of it I no- ticed you lying senseless and bleeding (my memory mnow became clearer). Fortunately, the sbldiers and oflicers, who at first helped the mob to plunder and rob, kept them b: now. Dr. Mandel, a friend of mine, came up with an ambulance. I left you in his care and went in search of my uncle and his daughter. I found tne girl in an unconscious condition in the haliway.” Levinski put his handkerchief to his face, but his voice betrayed that there were tears in his eyes. “You can imagine my feelings when at my cousin thus violated. the assistance of Dr. Mandel ined consciousness and began to or her father. This reminded me y uncle, and we went to search for We looked through the house, but he was not there. The furniture was demolished and his books—for he had a valuable library—were stolen some were torn leaf from leaf. we found him lying in the back with a fractured skull. He had long before we had arrived “I could see that the girl’s condition was critical. When she gained con- sciousness she told how her father had met his fate. Learning that the mob wae plundering downstairs, they locked themselves in a dark room on the second floor, hoping to save their lives. But after the mob had finished their diabolical work downstairs they broke into the rooms upstairs and at- tacked the door of the room where they were hidden. It was forced open and the girl assaulted. She and her father were armed with knives, but what could weak creatures like them do?” Levinski paused here and openly broke into tears. ““The ravagers succeeded in wresting the poogechild from her father’s arms, and violated her while she was wrest- ling with the rioters who held him back. Then they flung him through the window, and the girl succeeded in rushing downstairs. But they caught her in the hallway and attacked her again.” A vague recollection of the situation in which I found the girl was now coming back to me. “How is the girl?” I asked after a short pause. “She stabbed herself in the abdomen while being ravished, and she died from the wound the next day,” Levinski said and sobbed again. After the riot broke out in Yeliswet- ., if you remember that, a rumor s circulated that a similar outbreak s going to take place here on May 3. We sent a delegation to the Mayor and asked him to station soldiers in the most thickly populated Jewish streets, but he biuntly replied: ‘I would not trouble the soldiers for a pack of Jews” However, the riot did not oc- cur on the day expected, but on the next Sunday. “I was a dreamer. We were all dreamers who thought we had be- come citizens of Russia. Yes, we are only stepchildren in every country, after all, and we very seldom find a kind-hearted stepmother to take care of us. Always sneered at, scolded, cursed. persecuted, beaten, whether we commit a fault or achieve the heroic. To please the Christian nations we ought to, as Fichte says, cut off our Jewish heads and put on Christian ones; and I scarcely believe even that would be sufficient. {"Yes, I was dreaming. But the stones hurled at the windows of the Jewish quarter, the burning roofs over the heads of my brethren, the cry of agony of the wretched® dwellers of Libedski—these awaken me. The dream is over.” He spoke furiously; his eyes flashed through their tears. . “Yes, I awoke. Russia is my father- lard no longer. I can’t stay in this country. I expect to leave Europe and all Christian nations forever. The na- tions that teach love in the name of the crucified Jew do mot practice it They mever practice it. The Crusaders, the auto-da-fe, the Russian knout, the German press—they are all pursuing the same end in the name of Christian brotherhood. I shall flee to my Uncle Ishmael and seek protegtion under him. He does not preach much, and this leaves him more time to practice.” “I do not understand you,” I inter- rupted him. “Do you intend t§ go to Turkey > “You have been ill for the last few months €0 you do not know what is going on among us now. There is a movement among the Jews to go back and colonize Palestine. A great num- ber of Jewish students of Kieff and Kharkoff have abandoned their studies and will sail In a few weeks for Pales- tine. I subscribed to this league, too. Enough of this European civilization! Back to our anclent fatherland, where our prophets saw ‘celestial visions and preached peace; where David poured forth his heavenly psalms: where the earth was once saturated with the blood of the Maccabeans; where the precious relics of our history are en- tombed. 1 shall be happy to put on the Arab’s robe and turban and till the ground of my ancestors. No more dreaming—I have awakened at last.” Thus spoke Levinski, who had been an ardent bellever in assimilation two months before. I could hardly believe my ears; I thought I must be still de- lirfous. Ag soon as I was strong enough to walk about he house I began to worry about the future. The remembrance of Katia was as sweet as ever to me, but with the thought of her came the thought of baptism, and tkat pros- trated my mind. My conscience and self-esteem as a born Jew aroused by the recent massacre reveited against my love. I hesitated whether or not to go back to her. How strangely people often act! What would I not have done for Katia's sake two months before? And now, when my rocad was so smooth, without the least cbstacle, I thought of giving up the loveliest and most charming girl on account of a little cold water. True, the world calls it changing one’s faith, but is it not In reality only deceiving a narrow- minded priest? True, the world con- demns and despises one who goes through this ceremony without being in earnest about it, but do not men in morz ways than this deceive others in the pursuits of life? Do not writers every day, in _newspapers, magazines and voluminous books, misrepresent themselves and express ideas they do not themsclves believe? Do not poli- ticians who are respected and honored in our community, and whose praises &re perpetuated in verse-—do not these poiitical schemers advocate principles for their own benefit? What dif- ference is there between one who mis- represents his ideas or belief for a mi licn and the poor man whose stomach pains from hunger, who lets himself be. sprinkled with a little cold water by some priest for a few dollars? Is not Jove the most divine and the purest sentiment that can prompt one to de- bigoted priest? In doing this t trifle with God, but mere- 1y exposes a foolish priest to the ridi- cule of the wise, Never in his life did the witty Heine play a greater satiri- cal prank on Christendom than by his baptism. Finally T decided to go and see Katla. I inquired of Levinski, who was on friendly terms with Judge Bialnick, about the latter. “Judge Bialnick?” he said. knows where he is.” “What has happened to nim?” “He was arrested immediately after the riots and—" “And was sent to Siberia?” I struck in fearfully. ’ “No: he managed to escape, and was told he is with his daughter eithi in France or Switzerland.” “No one CHAPTER XIIL I BID FAREWE TO MY FATH- ERLAND. In a short time 1 recovered entirely from my illness; only a scar across my forehead and right eye was left to re- mind me of my injuries. I was low- spirited most of the time, and stayed in the ‘Jewish settlement. “The stone which I recently despised became the headstone of the corner.” 1 felt like the prodigal son returned to his father. Again there was a yearning in my heart fcr the Ghetto, surrounded by high, dingy walls, with a heavy gate; 2gain there was in my heart a craving desire for the Beth-Hamedrash, with its hot oven, by which I could sit among my honest people and brood over a folio of Talmud. I also had dreamed, for a certainty. And that day had awakened me, too0. R e About a week later the Zion League, which consigted of a large number of stude: young doctors and lawyers, Journalists and engineers, left for Pa- lestine to establish colonies there and prepare for the coming Messiah. 1, however, decided to try some coun- try of western Europe. 1 packed up my belongings, and in the same month bade farewell to the land that gave me life and sought to extinguish it. While 1 sat in the car that crossed the Rus- sian frontier and looked without, thick volumes of smoke issued from the en- gine-stack and rolléed over the vast stretches of stubble-fields and stacks of reaped rye, wheat, and straw. I looked gloomily through the car win- dow as we traversed woods and forests, flying swiftly across bridges, and al- lowing me only a glimpse of the waters below and of the broad expanse of Rus- sian territory. I gazed wistfully at the varying panorama through which I sped, and my heart throbbed wildly at the thought that it might be my last look at Russia. No matter how cruelly I had been treated in tnat land it was the Jand in which I roamed barefoot in my childhood, and was ever to be re- membered with yearning. As the train hurried toward the Ger- man frontier 1 continued to look through the window, which was fre- quently clouded with a blast of black smoke, and I thought of Litwinoff, one of Turgenieff’s creations: “All is but smoke and vapor; everything is con- stantly changing; one shape dissolves itself into another, one event succeeds another, but in reality everything re- maing the same. There is much stir and confusion, but all these clouds vanish at . last without leaving any trace, without having accomplished anything. The winds cnange their di- rection: they pass to the other side and there continue their feverish and fruit- less motion.” “Smoke, smoke—smoke and vapor,” I muttered to myself. “Smoke, smoke, and nothing but smoke and vapor. S < BOOK THE THIRD. LIBERTY, “'And strangers shall stand and feed their flocks, and the sons of the alien shall be your ploughman and your vinedresser.”—Isaiah. - CHAPTER L 7 IN THE LAND OF LIBERTY. Every person’s life would make an interesting story if the narrator only ‘knew which portions to tell and which to omit. In this.truism will be found my reason for omitting a detailed ac- count of the two years following my departure from my native soil. Like a restless spirit I wandered from city to city, from country to country, with no definite purpose in view, I traveled through Germany, France, Switzer- land, Italy, England. I tried hard to forget the past—root it out of my memory-—but one face remained ever vivid before me. I.searched, I in- quired, but I sought in vain for my heart’s desire. One fine frosty morning found me on the deck of a steamer gently beating the waves of New York Bay and slowly moving toward the land of liberty. As the steamer approached Castle Garden the passengers, with bundles in their hands, anxiously gazed toward the shore. The impatience of the crowd grew every moment. The climax of their excitement was reached when the boat was being moored. Handker- chiefs were waved from the dock, and those on deck who recognized friends among the waiting crowd exchanged cries of greeting with them. Leaning against the railing, my head full of strange thoughts, I looked jealously at my fellow passengers. Everybody came to acquaintances, frlends, rela- \ tions, but there was nobody to receive me—nobody to send me a shout of wel- come. 1 was again alone, again a va- grant orphan without a friend in the world. 1 thrust my hands into my pockets—I had only six dollars and thirty-two cents. After a few minutes we began to pour out of the steamer. Leaving the barge office I stood in the street with my knapsack in my mnand. ‘“Where shall I go?” 1 asked myself. I knew no one in the new land, and my knowl- edge of English, though not very mea- ger, was not quite sufficient to make me feel at home. After short reflec- tion I decided to repalr to the Jewish quArter. Jnstinctively I sought the poor Jewish settlement near the heart of the city, in the-main business por- tion. 1 wandered about aimiessly for an hour or more, and finally 1 reached the corner of Hester and Ludlow streets. The scene made me pause. There were thousands of people, and everybody was selling something. The sidewalks, or the planks that served as sidewalks, were decayed; there might have been a pavement years ago, but new the thoroughfare was slushy, and there was a sound like kneading dough as the crowd jostled hither and: thither. Some blessed and some cursed, some laughed and some cried, some shrieked and some grunted—but all in a broth- erly and frank manner. What a varie- ty of voices! Small, piping, baby voices; healthy, sweet, contralto voices; ‘sour, quarreling voices; soft, plaintive voices; harsh, guttural, dis- agreeable voices. What types of faces and what fashions of dress! Aged, de- crepit Jews with maps of Jerusalem (at the time of the destruction) on their faces; fresh, blooming faces marred only by merciless poverty and suffering; worn-out women with wrin- kled cheeks and withered bodles; and young women with lustrous black hair and_ sparkling eyes for which Fifth- avenue ladies would have gladly ex- changed their jewels. 1 lookeq at this curious and pathetic scene. “This misery Is the work of cruel persecution,” I murmured to my- self. Jewesses with shriveled faces and dim, once-brilllant eyes, carrying big baskets on their arms, passed me and murmured mechanicaily in,/ plain Russian Yiddish and in pitiful tones: “Reb Yid (Mr. Jew), buy something. Everything cheap, almost for nothing.” Then I heard a voice that made me turn around and stare. ‘“Women! women! candles for shabbos! Six for five cents—for shabbos!™ The candle-vender was a tall man with a white beard, dressed in a threadbare coat that had once been of good quality, and a costly Russian fur hat that betrayed long wear. From his shoulder hung a box oy a strap. “Women! candles for shabbos! Six for. five cents—for shabbos!” he repeated automatically. 1 observed him closely. “Is it possi- ble—Mr. Takiff?” I asked myself in- credulously. He seemed to feel scrutiny and raised his eyes. His face was marred by deep furrows of sorrow, and his eyes looked melancholy. “Mr. Takiff?” 1 said. He looked at me studiously. “Israel?” he answered hesitatingly. T nodded my head: I, was whelmed with emotion. “Mr. Takift?"” T repeated. Call me not Naomi, call me Mara; for the Almighty has dealt very bitter- 1y with me,” he answered in the words of Naomi, shaking my hand affection- ately. “.“How long hate you'been here?” he questioned. 1 told him. i He quickly thrust his merchandis into his box and said: “Come to my house. She will be glad to see you.” T divined who “‘she” was. “Do not trouble yourseif on count. T do not want you to day's profit,” I urged. “Let the whole business blazes!” he answered bitterly. “I stay here all day and make thirty or forty cents, and sometimes I must give away half of my profit to that tall policeman, who often threatens to make me move. This is American business,” he added with a sigh. “How delighted I am to see you, my good Israel!” he sald with manifest pleasure, as we pressed through the busy crowd. “You will excuse me for calling you Israel; in America you will be Mister,” he explained ironically. “Oh, she will be so pleased to see ycu!” he repeated without mentioning her nam “We are not far from ‘my we live on Ludloff (Ludlow) over- my, ac- logé to- g0 to “Here we are,” he said a few minutes later, stopping before a dingy, five- story tenement house. ‘“We live high up~on the fourth.” 2 Finally we reached tie fourth floor. The gray-headed Mr. Bakiff burst out: “Let the devil take the American stairs! They take my breath away.” He tried to open one of the several doors in the dark hall. It was locked. “She must have gone out. We'll go into my sister’s until she gets back.” He knocked at the other door on the same floor. “Gittele, we have a guest. Can you recognize him?” he said to the woman who responded to his knock. I recognized her instantly. She was the same Gittele I had seen years be- fore, buxom and healtny, but her face bore the marks of suffering. She looked at me and smiled, saying she could not recall me. When my host told her who I was she seemed de- lighted at seeing me again. “Are you long from home (meaning Russia) ?"” I told her how long. , “Blessed are those who know not of this cursed land!"” shetsaid with a sigh. “At home we were somebody. Every one knew of us and we (she always spoke for, her husband, too) lived in comfort; but here—would that Colum- bus had never been born, so that we had been spared from coming to this land of rigorous service! Woe to Reb Dovidle, at whose table every needy person found food and assistance! . In the meantime I cast a glance about the house. There were only three rooms. The one we sat in was the kitchen and dining-room, the fur- niture of which consisted of a small table covered with oilcloth, a stove near the sink, dish shelves on which T noticed a samovar and six candle- sticks; on the walls were a picture of the President of the United States at an inauguration, and certificates of several lodges, to which, I presumed, the head of the family belonged. The room, though small, was neat and tidy. “Make yourself at home, Mr. Russa- koff,” Ciftele said to me, returning with a white cloth, which she laid on the table. ‘‘My brother’s guest is also my gue: and besides, we are. old friends, too.” She poured out tea for me, remark- ing: “American tea! Does it have any taste or flavor? I brought a samovar from home, but where can you get the © ing to lift it. proper coals in this country, and who has the time to bother with it? My husband advised me not to bring it here at all, but I could not part with it; we had ghree, and I sold the others. I also brcught a Shaas (the Talmud), but who gives a glance into the Tal- mud in this treif America? There it lies packed up over my bed. At home my children would be rabbis, perhaps, but here—oi and woe is me!—no one cares for such things. My children do not want to answer in Yiddish when I talk to them—nothing but English. ~ “Let us go to the front room,” said Mr. Takiff after 1 had finished eating. “We will talk over old stories until ‘she’ comes.” ‘We went to the parlor, or front room, as they called it. Besices a folding- bed there were a set of second-hand plush-covered furniture, a small case crammed with books, and an old organ. We sat down. A short pause ensued. 1 could see that he wisned to tell me about Malke, so I waited for him to begin. “‘She will be so glad to see you,” he repeated again. ‘““My gister grumbles all the time, but I bear my wounds si- lently.” He was approaching the sub- Ject gently, I observed. His careworn face showed inner grief. “It would be a sin for me to com- plain. I have to praise the Lord for His favors to me in my old age. Why should I bewail my lost wealth so long as I have saved my daughter? Her name here is Regina Wigodski. Yes, I wrested her from that 'scoundrel’s hands,” he sald to me as if he were talking to himself. “He threatened to shoot me; he even ain§ed at me. But what a foolish count! I would -rather have the bullet pierce my brain than leave her in his house. But I saved her. I found out that she was with him on his estate near Mohilev. I went there about a month after you left us. His servants would not let me in. But I got in. He stood in tne veranda of kis palace and set his dogs on me, but they only tore my, clothes and bruised my hand here.” He showed me a deep scar. “But I did get into his palace in spite of all his threats. 1 implored him to give me back my daughter, and fell on my knees before him. I kissed his boots, but he only kicked me. He threatened to throw me out of his inn and ruin me. ‘Malke, my daughter!’ I cried with all my voice, so she could not help hearing me. He ordered_his servants to throw me out. They beat me, they flogged me, they almost crushed me. But I heard somebody weeping in an adjoining room. I knew her voice. I knew she would come back to me; I was certain that now she must come. So I waited. I knew she would come, and come she did. “It was in the middle of winter. I had neglected my business and the inn was less frequented, for I was practi- cally alone and could not attend to it. My wife had died just a week before.” This last he said as if in answer to my inquisitive look. “Late one night I was sitting alone in the house. My little boy was asleep. Snow had drifted around the inn as high as the window- sills and a storm was raging. I sat by the hot oven warming myself and look- ing into a book, though my thoughts were far away. My wife's ghost—peace be with her—had come to me in a dream the night before and said: ‘No- sen, Malke is coming home; forgive her. 1 was thinking about this, when 1 thought the latch of the door clicked. It must be caused by the wind, I de- cided. A few minutes later the latch clicked again, as if some one were try- The blasts of the wind made frightful noises, as if they were going to upset the inn. Then every- thing was quiet for a minute or so. I closed my book and paced up and down the room. I heard something bump up against the door. I hurried to the door and opened it. | A figure lay pros- trate before me. I fetched the lamp and locked at it. I need not telt you the rest. She had returned to the God of Israel.” He heaved a deep sigh and pro- ceeded: “That scoundrel took the inn away from me and ruined me, as he had threatened to do, but I was prepared for it. I sold out what little was left me and sailed for America. I left my son with a wealthy brother pf mine in Kovno. At home it would be hard for her to get married, I thought, so I de- cided to come to this country. I am not sorry for it. “Coming over here I had a Afittle money yet, and I did not let her go to work in a shop. I peddled and made my three or four dollars a week. But she Insisted on going to work, and she found a place in a shirt factory, where she made the acquaintance of Mr. Wi- goski, whom she married a year ago. He is also a student from home, and he expects to take a profession after a while.” As he finished tears were rolling down his wrinkled face, but I could not tell whether they were tears of joy or grief. The door opened and a middle-aged man with a black beard and a jovial face entered. I recognized him—the same Reb Dovidle I had met six years before. He was not as well dressed as he was then, and hard work had made deep marks in his countenance. “Well, Gittele, God be praised!” he said in Yiddish to his wife. ‘Business is improving from day to day.” He took off his stiff nat, put on his skull cap, and came into the “front oz You are home early to-day, Nosen. Oh, I see, you've found an old friend. Sholem-aleichem.” He ‘stretched out his hand to me cordially. “I can al- ways tell a ‘greener’ as soon as I look at him,” he.added, without waiting for a formal introduction. ‘Any news in Russia? How is the treatment of the Jews? As severe as ever?” and added a few more ques- tions without giving me a'chance to reply to the first, “Do you recognize him, David?” (Dovidle being a diminutive of David) asked Mr. Takiff. He shrugged his shoulders, and the smile that spread over his face plainly signified “no.” “Israel—a—Russ—" his brother-in- law tried to help him out. (I _had adopted the second name of my Rus- sian passport.) He shook his head negatively. “I had the pleasure of eating at your table one Friday night,” I struck in. At my remark his countenance beamed with gratification. ‘“Many ate at my table at home,” he said, nodding his head with a touch of pride. 1 recalled to his mind the occasion on which I had profited by his hospitality. A little later I told them that, much as I appreciated their kindness I would not intrude’on them longer, but would go at once and look for lodgings. “Really, you must think we came from Sodom or Gemoro,” said Gittele, with just a lttle bit of indignation in her voice. “Do you think we will let you go away Erev-Shabbos? We are Just as good Jews here as we were at home.’ “Why, you don’t know anybody else here in America,” put in Mr. Takiff. “Stay here over Shabbos, and Sunday I will find you a lodging.” This Ghetto life appeared very strange to me after I had been away from it so long. I had come to dislike it—at times I even detested it. Yet now I found it pleasant; their friendly talk, their cordial welcome, their sin- ;:‘ere hospitality warmed my forlorn eart. CHAPTER IL SHMUNKE MENKE SHMUNKE'S. This is my third birth I said to my- self that night as 1 tossed sleeplessly from side to side. I was a babe again. My proficiency in languages, my liter- ary skill, my ideas—none of these was of avail to me here. Again I was bab- bling the Jewish jargon as in the be- ginning of my miserable childhood; again an orphan—without a fatherland —a wanderer, a vagabond in a strange lznd. I had to start life anew from its very beginning. Again I was in the Ghetto I so much despised. It seemed that the Ghetto’ was foreordained for me. In vain had I struggled to free myself from it; futile had been my strenucus efforts to break away from the narrow confinement of the Jewry. By a force stronger than my will I was drawn baek to it. Mr. Takiff found me lodgings with a family that he said he had known in Russia, and on the following Sunday morning I climbed the four flights of dirty stairs that led to my new home and knocked gently at the door. It opened, and a heavily bewigged woman, with long earrings dangling down her cheeks, thrust out her head and asked in Yiddish: “Well, what do you want?" N I retreated a step In surprise. In- stead of announcing myself as her new lodger, I asked: f you please, arn't you from Javolin?” “Where should I come from if nct from Javelin?” she answered with a question. “Is not your name Groone?” I ven- tured to ask again, smiling at the grimace on her face. “What, then, is my name—Sprinze?” she flung another question instead of a reply, and swung the door as if to give me a hint. “And your husband’s name is Men'- " 1 continued tantalizing, hold- ing the door to keep her from shutting it in, my face. “What, then, should his name be— Todres?” came another interrogation, quick as lightning. Then she added: “1 don’t understand you, young man. My father was just as nice a man as yours, and don’t you come to insult me in oy own house.” “Don’t you know me, Groone?” I smiled, moving a little forward. My tone seemed to have gained fa- vor, for she said with rather Iless sharpness: “Where do you come from 2" 1 thought this enough dilly-dallying and told her who I was. “God be with you! Come in, Reb Isra.l, come in. Who would have ever believed that you would grow so tall and nice—and in America! Ach, mein Gott! You also in America! Tell me, ' not come by rail so I came By boat,” I answered, with rather a weak attempt at humor. “Upon my word, the same Israel, with the same old jukes. When did ycu get here?” I told her. L] “Did you leave your wife and chil- dren at home?” I said I had neither. “Upon my word in honor, you're making fun of me. How is it without a wife?” she asked incredulously. ‘With these and like arguments I was assailed, and would perhaps have sur- rendered had not Menke fortunately come in. “‘S-h!” Groone warned me, then fold- ed her hands in maternal easiness. “Menke, will you recognize this young man?” Menke remained standing as if sud- denly pushed under a shower-bath, with a half-idiotic smile on his face, his “American hat” a trifie inclined to one side. “I do remember him, but I can’t re- call his name,” he stammered in his nasal voice, shrugging his shoulders. “Then say you don’t know him,” his spouse burst out. “Why are you chew- ing and pretending that you do know him? Long shall live this head!” She patted her wig with her hand. “The moment he opened the door I cried cut “Israel!” ™" Menke was abashed at this; he c6n- tinued to look at me with a perplexed and foolish smile. As I was talking with these people, or rather as Groone talked and we lis- tened, the door opened and a tall, bony fellcw, smooth-shaven, with glasses on his nose, came in, and without looking at us passed through the room into the next one. “Shmunke!” Groone called after him. “I have told you a million times,” the young man said, turning about, “that my name is Dzames, and don’t you call me by your dirty sheeny names.” And he disappeared wrath- fully into the adjoining room. “That is America for you!" Groone odded her head and waved her .hand ward Shmunke, and Menke puffed at his pipe indifferently. *“ ‘At home’ Rabbi Brill consulted him whenevér he had a knotty qoint in the Talmud, and here he would throw stones at a Jew. Oi and woe is me what I have lived to see!” “What are you jabbering there?” Shmunke appeared in the doorway with a sneer on his f: “Your Jewish nonsense over again? How many times have I told you to leave me out of your lamentation after your rotten Ju- daism? I'll leaye home to-night if you go on with this.” He disappeared again, and I heard him strike a match in the next room. “I have nothing against Shmunlke,” she whispered to me the next instant; “if it had not been for us he would not have come here. What is the use of talking? We must keep quiet. He pays his board, and T make on him a dollar or a dollar and a half a weel Then she walked upon her tiptoes to Shmunke’s room, and opening the door timidly said: “Shmu—a—Dzames, a student of Javolin—’ ‘Without answering her he appeared with a lighted cigarette between his lips. With his chest thrust forward he stepped up to me and said in English, in a tone as if addressing an inferior: “So you are from Javoiin. My name is Dzames Connally. T vas also a.stu- dent of dat place.” we have a guest, When I had told him my name he shook my hand cordially and rattled off the following speech: “How t'ings turn! Before you vas de intelligence boy and I vas de fanatic, and yet (meaning now) you are, of course, a good orthodoxlan Jewish arnd I am a free-t'inker. Dis ignorant Jewish makes me seeck vit deir religion.” He spoke contemptuously, swinging his long arw and puffing out clouds of cigarette smoke. “And besides, deir manners awful, vit de beards and shabby clo'e and dey talk not’ing but Yiddish. Deir condition is awful! And all because of deir fanaticism and superstitiousness Vere God—vat God?—ha! ha! ha! Dey goes to shool like in Russia and pray— toe whom? Not'ing; dey pray. Is dere a God? Is it not nature—everyt'ing na ture, as Spenoza belleved? Dere is not'ing but nature. And if de Jewish vould believe in Sotzialism and read Karl Marx and Lassalle, or at least read de Arbeiter Zeitung or Dem Eme; dey vould too become delightened and educated lke us culturised peoples.” A few minutes later Groone and I be- gan to talk business, and after consid- erable bargaining we came to terms— seventy-five cents’ for lodging, and board to be furnished by her at actual ccst. On the same afterndon my trunk was bplaced in Groone's “front room”™ and T had become her boarder, siting in the only rocking-chair in the house and brooding over my sorry circum- stances. CHAPTER IIL I LOOK FOR A JOBE. Although Dovidle—I should say Mr. Levando, as he was best known here by his second name—was engaged in shirt- making himself, he said it would break his heart to see a graduate of gymna- sium and university sewing garments, 80 he advised me to look for more gen- teel work. Thereupon Mr. Takiff sug- gested cigar-making, but Malke mur- mured that cigar-making would hurt my lungs and heart. However, Mon- day morning I decided to take a tour through the small cigar shops on the East Side, to look for a job. After an hour of aimless wandering 1 stopped before a number of English-Yiddish signs, with a determination to seek work from some of the firms within. I walked up two flights of stairs and found myself in a hallway so dark that 1 could see no door. Sewing-machines worked speedily somewhere within and made the floor tremble. As I stood wondering where the door could be, it swung open, and I was almost knocked over by a boy with sleeves rolled up, who darted past me and down the stairs. 1 entered the door and found myself in a square room, the dimen- sions of which could not have been more than sixteen feet. Two girls sat stooped over sewing-machines, with their eyes fixed upon the pieces of cloth that they pushed under the nee- dles. “Whr-r—whr-r—whr-r-r-r—" the ma- chines hummed busily. At another machine sat an elderly man with spec- tacles, and one machine stood unoc- cupied, which I surmised belonged to the boy who had almost caused my overthrow at the door. There was only one window: a small gaslight burned over the elderly man’'s machine, which was farthest from the window. A wo- man whcse forehead was half-covered with a wig was pulling the thread from seams; next to her stood a presser, whose face was bathed in per- spiration, which he frequently wiped off with his rolled-up shirt sleeves; and by his side was a gasoline stove on which the irons were heating. No. one noticed me as I entered, ex- cept the bewigged woman, who gave me a furtive glance and dropped her eyes back to the seam. . A few minutes later the boy who had passed me in the hall returned. He was the boss’'s son, he informed me, and, the boss being away, he would at- tend to my wants. One girl nudged her neighbor with her elbow, and both cast glances at my feet. The two of them began to giggle. The "blood ascended to my face; my feelings were wounded. In my native land 1 wassespected as a student; here working-girls laughed at me. “I can tell a greener by his shoes,” I overheard one say. It was only my foreign shoes they laughed at. However, it hurt me. We are so egotistic that we even feel the insults directed at our belongings. I decided to go up another flight and see Simachowitch. When I reached the door of the manufacturer of pants, overalls, skirts and children’s suits I could hear no sound within except a slight click, between that of a sewing- machine and that of a slot-machine. I entered the room hesitatingly and remained standing near the door. There was only one person in the room —a middle-aged man, bending over a button-hole machine. Although I could tell from the ex- pression of the man making button- holes that he was aware of my pres- ence, he did not raise his eyes, but kept them fixed on the machine. His beard struck my fancy first; it was of a quaint color; the sides were almost red, the lower part almost dark, his mustache fairly brown. His eyes were dim and watery; his forehead was high and broad; a skullcap rested peacefully on his head. This was Sim- achowitch, “the cheapest clothing manufacturer in America. “whose spe- cialties were button-holes, overalls, shirts, knee pants, etc. When he had finished a button-hole the machine jerked and stopped, and the operator raised his head question- ingly. I repeated what I had said on the floor below. I thought I had seen this man before but I could not place him. The voice in particular sounded famillar. So I made another attempt to make him reveal his identity. “Is tailoring a good trade here “Are you a tailor from home he answered with a question, unintention- ally. wounding my pride. After I had looked at the man for a mint te or two something like a flash of lightning brightened my memory—Get- zel Gorgle! My heart beat faster; the conscicusness of another acquaintance sent a thrill of delight through my eart. P “I beg your pardon,” T began apolo- getically. “Weren't you the teacher of the Talmud Torah at—" The machine stopped abruptly with a click, and raising his head Inquisitively he said in a soft tone: “And who are you from home? Sit down, please.” He wiped the dust from a chair without a back. remarking: “I can see that you aré not one of the common people.” 1 told him who T was. “Shrolke!” He sprang up with joy. “T am so glad to see you—as my own child. Shone Zion! They told me that ycu went to the gymnasium, and that