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 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924055475879 
 
A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
A 
 LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 BY 
 
 LEON KOBRIN 
 
 AUTHORIZED TRANSLATION 
 FROM THE YIDDISH 
 
 By ISAAC GOLDBERG, Ph.D. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 BRENTANO'S 
 
 PUBLISHERS 
 
^. 
 
 
 Copyright, 1520, by 
 BRENTANO'S 
 
 All rights reserved 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 I The Village of B 1 
 
 II Summer 6 
 
 III A Summer Sabbath 9 
 
 IV The Week in Summer 21 
 
 V The Days of Penitence 31 
 
 VI The Day of Atonement 43 
 
 VII The Village Children at Liberty ... 51 
 
 VIII Cutting Osiers 56 
 
 IX The Rejoicing of the Law 63 
 
 X Autumn 68 
 
 XI Winter 73 
 
 XII A Sad Sabbath 80 
 
 XIII The Feast of Esther 89 
 
 XIV Spring 93 
 
 XV Preparations for the Fair 101 
 
 XVI The Fair 126 
 
 XVII Love in the Village 142 
 
 XVIII News of America in the Village . . . 159 
 
 XIX The First Letter from America .... 167 
 
 XX The Village Wanes 178 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 Leon Kobrin, who belongs with David Pinski 
 and Sholom Ash among the foremost writers in 
 contemporary Yiddish literature, was bom about 
 forty-seven years ago in Vitebsk, White Russia. As 
 early as his fifteenth year he had begun to write 
 sketches and tales in Russian. Emigrating to the 
 United States in 1892, he commenced the following 
 year to pen stories in Yiddish, based upon the New 
 World atmosphere, which he was one of the earliest 
 to bring into Yiddish letters. For, during his first six 
 years in this country, he engaged, with as little pa- 
 tience as success, in shirtmaking, breadbaking, weav- 
 ing and newspaper-selling; all this time his chief de- 
 sire was to devote himself exclusively to literature. 
 
 It was with his first book, "Yankel Boila and Other 
 Tales" (1898) that he won recognition from critics 
 on both sides of the ocean. Professor Wiener of 
 Harvard, who has since abandoned his Yiddish 
 studies, hailed the author as the Yiddish Gorki. Suc- 
 cessive productions in fiction ("Ghetto Dramas," 
 1904; a nine hundred page collection of tales, 1910; 
 the novels "The Immigrants," "Mother and 
 
VI 
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 Daughter," "The Professional Bridegroom," "The 
 Tenement House," "The Rise of Orre") picture the 
 multiform phases of tenement life and ghetto adven- 
 ture in the new land, with their exotic milieu and their 
 peculiar psychology. 
 
 As a pioneer in Yiddish literature in America, 
 Kobrin will always be remembered as the discoverer 
 of the tenement. He and Libin have been called by 
 their associates the twins of the tenement, because of 
 their preoccupation with the many themes furnished 
 by East Side life in the early days. Kobrin has a 
 deep sense of the environmental influence of the 
 gloomy structures upon the dwellers, so that his nu- 
 merous tales possess a certain historical interest. For 
 a whole generation, indeed, Kobrin and Libin 
 dominated Yiddish letters on this side of the Atlantic. 
 They both began with the sketch and the short story, 
 thence to the drama and finally to the novel. In 
 Kobrin may be studied the evolution of immigrant 
 psychology, from his homesickness for the "Old 
 country," to the direction of that yearning upon him- 
 self, and by a natural process, the formation of a 
 strong nationalistic feeling. 
 
 The author's dramas number some two dozen, and 
 the end is not yet. Of these a surprising number has 
 been successful, although upon the stage he seems too 
 ready to strain the truth for a situation. Without a 
 doubt, however, Kobrin has had a wholesome in- 
 
INTRODUCTION vii 
 
 fluence upon the Yiddish drama, having followed the 
 Gordin tradition and fought unceasingly for "play- 
 wright's rights" as against managerial dictatorship. 
 His first play, "Minna" was produced in 1899, having 
 been written in collaboration with Jacob Gordin, the 
 leader of the realistic reaction against the fatuities 
 and the absurdities of the Goldfaden imitators at 
 their worst. His second play, "The East Side 
 Ghetto," played in the same year, brought to the at- 
 tention of the play-loving public the talents of Bertha 
 Kalich, who has since achieved a reputation among 
 English playgoers. It was on the occasion of the 
 production of "Two Sisters," 1904, that Israel Zang- 
 will wrote a very favorable report of the play in the 
 New York Herald, later meeting the author and re- 
 questing him to translate into Yiddish "The Children 
 of the Ghetto." When that work was done and the 
 play presented in Yiddish for the first time, Zangwill 
 enthusiastically exclaimed to the translator, "Now I 
 realize that I have translated you — not you me!" 
 
 "Three years ago," said Kobrin to an interviewer in 
 1915, "I organized all the playwrights, about twenty 
 altogether, into a society known as the Jewish Play- 
 wrights' Association. Our mutual aim was to make 
 the dramatist independent — to make it possible for 
 him to express himself freely as he feels, and not as 
 the manager expects him to." A further insight into 
 the writer's independent stand is afforded by an in- 
 
viii INTRODUCTION 
 
 teresting detail in the history of his play "Children 
 of Nature." (The play, by the way, is founded upon 
 his early tale "Yankel Boila," and was several years 
 ago produced with great success in a Russian version, 
 at the Moscow Art Theatre.) The Yiddish version 
 was accepted in 1912 and rehearsals were begun. 
 The author had received seven hundred dollars in 
 advance royalties. At one of the early rehearsals, 
 however, the manager showed a disposition to change 
 the plot — a phenomenon not unknown to the English 
 "boards." Kobrin could not see the point, despite 
 the manager's most earnest protestations. The latter, 
 as a final resort, exclaimed that imless the author 
 conceded the issue he could take his play back. 
 Whereupon the playwright took the play back and 
 returned the seven hundred dollars. Other man- 
 agers proving just as obdurate, Kobrin decided to 
 produce the play himself, and surely enough, when 
 it was given at the Odeon Theatre on the East Side, 
 its immediate success justified the author's confidence 
 and persistency. 
 
 Kobrin's labors as a translator, in which he is 
 fortunate to have his wife's collaboration, have re- 
 sulted in opening up to Jewish readers a very wide 
 field; besides having translated "Faust," "Hamlet" 
 and some of the works of Echegaray, he has done 
 the complete tales of Chekhov (4 volumes) ; Tales 
 
INTRODUCTION ix 
 
 and Short Stories by Turgeniev (4 volumes) ; the com- 
 plete works of de Maupassant (18 volumes) ; Hugo's 
 "Les Miserables" (5 volumes), and Gorki's short 
 stories (3 volumes). 
 
 It is Kobrin, I believe, who may be said to have 
 "discovered" Gorki outside of Russia. He had noticed 
 in a Russian publication the tale "Makar Chudra," 
 signed by a then unknown name ; he at once translated 
 it for the Yiddish "Zukunft" — ^a New York publica- 
 tion that has few rivals of its kind in the near-by 
 English magazines. It was Kobrin who brought 
 Gorki to Professor Wiener's attention; the latter, on 
 his return from a visit to Russia for the purpose of 
 collecting material for his book upon Yiddish Lit- 
 erature in the Nineteenth Century, brought back with 
 him the first three volumes of Gorki's works, which 
 were later put into English by Isabel Hapgood. 
 
 With particular reference to "A Lithuanian Vil- 
 lage," it is wordi while noting that almost immediately 
 upon its appearance it was hailed by Yiddish critics 
 as one of the jewels of the literature. Although 
 Kobrin, in his short stories (which more than the 
 work of most Yiddish writers exhibits that sense of 
 interest and climax considered indispensable by the 
 English reader) is often brutally realistic, he has in 
 this charming idyll produced a work of rare atmos- 
 phere. Like some of his own tenement dwellers, he 
 
X INTRODUCTION 
 
 seems for a time to have been seized with a nostalgia 
 for the Old World. Yet it is an Old World that 
 points to the New. 
 
 This is the first of Kobrin's books to appear in 
 English.^ It represents but one aspect of die 
 versatile author's gifts, — a rare aspect, and by no 
 means the least attractive. Several, at least, of his 
 novels and plays, as well as a large number of his 
 short stories, should appeal to that part of the English 
 public which is gazing toward wider literary 
 horizons. 
 
 ISAAC GOLDBERG. 
 
 Roxbury, Mass. 
 August 1919. 
 
 1 Two one-act plays by Kobrin (which may hardly be SEiid to be 
 representative of his dramatic work) have appeared in my Six Plays 
 of the Yiddish Theatre (Second Series). 
 
A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 I 
 
 THE VILLAGE OF B- 
 
 COMEWHERE in Lithuania there once nestled the 
 *^ little village of B . It boasted a popula- 
 tion of several hundred Jewish souls and a score or 
 more of Gentile peasants ; it had a market and shops ; 
 an old, gloomy Polish church in the middle of the 
 market-place; a Jewish apothecary who would have 
 been reckoned by his feUow Jews as a Gentile, only 
 that he appeared in the synagogue at New Year's 
 services and upon the Day of Atonement; a Jewish 
 teacher with an excellent handwriting, who taught all 
 the flourishes of calligraphy, in both Yiddish and 
 Russian, to the boys and girls of the community, at 
 twenty-five kopeks per month; a Rabbi, or as he was 
 there called, a dispenser of justice; a couple of slaugh- 
 terers; a money-lender; a pair of cantors; a public 
 bath and several synagogues, begging pardon for 
 mentioning the profane and the sacred in the same 
 breath. In addition there was a Gentile police- 
 sergeant, — a veritable emperor in his domains. 
 
2 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 All the village Jews were "business people," and 
 made their living by dealing with the peasants of their 
 own village and the surrounding communities. In 
 truth, theirs was a poor existence, but illuminated by 
 a great faith in God, and just such a life as their 
 forebears had lived. They asked no greater favor 
 of the Lord than that their police-sergeant should have 
 a soft heart and a willing palm. . . . And the Lord 
 ever showed Himself indeed prodigal with His mercy, 
 and never withheld His bounty from the Jews of 
 
 B , sending them always sergeants with soft 
 
 hearts. And the Jews gladly crossed his palm and 
 praised and thanked their Father for His favors. So 
 that theirs was a happy existence! . . . They ate 
 bread and groats, sometimes with milk and sometimes 
 without. That was for week-days. For the Sabbath 
 and the holidays the good Lord betimes sent a fish or 
 two and a piece of meat. 
 
 Nor were the wives of these Jews barren women. 
 The male population was much at home, so that chil- 
 dren were not lacking, and there was always some 
 celebration or other in honor of a newly bom son. 
 They sent their sons to Hebrew school and to Old 
 Frankish instructors, where they received a small por- 
 tion of the Holy Law and a great deal of spanking. 
 Having finished Hebrew school the sons would either 
 open a place on the market or else go off to try their 
 fortune in a nearby town. 
 
THE VILLAGE OF B- 
 
 As to the girls, they were kept at home until they 
 were married. Unless, if one were particularly ill- 
 favored, she would be sent to a large city, to a dress- 
 maker, there to learn the trade, or be placed as a 
 domestic servant. 
 
 On the whole, however, the Jews of B lived 
 
 content, knowing that there was a God in heaven who 
 had provided for their fathers and grandfathers be- 
 fore them, who provided for the world, and who would 
 surely not forsake them, either. 
 
 And when one of the Jews was marrying off a 
 daughter the Lord came to his aid, sending him all he 
 needed for the purpose, through a promissory note, a 
 loan from the money-lender, or at times through a pure 
 miracle. In short, no one could need or wish for a 
 life more peaceful and content. 
 
 This peaceful contentment was disturbed only when 
 a new sergeant was appointed to the district. At such 
 times a terror fell upon the Jews of B . Sud- 
 denly they would dwindle in stature, bend their backs, 
 walk shrinkingly along, looking about them with 
 fright in their eyes, just like pursued animals. Until 
 the sergeant showed his soft heart. . . . Where- 
 upon they would again breathe freely, straighten their 
 backs and resume their life of peaceful contentment, 
 their hearts filled anew with an abiding faith. . . . 
 
 This quiet was disturbed also when anybody in the 
 village died. The whole population would turn out 
 
4 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 for the funeral, — relatives and strangers, friend and 
 foe, — and the air would ring with the moaning and 
 lamentation of the women. Even greater was the 
 lamentation in the village when the local youths were 
 summoned to the military examination. At such 
 times the mothers would run to the cemetery and beat 
 upon the graves of their departed, begging the dead 
 with cries of despair to save their sons. Frightful 
 wailing echoed through the streets, in the synagogues 
 and in the homes. . . . 
 
 Many of the sons were unfit, with scabby heads, or 
 were ruptured, lame, twisted, crippled, consumptive; 
 these were termed defectives and emerged with white 
 tickets, — exempt. 
 
 Those young men, however, who were sound and 
 sturdy, and who were taken into the service, were 
 looked upon, at their return to the village after their 
 term had expired, as even more defective than the 
 exempted weaklings. The local mothers, indeed, 
 were far more willing to give their daughters in mar- 
 riage to a lame yoimg man than to a robust youth 
 who had been a soldier. For it seemed, somehow or 
 other, that the youth had lost his Jewish character in 
 the service; he returned from the barracks a differ- 
 ent person entirely; he walked differently, talked dif- 
 ferently, and looked altogether different from the 
 usual young man of the community. ... To make 
 matters worse, they used to return from the army dis- 
 
THE VILLAGE OF B- 
 
 sipated and wanton, and it had happened more than 
 once that a soldier had led a respectable daughter 
 astray. One of the girls had been forced to flee from 
 the village. 
 
 Sometimes, — ^but rarely, — it happened that the rou- 
 tine of the village was disturbed by something of a 
 totally different nature; as, for example, a dispute 
 among the Jews over the merits of the Rabbi, — over 
 a slaughterer, over a cantor's voice, over the public 
 bath, or over the matter of precedence in being called 
 up to the altar to read from the Bible. ... A dis- 
 pute of this sort naturally did not last long; after the 
 right and the wrong side had slapped each other's 
 faces in warm fashion, — after a couple of minyans ^ 
 of countenances had been well scratched and a score 
 or more fingers had almost been bitten off, the weaker 
 side thrust a few rubles into the sergeant's fist. And 
 once that potentate had delivered his judgment, there 
 was not a Jew in B who dared question the de- 
 cision. 
 
 1 A minyan is the quorum of ten males above the age of thirteen 
 required for all religious functions. 
 
II 
 
 SUMMER 
 
 IN summer the village was bedecked with green. . . . 
 It lay in a valley: on the one side at the foot 
 of a dark forest, which looked down upon it with 
 most mysterious mien from a hilly eminence; on 
 the other, at the bottom of an old Polish cemetery 
 which was situated on a green hillock, with its gaunt 
 tombstones and costly monuments, beneath which re- 
 posed the Polish lords of long ago. . . . The burial- 
 ground looked down upon the village with a mien even 
 more mysterious than that of the forest on the other 
 side. . . . The sky above the village was clear: at 
 times a deep blue, like a calm sea, and at others 
 girdled with red bands. When the sun set, certain 
 windows seemed to glow with a red flame, while 
 others sank into gloom. When the sun rose, the 
 woods seemed to catch fire; the cross on the Polish 
 church in the market-place glittered; the tombstones 
 and the monuments of the Polish cemetery shone as 
 if they were spattered with gold, and waves of warmth 
 and light streamed over the village. . . . And when 
 the moon rose over the dark forest, the tree-tops were 
 
SUMMER 7 
 
 spangled with a sparkling dust, and the whole ham- 
 l^t' — its market, its roofs, its church and its ceme- 
 tery, — seemed to be covered with a shimmering 
 powder. . . . 
 
 Summer brought lively times to the village. Upon 
 the broad, dusty, unpaved streets the Jewish children 
 ran about in play, — boys and girls together, barefoot, 
 with dirty faces, some with fat little bellies under 
 their long, four-cornered, fringed scarf or under their 
 soiled skirts. The urchins, with their exposed shirl- 
 tails flapping about, scampered around like frisky 
 calves, fought with each other, wept from childhood 
 blows, or played for buttons. The girls sat in the 
 sand or on the green mounds of turf before the 
 houses, casting their dice made from the bones of ani- 
 mals. The older boys were at Hebrew school, and 
 from the open windows of the cheder came shrill, 
 piping voices, in a sing-song together with the Rabbi, 
 droning the words of thfiir primers or their Bibles. 
 . . . The mothers, — those who were not dragged 
 into town during the week together with their hus- 
 bands, sat upon the turf -mounds, mending and sewing, 
 darning socks upon a glass, or embroidering table- 
 cloths. Or again, others, — the business women, — 
 stood in their little booth-shops, or upon the market- 
 place near a table laden with bread, various tid-bits 
 at a groschen apiece, and kvass. The fathers, those 
 who had no occupation, sat near their wives in the 
 
8 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 stalls, kept a sharp eye for customers, and sighed; 
 others were in the synagogues discussing "politics." 
 . . . The grown-up Jewish daughters, who performed 
 the household duties, went about in slatternly fashion, 
 with tattered skirts, many of them with their shoes 
 upon bare feet, and others with feathers from the 
 bedding in their hair. ... If a young man should 
 pass by, there would appear at one of the windows a 
 head of disheveled hair and a pair of black, fiery 
 eyes. If the black eyes encountered those of the 
 young man, they would withdraw bashfully, and a 
 hand suddenly hastened to arrange the disordered 
 hair. And when the yoimg man had disappeared, 
 through the open window there would come wafting 
 a song in which a maiden's soul poured forth its hid- 
 den longing. 
 
Ill 
 
 A SUMMER SABBATH 
 
 T^HE selfsame maidens, however, looked altogether 
 -*- different on Sabbath eve, at the blessing of the 
 candles, when their fathers returned from the public 
 bath with wet temple-locks and dripping beards, their 
 faces red and steamy. Their niothers had closed the 
 shops on the market-place. When the young ladies 
 had tidied up the home, ready for the Holy Sabbath, — 
 had stored the evening meal away at the back of the 
 oven, — ^had hidden the Sabbath soup under a pillow to 
 keep it warm, had sprinkled the floor with a golden 
 sand, decked the table with a white cloth, and set upon 
 one end of the table a pair of shining candlesticks with 
 the candles in their places, and at the other end two 
 loaves of home-made white bread Tinder a white towel, 
 and had lighted the lamps, — ^then, too, the maidens 
 cast off the week-day spirit from themselves as well. 
 Their faces were washed; their eyes sparkled more 
 freely, and into the braids of their combed hair were 
 woven gaily-colored ribbons; in their starched dresses 
 many of them looked as if they were indeed possessed 
 of a new soul, — the soul of the Day of Rest. 
 
10 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 The sun goes down. Some of the windows flare 
 up with a fiery red, and others are darkened by 
 gloomy shadows. The forest arid the Polish cemetery 
 seem moodier than ever. ... 
 
 In the Jewish homes the women are reciting the 
 blessing of the candles. After this prayer^ while the 
 parents and brothers of the girls are stiU at the syna- 
 gogue, the maidens appear upon the street, stand 
 about their houses, chat with their companions or play 
 with a small brother or sister. . . . Their bearing 
 and even their gait is different, and if a yoimg man 
 acquaintance passes by, they look at him more boldly, 
 and their voices ring more freely, louder than 
 ever. . . . 
 
 For they are in their Sabbath, holiday mood; they 
 feel it, and they look it. The entire landscape has 
 assumed a Sabbatical air. . . . All the houses are 
 illumined, and through the windows may be seen the 
 bright, cheery beams of the candles, which seem to 
 escape into the street and engage in combat with the 
 dark shadows that the summer evening casts over the 
 village. The thicker and darker the shadows become 
 as they spread over the hamlet, the more strongly and 
 brightly shine the beams of the Sabbath lights through 
 the windows of the Jewish homes, and the more cheer- 
 ful and exalted are the eyes of the Queen of the Sab- 
 bath that gazes through the windows. 
 
 Over the market-place, too, hovers the Holy Sab- 
 
A SUMMER SABBATH 11 
 
 bath. Everything is so quiet, so peaceful. The 
 shops are closed, — the tables removed. No careworn 
 Jewish face is visible, nor can a Jewish groan be 
 heard. Quiet and peace. The market-place is 
 asleep, resting from its week-day cares. The hens of 
 the Gentile peasants, and their brood, the Gentile 
 geese and ducks, who were pecking all day about the 
 shops and tables, left the place before nightfall. 
 Only '"Jewish" goats wander now among the closed 
 stalls; nobody drives them away, so that they, too, 
 feel the spirit of the Sabbath and strut about calmly, 
 undisturbed, free; and when the desire moves them, 
 they stop short before a shop and peacefully rub 
 their beards against the door. . . . 
 
 Night has fallen. The forest and the Polish ceme- 
 tery seem to have receded from the village into a deep 
 darkness. . . , Stars have been lighted in the sky. 
 They, too, sparkle differently than on week-day nights. 
 Jews come forth from the synagogue. They walk 
 along at ease, their wives and sons at their sides, — 
 one with his coat slung across his shoulders, another 
 with both hands thrust into his sleeves, a third with 
 his hands folded behind his back. Step by step, ever 
 so leisurely, they walk along, as nonchalantly as if 
 there were no cares upon earth. . . . 
 
 "Good Sabbath!" echoes the street with cheery 
 voices. "Good Sabbath!" echoes in the houses. 
 
 "Good Sabbath!" whisper the little candle beams 
 
12 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 through the windows, it seems, to the twinkling stars 
 in the heavens. "Good evening!" . . . 
 
 And soon every Jew has welcomed to his home the 
 benevolent spirits of the Holy Sabbath. The wife 
 softly hums the chant of the prayers as her husband 
 intones them, and the pious daughter hums it, too. 
 And the raisin-wine, or the sweet mead, poured from 
 the Sabbath beaker and tasted by everybody in the 
 house, contains every flavor. . . . And later, when 
 the head of the house sings the Sabbath songs, his 
 voice sounds so free, and his sons join him, and the 
 wife and daughter chime in, too, humming softly or 
 accompanying the melody in their thoughts. . . . All 
 sorrows would be forgotten when the Sabbath came 
 to the village. The Jewish street, the Jewidi home, 
 the Jewish soul, — all rested when Sabbath came. 
 
 The day was particularly eventful for the girls, 
 since every Saturday they went walking in the woods. 
 They walked in pairs, and reaching the forest would 
 sit down upon the green carpet in the shade of the 
 trees. Through the trees would come a noise of 
 young men acquaintances, playing there at "butter- 
 tarts." Older men and women, who had come thither 
 on a walk, would sit on the grass, facing the young 
 men and laughing at their antics. The girls would 
 begin to sing a Jewish folk-song, whereupon the young 
 men grew silent, soon appearing from behind the 
 trees, looking upon the maidens and smiling fool- 
 
A SUMMER SABBATH 13 
 
 ishly. . . . The girls would turn their eyes away, 
 arrange their hair more becomingly, glance down 
 upon their bosoms, pluck the grass aimlessly and 
 sing, sing. . , . 
 
 All at once one of the young men takes up the 
 tune, — then a second, and a third, and soon all in 
 chorus, and the voices of the girls and the youths 
 blend, intertwine, caress and kiss. . . . The older 
 folk join in the tune with a nasal humming, and the 
 blue sky over the dark crowns of the trees seems to 
 sing with them. . . . There is an odor of dried hay 
 mingled somewhat with that of grease, for deep in the 
 forest there is a grease factory. A Gentile of the 
 neighborhood, who works at the factory, appears 
 amongst the trees, stops, and looks on, while a broad 
 smile plays over his features. He listens to the sing- 
 ing, thrusts his black, shining shocks of hair under his 
 cap, scratches the nape of his neck, and laughs heart- 
 ily, showing his white teeth. Then he turns to a girl 
 who looks healthier and sturdier than even he, and 
 cries "Ah! You sing well, Cheike!" And he gives 
 her a pinch in the breast. Whereupon a shrieking 
 laughter bursts forth among the girls, who scatter like 
 geese. The older folk commence to scold the im- 
 pudent rascal. 
 
 "You ought to shame yourself!" 
 
 The young men look upon the factory hand with 
 a sort of envy, and smile in confusion. The Gentile 
 
14 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 youth explodes into a roar of deafening laughter and 
 continues on his way. There is no more singing, 
 however. The girls gather more closely together, and 
 whisper secrets among themselves, bashfully; they 
 strike their shoulders against their companions, pinch 
 one another, stifle with laughter, laugh aloud, scream 
 and glance furtively in the direction of the young 
 men. The young men return the glances, gazing 
 especially at robust Chayke, who screams louder than 
 the rest. The young -men's laughter becomes now 
 more spirited, more nervous, and suddenly they begin 
 to wrestle with one another, throw each other to the 
 ground, roll over the grass, exhibit all their tricks, 
 walk on their hands, stand on their heads and bark like 
 dogs. . . . The girls continue to laugh and scream 
 louder and more shrilly than ever, and the forest 
 echoes their cries. . . . Thus it continues till the 
 evening meal. Then the groups break up and go 
 homeward. 
 
 They cross the market-place in pairs, in threes, and 
 even in fours; boys and girls separately, and both the 
 youths and the maidens are still under the spell of 
 the forest. During all the way home the sides send 
 signals, — the girls to the boys, the boys to the girls, 
 letting themselves be heard or their presence felt, 
 casting glances, making grimaces, uttering sudden 
 screams, shrieks, -bursting into laughter and dashing 
 about. . . . 
 
A SUMMER SABBATH 15 
 
 If the maidens meet a familiar Gentile boy they 
 greet him so freely, so unrestrainedly; they smile to 
 him, jest with him; and if he stops to chat with them, 
 one of the girls pulls his coat-tails, another his sleeve, 
 a third slaps him across the shoulder, and all of them 
 smile at him and are ready to play with him. . , . 
 The freedom which the Jewish daughter displays to- 
 ward the Gentile youth has not been revealed in her 
 bearing toward the Jewish young man. 
 
 At such times, when the Jewish young men meet 
 a familiar, barefoot Gentile peasant-girl, they jest 
 with her: "Who gave you the bloody nose?" they ask. 
 Whereupon she feels her nose with her rough fingers 
 for signs of blood, then laughs and exclaims good- 
 naturedly, "May the wolves devour you!" And 
 should they permit themselves greater freedom with 
 her, she answers with a slap over the hands and loud 
 laughter. . . . 
 
 The market-place is still at rest; the shops are still 
 closed, as the Jewish boys and girls come home from 
 the woods with their noisy chatter. The doors of the 
 old, gloomy Polish church are already open; they 
 are preparing for worship. A few peasants of 
 either sex, in their white smocks and their bast shoes, 
 have arrived early from the neighboring hamlets; 
 they sit on the ground near the church, waiting. The 
 men smoke their pipes and spit out in silence. The 
 women, their heads covered by kerchiefs of plain 
 
16 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 white or of flowery designs, converse in soft tones, 
 as if telling secrets. . . . Hearing the loud laughter 
 of the. familiar Jewish youths and maidens, they look 
 up and greet them dumbly with a nod. The passing 
 girls reply to the greeting with friendly smiles, adding 
 "Good evening! .Good evening!" 
 
 Behind the church, storks are hopping about on 
 their long legs. From an open window yonder peers 
 out a Jew in a skull-cap, covered with feathers from 
 the bed from which he has very evidently just arisen. 
 He strokes his beard in leisurely fashion, yawns in 
 the same carefree manner and wrinkles his forehead. 
 Another Jew with a yellow matted beard, wearing a 
 winter coat from beneath which may be seen the yel- 
 low, grimy edges of his fringed scarf, is standing at 
 the gate to his home, scratching himself with his left 
 hand under his right arm-pit, making grimaces and 
 complaining: "Ay-va! Such hot weather! Good 
 heavens!" A Jewish woman in her Sabbath bonnet 
 runs out of the house and shouts to her unwilling son 
 to come right in and do his reading from the Dicta of 
 the Fathers. And there sits a mother with her chil- 
 dren on a turf-mound, telling them tales about ghosts 
 and spirits, about miracle-workers and the thirty-six 
 saints. An elderly man with his coat-tails gathered 
 up is chasing a goat and calling to it. "Zhig! Zhig! 
 Zhig!" Another is driving away from his gate a pig 
 which has smelled something there and is rooting it up 
 
A SUMMER SABBATH, 17 
 
 with his snout. The man waves his hands at the ani- 
 mal, stamps his feet, seizes a missile from the ground 
 and shouts, "Off with you! Off with you!" 
 
 Here and there a goat is lying upon one of the turf- 
 mounds, scratching his beard and his back, raising 
 his head and beginning to chew something. Across 
 a high fence a cat is making its way, humping its long 
 back, curling its tail, shaking its light, transparent 
 ears, rubbing its white whiskers against its paws and 
 rolling its yellow eyes. Two elders come by, ob- 
 viously engrossed in a deep problem. Both walk 
 slowly, their beards clutched in their fists, their fore- 
 heads furrowed in thought. Perhaps they are dis- 
 cussing "politics," — Bismarck and Beaconsfield; or 
 perhaps some knotty problem in the Gemara, alto- 
 gether. . . , 
 
 A young Jewish mother, in her Sabbath clothes, 
 rests upon a mound with an infant in her arms, danc- 
 ing it up and down, singing and laughing to it in the 
 utmost glee. Small children with washed faces and 
 combed hair are playing before their houses. The 
 shirt-tails that stick out from the urchins' trousers 
 are still white and clean; the little girls' dresses have 
 not yet had time to be soiled, . , , 
 
 As soon as the children spy their elder brothers and 
 sisters returning from their stroll, they dash toward 
 them with a glad shout, surround them and press 
 close to their knees. The faces of the older brothers 
 
18 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 and sisters shine with a certain zest, and are covered 
 with perspiration; their eyes, however, glow happily. 
 And the father, seeing this, scolds his son. 
 
 "The idea of such a husky chap running about all 
 day long. Better stay home and do your Sabbath 
 studying in the Dicta of the Fathers!" 
 
 The mother looks at her boy and sighs. "How 
 ruddy, how healthy! He'U surely be taken as one of 
 the Czar's soldiers!" . . . 
 
 And to her daughter, at such times, the mother ex- 
 claims, "You're a regular Gentile peasant-girl! See 
 how you are sweating! You must have been raising 
 Cain!" 
 
 And the father, naturally in harsh accents: "She 
 ought to be thoroughly spanked, — ^the wanton, — so 
 that she'll remember!" . . . 
 
 But no sooner has the daughter, — "the wanton," — 
 "the Gentile peasant-girl" — turned away, than her 
 parents, naturally, glow with pride and tell each 
 other, "What a beauty! May no evil eye gaze upon 
 her! What a beauty! She shines like seven 
 suns!" . . . 
 
 The sun sinks lower in the west. Soon it wiU set. 
 The village gathers in the synagogue to say the sunset 
 prayer. The daughter remains at home, puts an 
 apron over her Sabbath dress, and prepares the 
 table for the closing Sabbath meal. She prepares 
 the table and dreams her maiden's dream. . . . The 
 
A SUMMER SABBATH 19 
 
 dream peeps out through her eyes, blushes across her 
 cheeks, hovers over her lips. ... She beholds a 
 youth, running about in the forest with fiery speed, 
 wrestling with his companion, and displaying super- 
 human strength, — such strength! . . . 
 
 And the youth, who has gone to the synagogue, 
 thinks also of the forest, of the maidens, and dreams 
 of their faces, of their eyes, their singing and their 
 laughter. . . . 
 
 And now the men have returned home from the sun- 
 set prayer. All sit around the table and eat the 
 closing meal of the Sabbath. The father begins to 
 sing from the Sabbath songs. The sun has set. Sud- 
 denly there resounds over the village a metallic ring- 
 ing, — Ding, Dong! — that trembles through the air in 
 a long monotone. . . . The Sabbath Spirit of Rest 
 among the Jews gives a shudder, and a melancholy 
 yearning descends upon them. . . . 
 
 The bell of the church begins to ring, and rever- 
 berates through the village with its alternate long and 
 short tones: Ding, Dong! Ding, Dong! 
 
 And its solemn, metallic notes mingle with the 
 deepening shadows that night scatters through the 
 village, and the tones penetrate into the Jewish homes, 
 into the Jewish souls, and rouse within them an even 
 greater melancholy, a greater yearning, — their week- 
 day cares. . . . 
 
 The Jewish father begins to sigh; the mother looks 
 
20 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 worried anew; the sons are distraught; the daughters 
 are sad. . . . 
 
 Later the men return to the synagogue to say the 
 evening prayers. All the Jewish homes are dark; the 
 Jewish daughters cast off their Sabbath finery, re- 
 move the colored ribbons from their hair and sigh 
 into the darkness. The church bell booms again, and 
 how mournfully its tones vibrate through the gloom, — 
 with what soulful melancholy they echo in the dark 
 Jewish homes out of which the Holy Sabbath has de- 
 parted. . . . 
 
 The stars have begun to twinkle in the sky. But 
 they do not sparkle as joyfully as they did on Sab- 
 bath eve. . . . 
 
 In the windows of the Jewish homes lonely little 
 lights have begun to appear. Voices are heard upon 
 the street. "Good week to you! Good week!" The 
 voices, however, echo with cares. . . . And soon 
 from every house arise the prayers that end the Sab- 
 bath and call upon the Lord's blessing for the coming 
 week. A few moments later may be heard the hoarse 
 rattling of keys on the market-place, where the Jewish 
 men and women are opening their shops. Here and 
 there sounds a Jewish groan. . . . Sabbath is over. 
 The Spirit of Rest has departed. The week-day soul 
 alone remains. Care has awakened, — care and wor- 
 ries. . . . Sabbath is over! . . . 
 
IV 
 
 THE WEEK IN SUMMER 
 
 T TPON the disappearance of Sabbath the village 
 ^ again donned its drab week-day garb. The 
 mothers and fathers resumed their places in their 
 shops and behind the counters at the market-place, 
 sitting with earnest, careworn faces, dreaming their 
 week-day dreams, — so trifling, so sad, so gray, so in- 
 significant, — and yet so great and important to 
 them! — The worm that creeps among the graves in 
 the graveyard, dreams, perhaps, such dreams as 
 theirs. Rarely did these people laugh, and if 
 laughter came from their throats, it was a curt, choppy 
 laughter in which echoed a groan. Mottel, son of 
 Channe-Dvayre, the "politician" of the village, — a 
 Jew with a yellow, pointed beard and darting, spark- 
 ling eyes, who wore a warm shawl around his neck 
 from the middle of July until the Day of Atonement 
 in September, because he was also a cantor and must 
 guard his voice from a cold, — this Mottel was the 
 only cheerful fellow on the whole market-place. 
 Often he would sit before the door of his shop, his 
 shawl tightly wound about his neck, telling the other 
 
 21 
 
22 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 shopkeepers in a loud voice that Israel Beaconsfield 
 was a greater statesman than even Bismarck. And 
 that was why England, and not Germany, to this 
 day held the keys to the ocean in its own treasury. 
 And if England wished to, she could lock up the 
 ocean and ruin the world. . . , 
 
 And the men and women shopkeepers, when they 
 heard these tales, marveled at Mottel's deep mind 
 and his broad learning; upon the careworn faces and 
 in the eyes haunted by sorrow there glowed a pleased 
 expression. For the great Beaconsfield was our 
 Israel Beaconsfield. . . . 
 
 ^ Should there appear in the midst of these diplo- 
 matic discourses, a Gentile peasant in his linen shirt 
 and his heavy boots, with a moist, fuzzy beard and 
 scraggly hair sticking out from under a new, peaked 
 hat, just purchased, the men and women shopkeep- 
 ers who had been engrossed in "our" Beacons- 
 field would forget him at once. Even Mottel him- 
 self forgot. All would make a dash toward the 
 peasant, with Mirke, daughter of Avrom-Layzer, in the 
 lead. Mirke was a long, lank woman with a yellow 
 face and a head-covering that never sat straight. In 
 the village she had a reputation as a shameless crea- 
 ture, because of her sulphurous language, and also 
 because all the year round she quarreled with every 
 other shopkeeper over matters of livelihood. Behind 
 her came the agile Mottel, the statesman, with his 
 
THE WEEK IN SUMMER 23 
 
 inseparable shawl around his neck, followed by all 
 the rest. They surrounded the peasant and seized 
 him, one by the coat-tails, another by the shirt, a third 
 by the sleeve, this one before him, the other behind. 
 And the contending shopkeepers dragged the peasant 
 toward their respective shops, their shrieking voices 
 filled with entreaty and almost with tears. 
 
 The peasant struggled, squirming in all directions, 
 tearing himself loose from one and thrusting the 
 other off. And when his brand-new hat fell from his 
 head of scraggly hair, he flew into a fury altogether, 
 glowered at Mirke, who happened to be pulling him 
 by the sleeve, and spat squarely into her face, giving 
 her a powerful thrust. Whereupon out of anger Mirke 
 spat into Mottel's face and tore the scarf of Mottel's 
 wife off her head; Mottel's wife, in confusion, threw 
 herself desperately upon another shopwoman, and by 
 this time the peasant had rescued his cap from the 
 ground; he started off on a run, and, as it happened, 
 flew right into Mirke's arms. She, with her head- 
 covering already on her shoulders, panting from ex- 
 ertion, dragged him at last into her booth. 
 
 Now the others resumed their seats before their 
 places and wiped their faces with bare hands; the 
 women rearranged their disordered head-coverings 
 and crooked bonnets; Mottel readjusted the shawl 
 around his neck. For a few moments they continued 
 to curse one another, all uniting to curse Mirke, until 
 
24 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 the peasant emerged from the shop with a package 
 of tobacco and something else in a parceL . . . Then 
 they all accompanied him with sorrowful counte- 
 nances, and with envy in their hearts tried to guess 
 how much Mirke had profited by his purchase. . . . 
 
 Thus they sit from early morning until late at ni^t 
 before their little establishments and their tables, and 
 seek their livelihood, if it may be called such. The 
 sun may bum, the wind may blow hot, sandy gusts 
 into their faces, into their eyes, — ^but there they 
 sit. . . . 
 
 The forest casts dark shadows over the village. 
 The sitting figures merge into the shadows that steal 
 gradually from the Polish church down into the val- 
 ley. A bbt ?lay expires; a new, cool night is bom. 
 The night dies. Another hot day is bom, and life in 
 the village goes on just as it went yesterday, — ^just 
 as it went a year ago, decades ago. . . . 
 
 And like decades ago, over the forest, after a warm 
 evening rain arid preceding a hot day, floats a mist, 
 and the newly risen sun gazes through the mist like 
 a red flame through the dust-covered glass of a lan- 
 tern. As the day is very hot, some Jewish yoimgsters 
 are going bathing with an older man, in the little 
 stream that flows just outside the village, across from 
 the Jewish cemetery. Then dbes the welkin ring with 
 young, mischievous cries, and from the virgin forest 
 nearby little birds rise in flight, with a frightened 
 
THE WEEK IN SUMMER 25 
 
 tweet-tweet. They fly out, see the naked mischief- 
 makers in the stream, and soon return to their nests, 
 disappearing into their verdant little world. . . . 
 
 And from the other side of the stream, from the 
 hill where the shepherd tends his sheep, behind the 
 trees, comes the shepherd's song, while his dog's bark- 
 ing echoes far and near. They cannot say whether 
 he barks from pleasure at his master's voice, or be- 
 cause he hears the noise yonder by the stream. And 
 opposite, under the fence around the Jewish ceme- 
 tery, is Orre Trahle, the caretaker of the burial- 
 ground. He is lolling on the grass, both knees stuck 
 out and his long, yellow fringed garment visible from 
 behind his trousers. His coat is fastened by safety 
 pins. He is a fellow with a red, perspiring neck 
 under a thick, wild, scraggly black beard, wearing a 
 cap with a broken peak. In his mouth is a long 
 pipe-stem, at which he sucks, burrowing with his 
 finger into the clay bowl. He gazes at the naked 
 youngsters who are performing all manner of antics 
 in the stream. 
 
 At the water's edge stands a father, holding his 
 little son by the hand and trying to pull him into the 
 water. The pot-bellied little fellow, about six years 
 old, tears himself from his father's grasp, stamps his 
 little feet and cries : 
 
 "I don't want to! I do-n't want to-o ! I'm afraid! 
 Ooh! Pa-a-pa! ..." 
 
26 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 The father takes the child into his arms, and when 
 the latter begins to struggle with his hands and legs, 
 the parent holds his legs and walks into the water 
 with the juvenile objector. At once, however, he 
 turns back. "Ay! 'It's cold!" He stops, sets the 
 child down on the grass and walks back into the water 
 himself. He stops at the edge, places one hand on 
 his hairy chest, sticks the other into his arm-pit, stands 
 thus for a while, looks at the water, then at the chil- 
 dren who are performing all sorts of tricks, and mut- 
 ters to himself: 
 
 "Regular evil spirits! Little demons!" Then 
 very cautiously he advances one foot into the water 
 and makes a wry face. "Ah, Ay!" Whereupon he 
 turns to a man nearby. "Pretty cold, isn't it?" The 
 latter, already bathing, replies, "So so!" And he 
 stops both his ears with his fingers, closes his eyes and 
 suddenly submerges himself, leaving only a black 
 lock of his hair visible, soon reappearing with a red 
 face, his beard and temple-locks dripping, and howl- 
 ing as if he were steaming on the board of an indoor 
 sweat-bath. . . . Meanwhile the other Jew, praised 
 be the Lord, has thrust his second foot into the water. 
 But the urchins are at play about him, chasing one 
 another, "ducking" one another's heads into the 
 stream, splashing one another. A splash strikes him, 
 and he starts, crying, "Oh, you little jail-birds! You 
 demons!! I'll kill you, good-for-nothings, reptiles! 
 
THE WEEK IN SUMMER 27 
 
 You're liable to drown a man, God forbid! This is 
 a river, you little ragamuffins!" The children shriek 
 with laughter, and one of them turns a somersault in 
 the water, disappears, sticks his foot above the surface 
 and soon emerges with a red, dripping countenance, 
 eyes shut, his hands clasped over his forehead, shak- 
 ing his head and his ears, splutters, and shouts so 
 zestfully, shrilly, merrily, swimming then back to the 
 other youngsters, who are floating on their backs, sud- 
 denly flopping over on their stomachs, perfbrming 
 paddle-strokes, "tread water" and other antics. . . . 
 
 The man in the stream shouts to the Jew who has 
 just scolded the youngsters, and who is preparing to 
 immerse himself. 
 
 "Did you see the tricks that Mirke's wild son was 
 doing? Some day he'll get drowned." 
 
 "May he take his mother with him," replies the man 
 addressed, thrusting his fingers into his ears, shutting 
 his eyes and — splash! Thank Heaven, the first duck- 
 ing over with, he passes his hand across his wet beard 
 and the water is no longer cold. . . . 
 
 And the Jewish maiden, when nobody is there, 
 steals over to the stream, — steals over on tiptoe with 
 a companion, and her black eyes dart about uneasily 
 in every direction as she casts off' the garments from 
 her pure, white body; and when the sun gazes upon 
 her nakedness the maiden huddles together, bends 
 over, abashed before the light, before the sun, the 
 
28 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 sky, the trees, — before all the surrounding world of 
 light and verdure, and steps thus into the murmuring 
 water. . . . And the young' shepherd, hidden by the 
 trees, looks from the hillock, — stretched out upon his 
 stomach, the handle of his whip against his chin, — 
 down upon the naked girl in the stream, — gazes, 
 smiles and wags his head. He cannot hold in, how- 
 ever, and thrusts his head from between the trees, 
 calls to the girl by her name and falls to whinny- 
 ing like a colt. . . . The maid utters a startled cry; 
 she seizes her companion by the arm; the companion 
 seizes her similarly, and both lower themselves into 
 the water as far as their necks, look aroimd with 
 frightened eyes at the shepherd, cry out at him, scold 
 him, and when he begins to laugh louder and more 
 lustfully than ever, they commence to creep on all 
 fours out of the water, with flaming cheeks and eyes 
 brimming with shame; they crawl thus to their clothes, 
 wrap their garments about them and bend down close, 
 close to the ground, to dress. And when they have 
 dressed they both arise, point their fists at the Peeping 
 Tom and shower him with epithets. He, too, has 
 risen, snapping his long whip at them, laughing and 
 whistling. Suddenly the companions clasp each 
 other, burst into laughter and run back to the village. 
 
 When Tish B'Ab (the 9di of the month of Ab) 
 came around, the rivulet, even as decade upon decade 
 
THE WEEK IN SUMMER 29 
 
 before, would hear horrifying lamentations from the 
 Jewish cemetery across the way, where Jewish women 
 lay upon the graves of their dead, wailing; where 
 stood men with snow-white beards, their heads resting 
 against the tombstones of their departed wives, mur- 
 muring prayers; where the jroungsters, whose hearts 
 bounded with the springtime of life, not caring to 
 know of sorrows or of death, climbed up the trees 
 above the graves and robbed apples. . . . "7 
 
 And shortly before the Solemn Days, even as dec- 
 ade upon decade before, the heavens hung gray 
 and gloomy over the forest, and out of grayness at 
 times came the long-drawn, angry caw of a crow; the 
 village was redolent of the gathered produce of the 
 surrounding fields, — of ripe apples from the neigh- 
 boring orchards, — of fruit for the local Gentile 
 neighbors, — of the heavy depression that came to all 
 the Jews there with New Year's Day and the Day of 
 Atonement. . . . 
 
 And upon the countenances of the men and women 
 shopkeepers would fall a preoccupied earnestness; 
 every heart would turn to God's mercy, entreating a 
 prosperous new year to be written down against their 
 name, and sealed, and every heart trembled before 
 the Lord's wrath. . . . 
 
 Not a curse could be heard, nor any scolding. 
 Folks were afraid to curse when heaven was astir with 
 preparations to write and seal the fates of all, — and 
 
30 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 earth bustled with purification from sin. All did 
 their utmost to bury their evil feelings toward their 
 neighbor until the awe-inspiring days should 
 pass, . . . 
 
 Even as tens and tens of years ago, so the fear of 
 God at this season would daily wax greater and 
 greater; the very sky above the wood, it seemed, be- 
 came dark and lugubrious with terror, the sun took 
 flight from fear, and the forest, together with the en- 
 tire ambient, became clouded with awe. 
 
 The nights were without a moon, — ^pitch dark. 
 The dwellings and the shops lay as in a deep, black 
 abyss. And the little lights in the windows gleamed 
 from afar, like the eyes of wolves in a black forest; 
 the Polish cemetery hovered like a strip of heavy fog 
 over the sunken hamlet, while from the woods was 
 wafted an imcanny rustling over the village; one 
 after the other, indistinct shadows stalked from the 
 market-place carrying the glimmering lights of their 
 lanterns, and soft footfalls were audible in the vicin- 
 ity of the shadows and the flickering flames. Sub- 
 dued sighs, too; and, in all this, Jews could discern 
 the imminence of the awe-inspiring holy days. 
 
THE DAYS OF PENITENCE 
 
 'T'HE older children, too, became more pious during 
 -*• this season; they were more fervent in the reci- 
 tation of their prayers, and shunned all transgressions. 
 Particularly did they avoid such transgressions as 
 were punishable by having their years cut off in 
 their prime. 
 
 A youngster is standing in prayer. Into the lower 
 windows of the house peers a gray, cloudy morning. 
 The child is about ten, pale and thin, wearing patched 
 trousers through which hangs the grimy tail of his 
 shirt. In his hands is a prayer-book, and he recites 
 with deep fervor, in a loud voice. His mother enters 
 from without, exhausted, bearing a small basket; she 
 is likewise pale, of small build, and still young; a 
 shawl is thrown over her shoulders and a kerchief 
 over her head, completely hiding her hair. She de- 
 posits the basket upon the table and begins to extract 
 cookies from its depth, counting them in a whisper. 
 The reckoning concluded, she replaces the cookies in 
 the basket and glances about uneasily at her younger 
 children, who are still asleep: one in a crib and two 
 
 31 
 
32 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 upon a couch. She must hurry to the market-place 
 and set her little stand. All the shopkeepers are al- 
 ready in their places and she finds it impossible to 
 tear away from the house, for the children must be 
 dressed and given their meal. Her husband is away 
 in the village of Kalyeda and will probably return 
 to-day or to-morrow with a little produce. At any 
 other time she would burst into cries and curses 
 against her chilren, because they "snooze" so and do 
 not allow her to get away. To-day, however, so near 
 to the New Year holidays, she fears to be angry, and 
 however much she is tortured by the thought that she 
 is probably losing business by this delay, she masters 
 her indignation, approaches the slumbering children, 
 caresses them, and wakes them with a voice that 
 throbs with tenderness. 
 
 "Get up, children ! A good, good year to you, my 
 fledglings, I'm late on account of you! . . ." 
 
 And while she is occupied there with her younger 
 offspring, who have by now awaked, and washes their 
 faces with a moist towel, reciting "I confess" with 
 them, the little ten-year-old continues saying his 
 prayers from the devotionary and every moment 
 glances furtively at the cookies in the basket. The 
 contents fascinate him and confuse his thoughts. In 
 his little heart the Evil Spirit contends with the Good. 
 
 "How sweet they smell! Steal one!" urges the 
 Evil One. 
 
THE DAYS OF PENITENCE 33 
 
 "You mustn't. That's theft. Such a sin on the 
 very eve of New Year's and the Day of Atonement!" 
 admonishes the Spirit of Good. And the youngster 
 turns his back upon the tempting morsels, shuts his 
 eyes and prays in a voice louder than ever. 
 
 "You can tell your mother afterwards, and ask her 
 forgiveness. How tasty, how sweet!" persists the 
 Spirit of Evil. He recalls the cookie that he fur- 
 tively abstracted from the basket several weeks be- 
 fore, and can still taste its sweetness. At length he 
 reaches a decision: he will take it only this once and 
 then he'll confess to his mother and beg her forgive- 
 ness. 
 
 He steals backwards to the table, his eyes distended 
 in fearful surveillance of his mother, sticks his hand 
 behind him and fumbles around for the basket, thrusts 
 in his fingers, withdraws them cautiously with a cookie 
 and quickly conceals it under his fringed garment,^ 
 next to his bare bosom. Then he resumes his pray- 
 ing, but in a confused manner, no longer as ardently 
 as before. 
 
 His mother has left with the basket. The young- 
 ster has finished his prayers and has gone into the 
 street with his cookie. He is on his way to the 
 cheder ^ and can feel that the stolen sweet has fallen 
 
 1 Worn by all orthodox males. 
 
 2 Elementary Hebrew school. Literally, the Hebrew word for 
 
34 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 down to his abdomen, where it has been caught in his 
 fringed garment. As he proceeds, he debates with 
 himself: To eat or not to eat? Yes, eat! No, not 
 eat! It tastes so nice! But it's such a sin! Just in 
 spite of the Evil Spirit he'll not eat it! Just in spite! 
 But how sweet it tastes! "I'll tell mama: 'Mama 
 I took a cake. . . .' Took? Stole! Stole!" he be 
 gins to scold himself in his thoughts. "That is theft 
 Fie ! On the eve of New Year's and the Day of Atone^ 
 ment you've committed a robbery! . . ." 
 
 All at once he catches sight of a playmate on the 
 way to the same cheder, — little Shlayme, "the wild 
 creature," Mirke's little rat, a child of the same age 
 with a scratched face, a torn cap on his bead, bare- 
 foot, and a grimy shirt-tail likewise flapping out of his 
 trousers. And the said Shlayme is really a wild 
 creature. Wherever there's a fence, he's sure to be 
 climbing over it. No sooner does he spy a billy-goat 
 than he must mount him for a ride. He must hang 
 from the rear of all passing carts. If he detects a 
 tot with a dainty, he must snatch it away. He clamb- 
 ers in the orchards, stealing apples. At the synagogue 
 he always becomes involved in fist-fights with the other 
 urchins and always emerges with a well-scratched 
 visage. Now, however, just before the Solemn Days, 
 Shlayme has reformed, and has become as meek as a 
 dove. 
 
 He accosts Shlayme. 
 
THE DAYS OF PENITENCE 35 
 
 "Shlaymekele, I've got a cookie!" 
 
 "Where?" 
 
 "Right here." 
 
 He taps his belly. 
 
 "Give us a piece!" 
 
 "I mustn't. . . ." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 ". . . Mustn't. . . ." 
 
 "Mustn't share a cookie? Why?" 
 
 " 'Cause I mustn't. ... I took it on the quiet." 
 
 "Ooh!" cries Shlayme, with a start. "Before New 
 Year's? Thief! . . ." 
 
 "Not from a stranger. From my mother." 
 
 "You're a thief just the same. . . . You mustn't. 
 You die early for doing that. Just ask the Rabbi 
 and you'll see. Hurry, give it back!" 
 
 "I was ready to go myself and give it back. That's 
 just why I told you I mustn't share. . . ." 
 
 "A big cake?" asks Shlayme suddenly. "You're 
 watering to eat it, ain't you? Let's have a look at 
 it! . . ." 
 
 "I mustn't," and the speaker shakes his head, break- 
 ing into a bee-line dash for the market-place. 
 
 His mother is already at her place beside her 
 stand, which is laden with cookies, candies, and 
 kvass.^ 
 
 ^A thin, sour beer, commonly made by pouring warm water on 
 rye or barley and letting it ferment. 
 
36 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 He rushes over to her and halts bruskly, brings 
 forth from under his garment the cookie, which is 
 warm from contact with his body, and hands it to his 
 mother without looking at her. 
 
 "Where did you get it?" she asks, after the cookie 
 is already in her hand. 
 
 "Took it," he stammers, bringing his slender arm 
 to his face, rubbing his nose against it and com- 
 mencing to sob. 
 
 "What are you crying for? . . ." 
 
 "I took it from your little basket," he continues 
 to sob, while his arm has already reached his fore- 
 head; from behind it he eyes his mother with a 
 twitching face, awaiting the slap. 
 
 But to-day his mother does not slap him. At any 
 other time she would have flayed him alive, heaping 
 curses upon him, crying: "The idea! Such a blood- 
 sucker! With what labor she earns a kopek. . . ." 
 To-day, however, she merely says, 
 
 "It isn't nice, my son; it's a sin, — on the eve of 
 New Year's. ... I would have given it to you my- 
 self. ..." 
 
 And this kindly speech, instead of the blow he ex- 
 pected, upsets him entirely and he cries more than 
 ever, with deep contrition, with genuine repentance 
 and all his heart. . . • 
 
 Then his mother caresses both his cheeks. "Hush, 
 hush, you won't do it again." She wipes his nose 
 
THE DAYS OF PENITENCE 37 
 
 with a comer of her skirt, presses the cookie into his 
 hand and says: 
 
 "There, now; go to school, a sweet year to you!" 
 
 He left her with sparkling eyes. He was no thief; 
 his years would not be cut off in the middle; and he 
 had the cookie, anyway! . . . 
 
 For sheer joy he began to kick about like a calf, 
 and the soiled tail of his shirt danced after him. . . . 
 
 The shopkeepers sat now before their booths deeply 
 absorbed in thought. 
 
 A peasant woman and a maiden passed by, the 
 former with a brass kerosene-vessel in her hand and 
 the latter with an empty sack. Both wore upon their 
 heads white linen kerchiefs and bast shoes upon their 
 feet. The shopkeepers, however, did not stir from 
 their places. They did not pull the prospective cus- 
 tomers from one another, did not contend for them, 
 but were content to call to them from where they 
 sat, so softly and abjectly, as was possible only on 
 the eve of New Year's and the Day of Atonement. 
 And when the peasant woman and the Gentile maiden 
 walked into Mottel's, the men and women shopkeep- 
 ers said to one another: 
 
 "Well, he's a Jew as well as we. . . . May God 
 send all Jews a happy New Year. . . ." 
 
 And Mirke, the serpent's tongue, added with an up- 
 right, pious mien: 
 
38 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 "Amen, Lord of the Universe, amen! . . ." 
 And thus in this season, until the Day of Atone- 
 ment had passed, did these Jews and their wives and 
 children strive to be better and more pious, even as 
 their forebears decades upon decades ago; they 
 cleansed and scoured their souls of sin, just as they 
 did their houses and their cooking utensils for Pass- 
 over, and the strange mood of the approaching Solemn 
 Days, so mysterious and awe-inspiring, so majestic 
 and pregnant with God's presence, grew more pow- 
 erful daily, in and about them. . . . 
 
 Old Mayshe leaves the old House of Study and 
 fares forth into the dark night, holding close to his 
 face his lighted lanterns, which illumine his flowing 
 white beard, and seeks the road to the Jewish dwell- 
 ings. A melancholy rustling of the trees wafts from 
 the forest through the darkness; the beadle stops be- 
 fore a house, raps at the shutters and cries out, in a 
 voice that seems to come from the other world: "Get 
 up for prayers! Get up for prayers!" From this 
 house he proceeds to another, to a third, raps and 
 summons the dwellers to God with his curdling voice 
 that rings through the gloomy night. . . . Gleams of 
 light appear in the dark windows, and from the houses 
 comes the shuffle of bare feet, accompanied by cough- 
 ing. Somewhat later, when the beadle's voice is 
 
THE DAYS OF PENITENCE 39 
 
 heard echoing from the next street, whence comes also 
 the sullen barking of the dogs in the Gentile's yard, 
 dark forms step forth from the Jewish homes, tall 
 ones and short, carrying lanterns; coughing and sigh- 
 ing, they totter along sleepily, all in the same direc- 
 tion, to the synagogue, which by now stands brightly 
 illuminated, with a sort of holy light, against the 
 surrounding darkness. , . And now the dark 
 night resounds with the united cry of Jewish fathers 
 and sons, which rises from the assembly house with 
 sighs and groans. . . . 
 
 Until the eve of the Day of Atonement the village ^ 
 Jews entreated God to forgive them their transgres- 
 sions. On the morning of that eve, assembled in the 
 S5Tiagogue, they begged forgiveness of each other. 
 For these Jews felt that they had sinned against one 
 another, — that they had torn the bread and butter 
 from each other's mouths, quarreled over a customer, 
 cursed, envied. ... So they foregathered in the 
 House of Study, treated one another to brandy and 
 cakes, asked one another's forgiveness with earnest, 
 solemn mien and wished everybody a happy year. J - 
 
 There on the market-place the sinner Mirke flitted 
 from shop to shop, her lean, lank body bent beneath 
 her shawl, her yellowish countenance screwed into a 
 grimace, her eyes red with weeping, halting before 
 every vendor and huckstress, beating her heart and 
 
40 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 sobbing: "I have sinned against you. ... I am a 
 wicked woman. . . . Forgive me, my dear man. . . . 
 Forgive me, my darling! . . ." 
 
 And the man addressed would reply with an earnest, 
 solemn mien: 
 
 "Forgive me, too, Mirke! . . ." 
 
 The women would answer, echoing her own sobs: 
 
 "Mirke, darling, forgive me, too! . . . May God 
 forgive all of us and may He inscribe and seal a good 
 year for all of us! . . ." 
 
 At night, after the fast had been begun, all the 
 Jewish houses would be ablaze with light. Candle- 
 sticks with stearine and wax candles shone upon the 
 commodes and the tables and cast a strange, mys- 
 terious glow through the room. . . . The fathers put 
 on their white surplices with mute, solemn faces. 
 The mothers, in white head-coverings and spotless 
 garments, swallowed their tears, overpowered by the 
 mood of the fast day. In almost every Jewish home 
 fathers blessed their children, and grandfathers their 
 grandchildren, before they left for the syna- 
 4 — gogue. . . . 
 
 ty At Mirke's, in her old home, at the low window 
 above the green mound, her aged father Avrom-Layzer 
 the capmaker, who lived with her, sat at the head of 
 the table, — a tall, spare Jew with a long, white beard 
 and a parchment-colored face wearing an expression 
 of deep absorption in thought. He sat in a white sur- 
 
THE DAYS OF PENITENCE 41 
 
 plice like a corpse from the other world, his eyes shut, 
 his bloodless hands sticking out of the ample white 
 sleeves, and was blessing his grandchildren, who stood 
 ranged in the center of the room, — four boys and three 
 girls. 
 
 Near the table, on which were lighted candles, 
 stood Mirke in a white kerchief and a white kaftan, 
 watching her father pronouncing his benediction upon 
 her children, and a tear glittered upon the tip of her 
 nose ; her husband, Mayshe-Itsye, the Hebrew-teacher, 
 a short, leaai fellow with a sparse red beard and red 
 eyebrows, wearing an alpaca coat, stood in the center 
 of the room, his head -bowed, his hands clasped be- 
 hind his black girdle, swaying to and fro. 
 
 As Mirke's oldest daughter, — Layke, a freckled 
 girl with red hair and reddish eyes, — ^inclined her 
 head under her grandfather's white hands, Mirke con- 
 cealed her face behind a comer of her white kaftan, 
 stifling her tears and entreating with all her heart: 
 
 "Send her a sweetheart, dear God, for she's already 
 a grown-up girl! . . ." 
 
 And her husband, Mayshe-Itsye, raised his head, 
 glanced at his daughter's red head, upon which rested 
 the trembling hands of the old man, protruding from 
 their ample white sleeves, shut his eyes and began 
 to sway more fervently than ever. . . . And while 
 Chayim-Beer, his son, who was to be summoned for 
 the military examination that year, — a lanky chap. 
 
42 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 like his mother, with black down fringing his cheeks, 
 cotton-wadding stuffed into his ears and a head of 
 curly black hair, — inclined his head, the grandfather 
 heaved a deep sigh, and in his mumbled benediction 
 stifled tears were divined; Mirke broke down com- 
 pletely and burst into lamentation, which she soon 
 mastered, however. After this wailing, other out- 
 bursts, long concealed, rose from her soul. 
 
 "0 Father in Heaven, have pity upon him! . . ." 
 
 And Mayshe-Itsye began to pull at his nose and 
 sob and sway piously. . . . 
 
 Thus, one after the other all the grandchildren ap- 
 proached their grandfather, — including Shlayme the 
 wild creature, — and each bowed before him with an 
 earnest, absorbed mien, a quivering spirit and bated 
 breath. A solemn silence reigned throughout the 
 household, over which a certain holy awe seemed to 
 hover, and through this silence sounded the murmur- 
 ing of the aged man, blessing his grandchildren from 
 the depths of his heart. . . . 
 
 The flames of the candles upon the table burned in 
 a different fashion, it seemed, impregnated with the 
 awe of the Day of Atonement. 
 
 Somewhat later, they have all repaired to the syna- 
 gogues. The streets are deserted; not even a child 
 is to be seen. The entire village, together with the 
 forest on the hillside and the dark sky overhead, seems 
 steeped in the mystery of Yom Kippur.^ 
 
 I Hebrew, "Day of Atonement." 
 
VI 
 
 THE DAY OF ATONEMENT 
 
 'T'HE synagogue is warm and stifling. Hundreds of 
 -*- wax tapers bum upon the tables in earthen pots, 
 and from them in every direction dart long, narrow, 
 flickering, burning tongues, filling the atmosphere 
 with a warm, sweetish odor of wax and a choking 
 smell of sizzling tallow. 
 
 Tens of hanging candelabra and lamps pour their 
 lights upon the people in their white surplices, sway- 
 ing, groaning and wailing, drowning out with their 
 cries the lamentations that come from the women's 
 section, . . .^ 
 
 Before the altar stands Mottel, son of Channe- 
 Dvayre; not Mottel the poor vendor of the rest of 
 the year, who wages battle upon the market-place, 
 contending for the chance to make a kopek profit, but 
 another Mottel entirely, — the spokesman who weeps 
 out before God the sins of all Israel. It is Mottel's 
 opulent soul, which has left his lowly, money-grub- 
 bing body, that stands now before the altar. In his 
 white surplice, his head cowled beneath his prayer- 
 shawl, and thrown back, his exalted face and dis- 
 tended eyes turned heavenward, both hands extended 
 
 ^ Women sit apart from the men in all orthodox Hebrew services. 
 
 43 
 
44 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 to the candles that bum behind the altar, he entreats, 
 implores, and weeps with such feeling, such earnest- 
 ness: 
 
 "0 Lord, forgive Thou the sins of Thy people, for 
 great is Thy mercy. . . ." 
 
 And in response comes a louder groaning, a louder 
 lamentation, — a pounding upon the walls, upon the 
 reading-desks, a beating of fists against breasts, a 
 slapping of hands, and wailing from the women's 
 section, accompanied by the piping voices of the 
 youngsters, who stand beside their fathers and their 
 grandfathers, gaze into the prayer-books and feel the 
 very presence of God and the angels, who look down 
 upon them from the vast heights. And all this tumult 
 breaks through the walls of the synagogue, into the 
 mysterious darkness of outdoors and is wafted straight 
 to heaven. . . . 
 
 Here stands an aged Jew with a flourishing white 
 beard, both hands pressed against the wall, eyes 
 closed, shaking his hoary head under his prayer-shawl 
 and crying in a broken, plaintive voice; there near the 
 wall sways a tall form, back and forth, to and fro, 
 sobbing. And all at once he thumps his hands to- 
 gether and cries out impulsively, "Good God!" as 
 if he has suddenly recalled a frightful transgres- 
 sion. . . . 
 
 "Father in heaven, woe is me! Heavenly Father! 
 Woe! Woe!" cries Mottel's tearful tenor. . . . 
 
THE DAY OF ATONEMENT 45 
 
 "Aye, aye, aye, ah, ah!" wails Mayshe-Itsye from a 
 comer, in his squeaking voice, and his cry is taken 
 up by all, both around him and in the women's sec- 
 tion, with a concert of sighs, sobs and lamentations. 
 
 Near the entrance stands the village apothecary, a 
 blond young man wearing spectacles, pulling with his 
 thin, white fingers at the blond beard on his under 
 lip; he is holding a small devotionary, glancing over 
 its pages and moving his mustache slowly as he 
 mumbles the prayers; beside him is the village 
 teacher, a lanky fellow with sprouts of black hair 
 here and there on his cheeks and on his chin, wearing 
 a soiled collar. One finger he holds in his nose, 
 twirling it absent-mindedly, and reads softly and 
 calmly from his prayer-book. From time to time he 
 begins to sway, whereupon he removes his finger from 
 his nose and recites his prayers with fervor. Sud- 
 denly, however, he catches himself, ceases his sway- 
 ing, sticks his finger back into his nose and resumes 
 his low-voiced recitation. He is bashful in the pres- 
 ence of the apothecary, from whom he borrows books 
 and periodicals, and does not pray with the ardor 
 that he really feels. He desires the druggist to hold 
 him for an "enlightened" person, wherefore he recites 
 his prayers unobtrusively, and, as has always been 
 his habit when he speaks or reads at ease, he picks 
 at his nose. . . . 
 
 But a few moments later, affected by the prevailing 
 
46 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 mood, he edges away from the druggist, gets into a 
 comer, once more removes his fingers from his nos- 
 trils, starts swaying fervently, and his groaning voice 
 merges with the din from the rest and flies with them 
 to heaven. . . . 
 
 On Yom Kippur eve the village is submerged in 
 silence. Through the darkness wafts the sinister 
 whispering of the forest, and with what awe it whis- 
 pers! 
 
 From the beds in the Jewish homes rises a sigh- 
 ing. The candles flicker and go out. And a mother 
 gazes at the guttering candle with terror in her heart. 
 "It has gone out. Woe ! Has some soul, God forbid, 
 been extinguished? . . ." 
 
 And on the next day the village is as quiet as a 
 graveyard. All except the maidens and the very 
 young children, who remain at home, are in the 
 synagogue. The girls, too, are fasting; pale and 
 earnest are their faces, and their hearts, too, are 
 turned to God. . . , Not a living creature is seen 
 upon the market-place. The Gentile peasants, too, 
 know that the awful fast day of the Jews has come, 
 and they do not journey to the village. Only "Jew- 
 ish" goats wander hungrily about the shops, for they, 
 too, have this day been denied food and drink; there 
 are also the "Gentile" geese and ducks squatting upon 
 their downy bellies, some of them pecking under their 
 
THE DAY OF ATONEMENT 47 
 
 wings; hens and their tiny broods are scratching about 
 in the little heaps of dirt. . . . 
 
 Within the synagogues, sighs, sobs, cries unto 
 heaven. . . . On the tables the tall wax candles have 
 been burning since yestereve in their earthen vessels. 
 The Jews in their surplices press their burning fore- 
 heads against the cool walls, beat their breasts and 
 sob in silence. Others are striking their book-rests, 
 clapping their palms, swaying fervently and howling, 
 already hoarse. They fall upon their knees, press 
 their foreheads against the floor and entreat, en- 
 treat. . . . From the women's section comes a wail- 
 ing. . . . They are seized with the old universal 
 chant of the cantor, and they sway harder than ever, 
 accompanying him with rending tones: 
 
 "Ay, ay, ay! . . ." 
 
 They are already reciting Neilah. . . .^ Soon 
 the gates of prayer in heaven will be closed, and the 
 members of the assembly, who since yestereve have 
 had nothing in their mouths and feel very weak, 
 gather strength for a final effort, so that they may let 
 themselves be heard while the gates of heaven are 
 still open. . . . 
 
 Mottel stands before the altar and his feet are sag- 
 ging beneath him from faintness. He is hoarse, but 
 there are still a few tears left in his eyes and some 
 1 Literally, Closing of the heavens. 
 
48 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 Jewish groans in his bosom, and his hoarse voice 
 reverberates with tears and groans. Shmerel the 
 cobbler, a broad, short fellow with a grayish-black 
 sparse beard and tearful red eyes, who knows all his 
 "tunes" and possesses a pleasant baritone voice, now 
 edges up closer to the altar, on the other side of the 
 platform, where his regular "pew" is, and begins to 
 help Mottel out. His baritone rings through the hall 
 like a bell, and Mottel himself becomes more spirited, 
 and his voice, it seems, becomes clearer; the entire 
 assembly groans. . . . 
 
 After the Eighteen Benedictions of Neilah a fresh 
 breeze seems suddenly to waft through the syna- 
 gogue, — soon Yom Kippur will be over. . . . Many 
 countenances beam with a happy expression. The 
 youngsters grow mischievous; like the sun from be- 
 hind a dark cloud, the gladsome Rejoicing of the Law 
 beckons to them with its banners, its Scrolls and its 
 dancing. The village teacher is already at the drug- 
 gist's side and is discussing with him Turgienev's 
 novel, "Fathers and Children," which he borrowed 
 several days before. 
 
 Once Neilah is over, the majority of the worship 
 ers feel as if they have been acquitted of a very ser 
 ious charge before a stem judge. Their hearts be 
 come so strangely light. The disburdened soul re 
 turns to its body, which is still free of weekday cares 
 The weeping has ceased. All eyes are aflame, all 
 
THE DAY OF ATONEMENT 49 
 
 cheeks are pale, and all legs are weary from hunger, 
 from such endless praying, yet a joyous expression 
 lights up all the blanched countenances. Shmerel 
 the cobbler, who is fond of a glass, is already dream- 
 ing of the little flask that he prepared before the Day 
 of Atonement for the breaking of his fast. . . . 
 
 Evening prayers are attacked hastily, and by the 
 time the throngs begin to issue from the synagogues 
 with sleepy gait, their surplices rolled up under their 
 arms, the women and children with the devotionaries 
 tucked aside, the twilight atmosphere is no longer 
 impregnated with solemnity and awe; around the 
 houses stand groups of maidens and little children 
 with merry faces, waiting for their parents. 
 
 And later, when from the market, where they are 
 opening the shops, comes the rattle of the keys, it 
 does not sound so sorrowful and ordinary as on a 
 usual Sabbath evening. ... In many yards they are 
 harnessing horses: the peasants who have come to the 
 village on Yom Kippur are now preparing to return 
 home with their wives and children, and some of the 
 Jewish merchants are getting ready to drive into the 
 surrounding towns with their merchandise. 
 
 In his home, on a low bench, sat Shmerel the cob- 
 bler, who had emptied half of his flask; on a form he 
 was holding a shoe, which he was sewing for Berel- 
 Itsye the money-lender. He hammered away and 
 
50 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 sang a merry ditty. His sweet baritone rose from the 
 semi-gloom of the room, which was lighted by a 
 smoky lamp, and winged into the street, resomided 
 over the village roofs and was lost in the darkness 
 amid the little lights of the shops on the market and 
 the dusky rustling of the forest. 
 
 "Ay-ay-ti-ra, ay-ay-ay! Ay-ti-ri-ra-ay-ay-ay!" re- 
 sounded his merry song through the village darkness. 
 "Ay-ti-ri-ra, pum-pum-pum! . . ." 
 
VII 
 
 THE VILLAGE CHILDREN AT LIBERTY 
 
 T^HE following day the village teemed with life. 
 -*- The youngsters, free from cheder until the com- 
 mencement of the next term, were in clover, 
 Shlayme, Mirke's "wild creature," led a gang of 
 urchins to a fence, over which hung branches bearing 
 the last ripe apples of the season. With his new pair 
 of shoes he placed himself upon a fellow's shoulders, 
 reaching for the fence ; when he had seized the upper- 
 most board there suddenly appeared on the other side 
 a huge, red hand which clutched his own. Shlayme 
 set up a howl and began to kick about desperately; 
 his companions, however, vanished on the instant, 
 leaving little Shlayme hanging from the fence. He 
 cried "Oh, mama!" and attempted to release him- 
 self from the big red hand, and soon from the other 
 side appeared the angry, bushy-haired face and the 
 broad shoulders of a Gentile; he seized Shlayme's 
 new hat off the youngster's head, pulled his ears in 
 excellent fashion and thrust him rudely down from 
 the fence. The child fell on his knees into the sand, 
 scrambled to his feet, placed both his hands upon his 
 
 51 
 
52 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 bare head and started off on a run, crying, "Oh, 
 mama! My new hat! Oh, mama! My new 
 hat!" He ran past his chums, who called to him, 
 but he did not stop, continuing to run with his hands 
 on his bare head, wailing from the depths of his soul: 
 "My new hat, mama ! . . ." 
 
 Two peasant carts were riding by with a group of 
 urchins hanging on behind; all at once one of them 
 received a blow of the whip from the driver, where- 
 upon the rest scampered off. Here and there chil- 
 dren were playing "knots." Elsewhere gamins were 
 quarreling, performing antics and turning everything 
 topsy-turvy. The goats could enjoy no rest, and con- 
 cealed themselves from the mischief-makers in the 
 yards. The geese waddled hastily through the street 
 with a loud cackling. The hens and their chicks 
 sought refuge in the houses, in the spaces under the 
 oven. The dogs came tearing out of the yards with 
 an angry barking. . . . Until the time came around 
 for setting up the booths. Then the youngsters aided 
 their fathers and their elder brothers to erect the com- 
 memorative tabernacles. Planks were torn from the 
 fences; they were sunk into the earth; boards were 
 dragged hither and thither, and there was a din of 
 clapping and hammering. What a gay time for the 
 children! The youngsters' cheeks flamed, their eyes 
 glowed, and their hearts beat in such a holiday mood, 
 as they labored away at the construction of the arbor. 
 
THE VILLAGE CHILDREN AT LIBERTY 53 
 
 Amid the darkness of the night stalk shadowy forms 
 with the undulating lights of lanterns in the direction 
 of a house with illuminated windows, standing in the 
 center of the market-place. Within, around a table 
 upon which a samovar is chirping, sits Berel-Itsye the 
 money-lender, — a tall Jew with a florid neck and a 
 flowing beard, wearing an alpaca coat. A man enters 
 with a lantern, and a bundle under his arm ; he comes 
 in softly, meekly, and as if in embarrassment, places 
 the lantern upon the floor, hands the bundle to Berel- 
 Itsye and heaves a sigh. Berel-Itsye undoes the par- 
 cel, glances at its contents — locks it in his bureau and 
 gives the visitor a couple of rubles. 
 
 "May we all have a happy holiday," prays the 
 recipient, sighs again, takes his lantern up and walks 
 out. 
 
 Scarcely has he disappeared when there enters a 
 woman with a kerchief over her head and a lantern 
 across her arm. She leaves the lantern behind the 
 door, near the threshold, approaches the table at 
 which Berel-Itsye is seated, shakes her head, removes 
 a piece of cloth from under her kerchief, extracts 
 from the cloth a pair of old-fashioned ear-rings and 
 hands them over with a sigh. She receives two 
 rubles, and says: 
 
 "Well, thanks be to the All-Highest. He does not 
 forsake us. Now what could I have done for ex- 
 ample if there weren't any ear-rings, God forbid? 
 
54 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 May He protect us all, it's good that I'm not spending 
 the money on iUness, ha? A good God, He does not 
 forsake us! Now we can celebrate the holiday in 
 fitting fashion! ... A happy holiday to you and to 
 us aU, Reb Berel-Itsye. . . ." 
 
 She seizes her lantern and hastens away. 
 
 However poor the Jew of B may have been, a 
 
 holiday was to him a holiday. . . . 
 
 After the first days of the Feast of Tabernacles it 
 began to rain hard. The forest groaned, the green 
 life within it began to languish. The sullen cawing 
 of the crows was heard more frequently; in the or- 
 chards the last apples fell from the trees upon the 
 moist, withering grass, and the streets were gradually 
 transformed into pools of mire. . . . And if the pud- 
 dle before a house grew very large, they would place 
 a plank over it and stride across, some of the girls in 
 their fathers' shoes, with their skirts raised high, 
 huckstresses in winter kaftans, vendors in their thick 
 overcoats. The youngsters, however, were little 
 daunted by the rain, indeed! They were having the 
 time of their lives; there was no cheder for them, 
 and the merry Rejoicing of the Law was soon due. — 
 This, then, was the life for them! They jmnped 
 about in the puddles, and as the water flowed noisily 
 along the gutters, they launched boats and ships and 
 chased after them through the mire, as wet as hens, 
 drenched from head to foot; and if any of them hap- 
 
THE VILLAGE CHILDREN AT LIBERTY 55 
 
 pened to cough, much he worried about it! ... A 
 peasant's cart passed by, and on it sat a peasant with 
 a wet sack over his head, huddled under the rain. 
 The small, lean nag, soaked and with lowered head, 
 trotted splish-splash over the muddy road. The cart 
 shook and the mud spattered its wheels with a hissing 
 noise. On a mound beneath the low window of an 
 old shanty lay a white goat coiled up, his beard buried 
 in his drenched back, looking sadly with half -open 
 eyes at the rain. Near the door, deep in the mire, 
 squatted a pig, grunting. And there scampered a 
 wet black cat, miauing loudly, finally stopping before 
 a house ; she glanced at the gate with a more plaintive 
 miau than ever, and ran on. It seemed as if she were 
 seeking something; perhaps they had stolen her kit- 
 tens from her that day and she was now dashing 
 hither and thither through the rain in search of them, 
 with her pitiful wailing. . . . From the market-place 
 a yellow cur came running, his head lowered dis- 
 piritedly; for a moment he paused before a house and 
 garden, stretched his yellow-haired hide and shook 
 the rain out. Then he disappeared behind the 
 garden. 
 
 Only the youngsters were merry and lively under 
 this dreary autumn downpour, beneath that mournful 
 sky, — the youngsters, in whose souls already danced 
 the Rejoicing of the Law. . . . 
 
VIII 
 CUTTING OSIERS 
 
 EARLY in the morning a veritable horde of young- 
 sters with knives in their pockets leaves the village 
 in the direction of the small forest that is situated 
 behind the stream near the Jewish cemetery, bent 
 upon cutting a supply of osiers. The air is heavy 
 with darkness. The merry voices of the children ring 
 to the accompaniment of the noise of their feet shuf- 
 fling through the puddles. Shlayme, "the wild crea- 
 ture," walks at the head with a lantern in his hand. 
 He is their leader, and therefore carries the lantern, 
 which he took away from a little chap named Samke. 
 The children speak all at once, trying to outcry one 
 another. 
 
 "If the Gentile kids attack us, we'll make a 
 stand. . . ." 
 
 ". . . And give them a drubbing. . . ." 
 "A year ago Mitka's boy tore the hat off my head!" 
 "But, fellows, suppose Murza attacks us?" 
 "Then we'U recite the passage. . . ." 
 "And shower him with stones," cries the wild crea- 
 ture. "And chop his legs off for him." 
 
 "I'm afraid; he's such an angry dog, . . ." 
 
 56 
 
CUTTING OSIERS 57 
 
 tn 
 
 'You needn't be afraid. You just wait an' see 
 what I'll do! I'm not afraid of any dog!" boasts the 
 wild creature. 
 
 They have already come to the outskirts of the 
 village, where the Gentiles live. The dwellers are al- 
 >ready up and little fires peer out of the windows into 
 the darkness. 
 
 Suddenly a dog dashes out of a yard from the dark- 
 ness, with an angry barking. . . . The "wild crea- 
 ture" cries out "Mama!" and remains fixed to the 
 spot in terror, with the flickering lantern thrust toward 
 the dog, which in turn thrusts its great white head and 
 glowing eyes out of the darkness, gives a loud bark, 
 disappears once more into the gloom and again pro- 
 trudes its head. The entire group of children stand 
 as if rooted to the ground; they are afraid to move 
 from the spot, either forward or backward, and peer 
 thither where the white head and the glowing eyes of 
 the dog loom out of the obscurity, barking angrily, 
 vanishing anew as if into a black sea. Suddenly one 
 of the children begins to murmur the passage: 
 
 I am Jacob, 
 Thou art Esau; 
 And if thou bite me, 
 Demons will smite thee. 
 
 And all the rest chime in. Evidently the dog is in- 
 timidated by the strange chorus of murmuring amid 
 
58 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 the gloom, for he gives a final howl and vanishes. 
 Not until then does the little horde continue on its 
 way, first quietly, then resuming its din and laughter. 
 Each one now seeks to win the credit for having first 
 begun the verse and aU join in laughter at the wild 
 creature's expense, because of his ready fright. That 
 worthy feels ashamed; he is not at all pleased to have 
 fallen in the esteem of his chums, so he makes reply: 
 
 "It didn't look to me like a dog, but something, — 
 you know. . . ." 
 
 And seeing that this is of no avail, he seeks to re- 
 deem himself with a tale that he heard yesterday 
 from his mother. 
 
 "Hush, children," he begins. "Did you ever hear 
 tell of Rothschild's pig?" 
 
 "Rothschild's pig? Does he eat pork?" 
 
 "Rothschild is a Jew. He doesn't eat pork!" 
 
 "Of course he doesn't eat pork," cries Shlayme. 
 "But he has a daughter with a face like a pig's, snout 
 and all, and she grunts: 'Khrook-khrook! Khrook- 
 khrook! . . ." 
 
 "Really?" 
 
 "May I live so. My mother told it to me herself," 
 shouts Shlayme. "His wife looked too long at a 
 pig and she gave birth to a daughter who's half human 
 and half pig, — a real pig! . . ." 
 
 "Ooh, ooh! Ay, ay! A pig? A real pig? You 
 don't say? WeU? . . ." 
 
CUTTING OSIERS 59 
 
 "Well? He's got mil-mil-mil^millions," recounts 
 Shiayme, "and he sent out matchmakers all over the 
 world, to look for a husband for her, because nobody 
 will have her as his bride. He gives mil-mil-millions 
 as a dowry, and nobody will have her. . . ." 
 
 "Ay, ay, ay! . . ." 
 
 "My mother says that my brother Aaron ought to 
 take her as his wife and keep her face covered; and 
 my father, too, asks Aaron to marry her. But I'm 
 against it, I'll have to hide for shame. Khrook! 
 Khrook! And if she should get angry and wish to 
 scold my brother or me she'd start in like this: 
 'Cholera seize your bones — ^khrook-khrook! Khrook- 
 khrook! Khrook-khrook!" 
 
 "Khrook-khrook! Khrook-khrook! Khrook!" 
 chorus the gang amid a tumult of merry shouts and 
 cries. 
 
 The gloomy atmosphere turns grayish. Far in the 
 distance, behind the stream, a rooster crows; soon 
 another replies from a different direction, whereupon 
 there follows a "cockadoodledoo" from every side, 
 both from the village and from the distance beyond 
 the forest and the river; there are long-drawn con- 
 fident calls from old roosters, and short, piping, curt, 
 timorous calls from the young cocks. . . . 
 
 Out of the grajTiess looms the Jewish graveyard 
 with its trees and its tombstones facing the stream, 
 which already glistens out of the milky atmosphere 
 
60 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 with a silvery glint, and murmurs gently. . . . The 
 children grow suddenly silent and glance about un- 
 easily at the Jewish graveyard, and it seems to 
 Shlayme that his two-year-old sister Ethel, who died 
 two years before, is looking out at him. He turns 
 his head away in terror and edges up closer to his 
 chums. 
 
 And now they have reached the sparsely grown 
 wood. Day begins to peer over the horizon ; it glances 
 out like a consumptive, and the red ribbon on the edge 
 of the sky looks, too, like the hectic flush upon a con- 
 sumptive's countenance. Shlayme extinguishes the 
 lantern, then joins the others to apportion the knives 
 w^ith which they are to cut the osiers, which are still 
 wet from the previous night's rain and the dew of 
 early morning. On the withering branches of the 
 trees glisten dewdrops, resembling a spider's web. 
 Similar drops bejewel the wilting grass. There sits 
 a gray bird upon a twig, shaking her winglets appar- 
 ently in an efifort to rid herself of the moisture, and 
 chirps such a plaintive, yearning song. It is longing, 
 perhaps, for the verdant summer, that now lies dying, 
 — for the bright, warm sun, and — ^who knows? — ^for 
 fledglings that the dark, sullen autumn has slain. 
 
 A black crow flies by with a raucous cawing, and, 
 as if in triumph, its malevolent shriek echoes over the 
 gaunt little wood, as though rejoicing at the death 
 about it. . . . 
 
CUTTING OSIERS 61 
 
 The children have by now gathered bundles of 
 osiers and are preparing to return home, when sud- 
 denly from among the trees appears their ancient 
 enemy, — a peasant boy between thirteen and fourteen 
 years of age, garbed in a coarse coat with a winter 
 hat on his head. He cries out: 
 
 "Stepan! The Jewish kids are here!" 
 Then he begins to cry even louder, at the urchins: 
 "Dirty Jews! Dirty Jews! Dirty Jews!" 
 The youngsters have already taken to flight but the 
 wild creature, who fears only a dog, cries out to them: 
 "Fellows, don't run away! Let's give him a good 
 beating!" — He hands his lantern to Samke, entrusts 
 his bundle of osiers to another comrade, takes off his 
 hat and hides it in his bosom lest the Gentile boy steal 
 it, and jumps upon the latter with his head bent down, 
 like a wild young bull with his horns. 
 
 "Stepan," cries the Gentile boy, at the same time 
 rushing to attack Shlayme. 
 
 Shlayme assails his opponent's abdomen with his 
 head, at the same time pounding lustily away at his 
 face with both hands, while the Gentile boy thumps 
 him upon the back, in the ribs> and seizes him in an 
 attempt to throw him to the ground. Whereupon 
 Shlayme grabs the youngster's nose, and the latter 
 commences to kick Shlayme in the shins. In the 
 meantime Stepan, — a smaller boy than his chum, but 
 more agile, — ^has dashed upon the scene and before 
 
62 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 the rest of the gang have rushed to Shlayme's assist- 
 ance, Stepan has given him a bloody nose and has 
 escaped through the trees with his brother. 
 
 Shlayme, his nose dripping blood, and his cheeks 
 flaming, laughs in triumph: 
 
 "Maybe I didn't give him a beating!" 
 
 But when his companions tell him that his nose is 
 bleeding, and he wipes it and beholds the sight of 
 blood on his fingers, he bursts into howling: 
 
 "Oy, mama! Oy, ma-ama! . . ." 
 
 He begins to upbraid the children for not having 
 helped him, and gives one of them such a hard slap 
 that he, too, commences to yell: 
 
 "Oy, ma-ama! . . ." 
 
 Finally, however, he once more makes friends with 
 the troop, now that the blood has ceased to flow from 
 his nose. And he keeps repeating with bubbling de- 
 light: 
 
 "Didn't I give him the trouncing! . . ." 
 
 Later the parents of these children were striking the 
 osiers upon the benches of the synagogue, and wild 
 Shlayme struck another youngster in the face with one 
 of them, whereupon the child's father boxed Shlayme's 
 ears for him and Shlayme set up his cry anew: "Oy, 
 ma-a-ma!" Might the Lord slay him before the 
 next day, he vowed, if he didn't catch hold of that 
 kid and tear the lungs and liver out of him. 
 
IX 
 
 THE REJOICING OF THE LAW 
 
 T^HE village rings with song. The merry tenors in- 
 -*- terweave the strands of their melody through the 
 darkness of night. The Rejoicing of the Law fills 
 the hamlet with its spirit. In the synagogues Scroll 
 processions are going on. 
 
 The old synagogue rocks with the singing voices. 
 Children, flags, women, men — all in gay confusion. 
 People stand upon the benches, on the tables, and 
 nm in and out among the men with the Scrolls. The 
 women and maidens rush to kiss the Holy Scrolls, 
 while the boys and the men join in a chorus and break 
 into a merry dance. . . • 
 
 Mottel is drunk, rocks on his legs, waves his arms 
 and laughs. Every other moment he bursts into a 
 cry of "Holy Sheep," and the boys chime in with 
 "Bah-bah!" And Mayshe-Itsye the teacher, his eyes 
 flashing and his cheeks burning from the schnapps he 
 has imbibed during the day, adds his voice to the 
 youthful chorus, while the madcap Shlayme, with a 
 fresh scratch on his face and a torn pennant in his 
 hand, is already hoarse from shouting. "^ 
 
 All at once Shmeril enters the hall, stops near the 
 
 63 
 
64 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 door, throws his head back, brandishes his arms aloft 
 to command attention and thunders in his baritone 
 voice: 
 
 "Sha! Sha-sha-sha! I say: Hush-sh! Where 
 is my chance to hold the Scrolls? A real one, you 
 rascals!" 
 
 Mottel shuffles over to him, gesticulating. 
 
 "Shut up, you fresh old codger! . . ." 
 
 "Pooh pooh for you!" retorts Shmeril. "And 
 pooh pooh for your father and your whole ancestry! 
 You scabby-head, do you think that you're a cantor? 
 As much as my boot-leg! I've got a better voice than 
 you myself!" 
 
 Mayshe-Itsye the teacher runs over. 
 
 "Reb Shmeril, for the Lord's sake, are you at it 
 already?" 
 
 Shmeril strikes his chest. 
 
 "Reb Mayshe-Itsye, I demand the genuine. AU 
 year long they feed me on filth, and give me the 
 scantest honors, the rogues! . . . To-day I demand 
 a gen-u-u-ine one. I'm as good a Jew as the others! 
 I've got a soul, too! . . ." 
 
 "You're a scandal-raiser!" shouts Mayshe-Itsye. 
 "If you dare to call a chance to read from Torah filth, 
 then you're an enemy to Israel." 
 
 "Who?" thunders Shmeril, spitting upon the palms 
 of both his hands. "I'll twist your leg for you in a 
 jiffy! . . ." 
 
THE REJOICING OF THE LAW 65 
 
 And he really raises his fists against Mayshe-Itsye. 
 
 "Help, everybody! He's going to kill me!" cries 
 Mayshe-Itsye, taking refuge behind a bystander. 
 Mottel, however, has remained near Shmeril, who 
 thumps his fist so hard upon that worthy's hat that 
 Mottel shakes from head to foot; he begins to shriek 
 in such terror that Shmeril advances toward the men 
 with the Scroll, his hands opened menacingly. 
 
 "Tfrrr! No marching! No singing! No danc- 
 ing, except with Shmeril! . . ." 
 
 Whereupon there springs up, as if from under the 
 ground, Sholom the "Gentile," a broad-chested, gi- 
 gantic fellow, — ^with a stubby, powerful neck and a 
 face covered with fierce-looking hair and big bushy 
 eyebrows, — ^he works for Chayim the commissioner 
 on the wagon and takes the part of a Gentile in the 
 Purim plays, whence his sobriquet. He, too, is drunk 
 and has complaints regarding the apportionment of 
 honors. 
 
 "R-r-right you are, Shmeril!" he manages to say; 
 and what he cannot get through his mouth he ex- 
 presses with his hands. "To-day is Simkhis Torah, 
 isn't it? They feed me with the recitation of the 
 curses, don't they? Then I'm entitled to a real scroU 
 to-day, ain't I?" 
 
 "Of course!" corroborates Shmeril, thunderously. 
 "Well, what are you standing there for? Back to the 
 Holy Ark with the Scrolls! Get a move on, now! 
 
66 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 . . . They don't want to? Come on, friend Sholom, 
 just roll up your sleeve! . . ." 
 
 And once again he expectorates upon his pahns. 
 
 Confusion reigns. The Jews carrying the Holy 
 Scroll dash toward the Holy Ark, and soon Shmeril 
 helps himself to a ScroU. 
 
 "Let Reb Shmeril son of Abraham arise to the first 
 procession," he sings out. 
 
 Then he gives a Scroll to Sholom the "Gentile" and 
 both of them dance oflF with the sacred parchments, 
 stamping so with their heels and shouting so loudly 
 that the walls of the edifice tremble and the rest of 
 the celebraters are infected by their rejoicing, even 
 those who were angry with them; they place their 
 hands upon one another's shoulders, the children and 
 their flags mingling with the older people, and they 
 turn about and dance beard to beard, shoulder to 
 shoulder, and sing so loudly that the very air catches 
 fire. . . . 
 
 Suddenly Shmeril seizes Mottel and imprints a kiss 
 upon his shoulder. 
 
 "I know all your tricks," he asserts with enthus- 
 iasm. "And maybe you're not the sweetest-voiced 
 cantor, so may I know good fortune, devil take your 
 father! . . ." 
 
 Later, when Shmeril left the synagogue, it was al- 
 ready pitch dark and the rain was falling hard. 
 
THE REJOICING OF THE LAW 67 
 
 From the next street came the sound of song and dance. 
 Shmeril took up the song and dance amid the 
 rain and mire. One foot slipped deep into the 
 mud and he hastened to pull it out, but his boot 
 refused to move, as if some one were holding him 
 there in the mud. . . . He pulled again and again, 
 at length withdrawing it minus the boot and the rags 
 with which it was wrapped about. So he let down 
 his bare foot into the mud, administered a sound scold- 
 ing to the recalcitrant boot, and as a group of singing 
 Jews happened to pass by, he tore the boot up from 
 the swampy soil, cast it over his shoulder and toddled 
 off after the merrymakers, one foot bare, to sing and 
 dance in the downpour in honor of the Rejoicing of 
 the Law. 
 
AUTUMN 
 
 /^N the morrow after the Rejoicing of the Law, 
 ^^ gone is song, gone is dance, gone is the festive 
 spirit of the village. The sky is gray and spiritless. 
 The street is submerged under puddles and mire. 
 Just before dawn the rain has ceased to fall, but now 
 it is again in the air, and before long it will be pour- 
 ing anew. From the woods there comes the moaning 
 of the autumn wind and the dying groans of the 
 trees. On the market-place, under the eaves, which 
 have been dripping rain since yesterday, sit the ven- 
 dors near their tables laden with loaves of bread, 
 doughnuts, dainties and kvass; they sit there huddled 
 in large shawls, waiting and waiting to make a sale. 
 The men and women vendors, garbed in winter jackets 
 and overcoats, sit in the doors to their booths and 
 look sorrowfully out upon the deserted square. Here 
 comes a peasant in a winter coat and wet, muddy 
 boots, with an empty sack in his hand. All of the 
 hucksters dash forward to meet him, with the lanky 
 Mirke in the lead ; they fall upon him from all direc- 
 tions, and once more, as before the solemn holidays, 
 
 68 
 
AUTUMN 69 
 
 they tear him from one to the other, curse one an- 
 other and fight for him, — even Mottel. ... By this 
 time he has laid aside his shawl. Now he is no longer 
 afraid of catching a cold, and will not put on his 
 shawl until the month of Ab.^ Now he is no longer 
 the fervent cantor, the spokesman with the deep soul, 
 but the abject, poverty-stricken shopkeeper, the am- 
 bassador of his family's stomach, in plain words, and 
 he calls the peasant to him with as much rivalry as 
 the others. Only when Mirke scratches his hand, 
 drawing blood, does he release the peasant, for the 
 
 Jew of B fears the sight of blood. ... He 
 
 clutches his hand and presses it to his side with a wry 
 face. 
 
 And a few moments later all is peace again. The 
 shopkeepers sit in the doors of their stores and look 
 sadly out upon the square. From Mottel's place 
 comes the soimd of his voice. He is telling some- 
 body there the story of Rothschild's daughter, who is 
 half human and half sow — (this particular bit of gos- 
 sip was imported into the village by Chayim the 
 commissioner from the city shortly before the Feast 
 of the Tabernacles, — Succoth, — and it was the talk 
 of the town). — Now Mottel is discussing it and at the 
 same time explaining who Rothschild is, and how 
 many kingdoms he has stored away. 
 
 The rain, which has been hovering in the air, begins 
 
 ^ July-August. 
 
70 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 to descend. It whistles ominously in its course, slap- 
 ping upon the eaves, upon the little roofs of the shops, 
 upon the roofs of the dwellings. The puddles quiver 
 and seethe beneath it. And when a cart rides through, 
 the thick mud crunches beneath the wheels and squeaks 
 with moisture. . . . 
 
 The Jewish goats take refuge in the entries. The 
 hens scamper under the ovens, — only the old ones 
 paddle about in the mire. . . . 
 
 The children have returned to the seclusion of the 
 cheders, and their voices rise sadly and lazily into 
 the rainy outdoors. 
 
 Suddenly the beU of the Polish church begins to 
 toll. Somebody has died. Ding-dong-dong! — And 
 the tones of the bell mingle with the rain, with the 
 wailing of the forest, with the groaning of the trees, 
 with the cares and the troubles in all hearts, and the 
 village is so dreary, so dreary after the merry Re- 
 joicing of the Law. . . . 
 
 Outside Chayim the commissioner's house stands 
 his wagon, in which his "Bulanke" is harnessed. He 
 is getting ready to drive to the city, about thirty 
 versts ^ from the village, after supplies for the 
 shops. Twice weekly he drives to the city with orders 
 from the stores. On his wagon lie small hides, hog 
 hair and a sack, which a certain village dealer is 
 sending to the city. Chayim, a Jew past middle age, 
 
 ^ A verst is equivalent to .6629 of a mile. 
 
AUTUMN 71 
 
 with a white beard, in a wide overcoat, comes out of 
 the house accompanied by three women, and they 
 are soon followed by Shmeril the cobbler and Sholom 
 the "Gentile." 
 
 The women's heads are covered with kerchiefs 
 knotted behind. Two of them, elderly ladies, are 
 shopkeepers, and are journeying to tlie city together 
 with Chayim upon a personal quest for supplies; the 
 third is Shmeril the cobbler's daughter, Shoshke, who 
 is traveling thither to engage as a domestic. Only 
 her large, black eyes are visible through the ker- 
 chief, — and her diminutive, turned-up nose. 
 
 Says Sholom the Gentile: 
 
 "Well, ladies, no delay. Into the wagon, now! 
 With two birds like this it won't be a cold journey, ha, 
 Shmeril?" 
 
 Shmeril is much affected, however, and when his 
 daughter has taken her place in the wagon, he ap- 
 proaches her and says: 
 
 "Remember, now, Shoshke, what I told you. Take 
 good care of your hide. In a big city there are a 
 great many wicked creatures. You're only a young 
 filly; so, if you should meet a fresh fellow, run away 
 from him, give him a kick that'll send him to the 
 deuce. A curse on his father!" 
 
 And suddenly he flew into a rage, as if he beheld 
 before him that fresh fellow who had cast an eye 
 upon his daughter. "Grab a stone and smash his 
 
72 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 skull for him. ... Do you hear what I'm telling 
 you? See, Shoshke!" He beat his breast. "In 
 case . . . God forbid . . . Oy! . . ." He pressed 
 his lips tightly together, shook his head and pointed 
 his fists at her. "It will be all up with me and you! 
 I'll send you to your grave. . . . Remember, 
 Shoshke!" With his bare, grimy hand he dried his 
 eyes. — "Well, go in the best of health. Let's kiss 
 again! . . ." 
 
 And he gave her a farewell kiss. 
 
 The wagon with its human burden gives a start and 
 begins to creak and crunch through the mire under 
 the rain. Shmeril remains rooted to the spot, gazing 
 after it with sorrow-laden eyes and scratches his head. 
 Suddenly he bursts out: 
 
 "Reb Chayim! Reb Chayim!" 
 
 The wagon comes to a halt. Shmeril runs after it. 
 
 "And your mother died the fifth of Tammuz,^ so 
 don't forget to burn a light upon the anniversary of 
 her death. . . . Here! — " He took from a hide- 
 purse another quarter of a ruble. "Maybe you'll 
 need it! , . ." 
 
 The wagon makes a new start. For a few moments 
 Shmeril stands motionless, gazing after it, then he 
 goes back into the house opposite, — a tavern, — for a 
 glass of brandy. 
 
 1 The tenth month in the Hebrew calendar, corresponding to parts 
 of June and July. 
 
XI 
 
 WINTER 
 
 A LL night long fearful cries had been borne over 
 -^^ the village from the direction of the forest. . . . 
 A frightful struggle was waged there in the darkness. 
 With a wild howl the autumn wind wrought destruc- 
 tion on every hand, tearing the leaves from the 
 branches, shattering the nests of the birds, squeezing 
 the last drop of sap out of the grass blades and an- 
 nihilating the last vestige of green life. The trees 
 could not withstand this attack of the angry wind; 
 they bowed and groaned in despair. The half-dead 
 leaves fell to the ground almost noiselessly, mingling 
 with other leaves that had already died, which whirled 
 about in the gloom hither and thither upon the dying 
 grass with a dry rustle. All life lay writhing in 
 fright and confusion. . . . Then the raging wind tore 
 out of the woods and made an assault upon the village, 
 uttering a soul-chilling howl. It knocked at the shut- 
 ters, climbed to the roofs, crept into the chimneys and 
 shrieked there with long, long, hair-raising yells. . . . 
 And when the children in their beds heard these cries 
 they were seized with terror. They suddenly re- 
 called all the tales they had heard about spirits and 
 
 73 
 
74 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 demons, reincarnations and goblins, and it seemed to 
 them that these miworthy spirits were howling in the 
 gloom. Somewhere a woman thought of a departed 
 one whom she had known intimately, and from fright 
 she began once more to whisper the prayer "Hear, 
 Israel," and pressed the child who was sleeping at 
 her side close to her breast. . . . 
 ; And the next morning, when the village awoke, it 
 was very cold in all the houses, and the roofs were 
 covered with a layer of hoar-frost. The roofs had 
 been torn off the tabernacles that had been left stand- 
 ing since the holidays. The mud on the streets had 
 hardened into jagged ruts, and it was hard to walk, 
 as the dirt was covered with a film of ice that looked 
 like dust-laden glass. . . . And suddenly from some- 
 where or other came a flock of crows flying with their 
 kra-kra, spreading over the roofs, the yards and the 
 gardens, opening their wings, swaying their bellies, 
 their heads, circling all around, and cawing in wild 
 triumph over dying nature. 
 
 Smoke began to curl up from the chimneys. The 
 shopkeepers left their houses, carrying brasiers. 
 
 The snow was falling. . . . Between heaven and 
 earth a gigantic white veil lay hovering. Wherever 
 the eye could reach, it encountered this tender, silent 
 fluttering of the white veil. Below, a downy white- 
 ness; above, a downy whiteness; on all sides, a downy 
 whiteness. . . . The market-place and its booths re- 
 
WINTER 75 
 
 ceded behind this white veil and looked through it, 
 as if through snow-covered windows. 
 
 The hill and the forest are visible only from the 
 market-square. They hang there like a huge white 
 cloud, upon which gray silhouettes have clambered. 
 . . . The black Polish church peers through the 
 white mesh and hides, peers through once more and 
 then returns to concealment. It seems that all the 
 dwellings as far as the Polish cemetery have somehow 
 or other bent over and huddled together under the 
 snow, and the spirals of smoke that rise from the snow- 
 capped chimneys, huddle likewise together, weaving 
 themselves into the downy web. . . . The Polish 
 cemetery with its tombstones and monuments has al- 
 most entirely disappeared behind the white veil; only 
 here and there stands out against the hill the silhouette 
 of a snow-covered tree or a high, snow-mantled monu- 
 ment with its golden letters, as if some Polish noble- 
 man with white hair and gold buttons has risen from 
 his tomb and is gazing down upon the village which 
 once resounded with his glory. . . . And there, be- 
 yond the cemetery, where the village boundary is, 
 the heavens and the earth blend so closely that one can 
 make out only a wall of whiteness. . . . 
 
 The village is hushed. There goes a shopkeeper 
 on his way from the square. Like a gray shadow he 
 moves through the white veil; around his neck is 
 
76 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 rolled a large kerchief; he is bent over; both his 
 hands are shoved into the sleeves of his overcoat; 
 his footsteps are not heard on the soft, downy carpet. 
 He disappears somewhere behind a gate. And from 
 that house over there issues a Jewish shopwoman in 
 a sooty cotton kaftan topped by a kerchief. With 
 both hands she is carrying a brasier filled with glow- 
 ing coals, just taken out of her oven, and is hurry- 
 ing to her shop. Snowflakes fall into her brasier and 
 the coals begin to hiss: Sh-sh-sh-sh! 
 
 Suddenly the silence is rent. A jangling of bells is 
 heard. It is the police-sergeant on his sleigh, riding 
 by as if on a soft carpet. ... A few moments later 
 come strains of song from a drunken Pole. A peasant 
 emerges from a house, in a coat and bast shoes; he 
 shakes his legs; his head and the warm winter cap 
 upon it are lowered to his breast. He brandishes his 
 arms about and sings in a melancholy time: 
 
 Volga, dear river deep, 
 
 I'm coming to you; 
 Volga, dear river deep, 
 
 I'm coming to you! 
 
 The snow stopped falling during the day and by 
 nightfall a frost had set in. The heavens were fiery 
 red and yonder it was set as if in a wonderful mother- 
 of-pearl. The houses with their snow-mantled roofs 
 seemed flattened. From the chimneys the smoke rose 
 
WINTER 77 
 
 straight and pink, as if long, pink ribbons were wind- 
 ing their way upward. . . . The market-place and its 
 booths seemed bathed in a red glow. The cross at the 
 top of the Polish church glistened and the snow-cov- 
 ered hillock behind the woods sparkled, too, with all 
 manner of gleams, as if bedecked with jewels. 
 
 There runs a Jew in a fur-coat, with the collar 
 turned up, to the synagogue, to be in time for the 
 evening prayers, and the snow sings under his 
 step. . . , And yonder a crunching of snow is heard ; 
 peasants appear, with their small horses, dragging 
 along sledges laden with wood, hay, and produce in 
 sacks. The rivers have frozen over and given them 
 a straight road. The hearts of the men and women 
 shopkeepers grow lighter. Merry lights twinkle from 
 the booths. A din arises from the square. . . . And 
 now the moon has sailed into view. The village be- 
 comes bright and white. The hill behind the wood 
 sparkles more than ever. The white roofs shimmer 
 beneath the moon; the white street, too, glitters. . . . 
 
 The children come running out of cheder with 
 hoods, with all manner of tatters wrapped about their 
 ears, in kaftans and old, patched coats, in woolen 
 boots, in their father's or their older brother's shoes, 
 and begin to dance upon the snow wherever the drifts 
 are deepest. Shlayme, the wild creature, who studies 
 Hebrew with his father at home, where the cheder 
 is situated, runs out, too, with his little gang of chums. 
 
78 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 composed of youngsters who study under his father, 
 numbering some ten in alL He runs out dressed 
 just as he had been sitting in the room, — in his broth- 
 er's kaftan and in his father's old boots; he squats 
 upon the snow, stretches out upon his back, full 
 length, and impresses his figure upon the ground. 
 This is called "making a little man." The other 
 urchins follow suit, and soon eleven "little men" lie 
 upon the grotmd, one next to the other. 
 
 "Fellows!" cries Shlayme. "Let's make a 
 granny!" 
 
 "A granny! A granny!" comes the noisy chorus. 
 
 And the eleven children attack the work with glow- 
 ing enthusiasm. With their bare hands they gather 
 snow and roll it into a ball. Their fingers get cold, 
 and they have a stinging sensation under their nails, 
 but much this concerns them! Soon a huge mass of 
 snow has been piled up and Shlayme sets gleefully 
 about making the granny. Now she is completed; 
 a tall mound of snow with a head on top, which shines 
 under the moon. The children commence to shout: 
 "Eyes! Give 'er eyes!" Shlayme dashes into the 
 house and soon returns with pieces of coal. He sticks 
 two lumps in the side of the snowy head and one in 
 the middle; now the granny has eyes and a mouth, too, 
 and the gamins are content with their work. They 
 join hands and commence to dance in a circle around 
 her, raising a joyous tumult. In the midst of the 
 
WINTER 79 
 
 merriment it occurs to the wild creature that he will 
 put a hat on grandma's head, whereupon he pulls the 
 hat off one of the children who happens to be stronger 
 than he. The child thus assaulted throws himself 
 upon Shlayme and pushes him against the granny, 
 into which his head sinks. And Shlayme begins to 
 howl: "Ma-a-a-ma! Oy, Ma-a-ma!" The children 
 vanish in all directions. Shlayme manages to extri- 
 cate himself from the "granny," and as he rises, the 
 snowwoman's head and eyes and mouth are scattered 
 over his shoulders and his hat. 
 
 "Wait, wait! I'll shorten your years for you!" — 
 he shouts whimperingly; then he feels a piece of 
 snow under the collar of his kaftan and begins to 
 wail anew: "Oy, Ma-a-ma-a!" and dashes into his 
 house. 
 
 Life was easier for the village in winter. The 
 peasants came oftener. Whence it happened that a 
 Jew would taste a piece of meat during the middle of 
 the week. And at Chanukah, when the festive can- 
 dles burned in every Jewish home, and the grown-up 
 boys and girls played "okke" at a kopek a game, — 
 and the children played "goren," in many houses 
 there arose the savory odor of pan-cakes and goose 
 cracklings. 
 
XII 
 A SAD SABBATH 
 
 THE village rested. It was a Saturday afternoon, 
 a few weeks before The Feast of Esther (Purim). 
 Nobody strolled along the streets, and even the goats 
 remained in the entries. Outside the frost nipped 
 everything. The sky flamed like the frozen cheeks 
 of a healthy maiden. On the hardened snow played 
 green gleams. The Sabbath villagers sat in their 
 homes, — the fathers with their skull-caps on, the 
 mothers with their Sabbath cloths over their heads, 
 the daughters with their long tresses braided with rib- 
 bons, but not so neatly dressed nor with such shining 
 coxmtenances as on summer Saturdays. They missed 
 the warmth of the sun, the verdure of the woods and 
 the warm, meaningful glances of the young men. 
 Folks drank tea from the earthen jug, looked into a 
 holy book, recited psalms, read aloud from the "Great 
 Light," and many a maiden, in company with a girl 
 chum, read one of Shomer's or Blaustein's novels, a 
 couple of which had blundered hither from the city 
 and passed from one girl to the other until the leaves 
 were tattered; and once in a while a young man 
 
 would get hold of it, too. Almost every girl in the 
 
 80 
 
A SAD SABBATH 81 
 
 village, indeed, had read these novels a couple of 
 times and once it happened that a few pages from 
 one of the romances went astray, — and from the most 
 interesting part of the tale, at that, where the young 
 man endowed with every virtue declares his love for 
 the young woman endowed with every virtue, — where- 
 upon Mirke's oldest daughter, Leah, red-headed Leah 
 with the freckles, repeated word for word the missing 
 pages of the novel, and one of her chums, who had 
 a good handwriting and could even write a Russian 
 address, — a maiden who was reckoned as most highly 
 educated, — wrote it out and pasted it into the book. 
 
 On this particular Saturday afternoon Mirke's i^' 
 home was filled with sadness. A letter had come 
 from their son Chayim-Beer, who had for several 
 months been serving as a soldier in some Polish city. 
 Shlayme-Itsye read the letter aloud with tears in his 
 voice. At the table sat Mirke, wringing her hands, 
 shaking her head, weeping and murmuring: "Oy, 
 my son! Oy, crown of my head! Oy, my great af- 
 fliction!" Old Avrom-Layzer sat there, his white 
 head and his pointed skull-cap lowered upon his flow- 
 ing white beard, listening to the letter and sobbing. 
 Red-headed Leah, in a coat, sat with her jaws pressed 
 against her hands, which were propped against the 
 table. She looked into her father's face and her 
 nose twitched. Shlayme, the wild creature, lay back- 
 upward upon the warm oven-bench and likewise lis- 
 
82 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 tened to the reading of Chayim-Beer's letter. Even 
 the younger children, who were sitting upon the bench 
 above the stove, maintained silence and earnest faces. 
 
 "It's very bad here in Pluzhbe," read Shlayme- 
 Itsye. "Things have reached a climax. Especially 
 for a Jewish soldier, who is not looked upon very 
 kindly. Parents, have pity on me. Send me at least 
 a couple of rubles per month. If not, things will be 
 terrible." 
 
 Mirke's lamentations broke out, louder than ever. 
 
 "I'll pawn my very flesh and send it to him! Oy, 
 my son! Oy, my heart! Crown of my head! My 
 great aflBiction! . . ." 
 
 Shlayme-Itsye, too, burst into sobbing, and red- 
 headed Leah wiped her eyes with her sleeve. But 
 oM Avrom-Layzer slowly raised his hoary head, mur- 
 muring as he swallowed his tears: 
 
 "Nu, nu, my children. It's Sabbath . . . Sab- 
 bath. . . . Don't disturb the holy day. ... It is not 
 allowed. . . . Oh, woe is me, woe is me. . . •" 
 
 He arose, took a psalm-book, sat down in a comer 
 near a window and began to chant. Shlayme-Itsye 
 put on his old cat's-fur coat, wound a warm scarf 
 about his eyes and left for the synagogue. Mirke 
 took the Yiddish Pentateuch, and began to read from 
 it softly, while the tears rolled one after the other 
 down her reddened nose. Then old Avrom-Layzer 
 left for the synagogue, groaning feebly. Shlayme 
 
A SAD SABBATH 83 
 
 jumped down from his perch, threw a kaftan over 
 him, wrapped a red cloth around his ears and fol- 
 lowed the elders to the house of prayer. Layke sat 
 down upon the oven-bench, took down her youngest 
 sister, six-year-old Channele, from the oven, sat the 
 child down upon her lap and began to tell her a 
 story in a distracted voice. The other children, too, 
 listened to Leah's tale. 
 
 "Once upon a time, long ago, there was a princess, 
 and she was as beautiful as all the seven suns, and 
 as good and pious as queen Esther. And a prince 
 fell in love with her, and he, too, was so handsome 
 that nobody could look into his dazzling face. So 
 once there came an ogre, with one eye in his fore- 
 head, and looked upon the princess, and he was smit- 
 ten. And he cried out: 'Princess, princess, marry 
 me!' She was frightened and hid in a high, high 
 tower. But the ogre came and stole the princess 
 away from the tower and took her off to his 
 cave. . . ." 
 
 "If I could only get to my mother's grave I'd run 
 over to it and pour my heart out," came the sudden 
 interruption of Mirke's voice. Leah grew silent. 
 But when the children urged her to continue the 
 tale, she resumed the story in a very low voice and 
 told them how the prince discovered the princess in 
 the cave, how he married her. "And they lived hap- 
 pily ever after." 
 
84 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 Later Mirke went to the synagogue. Three chums 
 came to Leah, their heads covered with kerchiefs. 
 They all sat down upon the warm oven-bench and one 
 of them, Mottel's oldest daughter Chayke, — a buxom 
 maiden with chubby cheeks and black eyes, and the 
 same whom the Gentile from the grease factory had 
 one Saturday, in the woods, pinched in the breast, 
 saying to her, "What a pretty girl!" — ^began to talk 
 about Rothschild's daughter, who was half human and 
 half pig. . . . 
 
 "She'll get a sweetheart just the same. . . ." 
 
 "I wish I had her money, as surely as she 
 will. . . ." 
 
 "With that pig-like snout of hers? . . . ." 
 
 "Her father's millions will cover her snout." 
 
 "I should say so. . . ." 
 
 "I wish I had such a rich father. . . ." 
 
 "In that case, it wouldn't worry me a bit if I were 
 as ugly as she," chimed Leah. 
 
 "With a pig's face? Are you crazy?" asked 
 Chayke. 
 
 "And if you're so good-looking, what sort of sweet- 
 heart has your beauty brought you?" retorted Leah 
 enviously. "How much of a dowry will your father 
 give with you? What kind of sweethearts do you 
 imagine we'll all catch?" 
 
 "What do you mean, 'what kind of sweethearts'? — 
 Sweethearts. . , ." 
 
A SAD SABBATH 85 
 
 "Where are they?" asked Leah, yearningly. 
 "Who even turns around to look at us?" 
 
 "Fie! Let but appear the destined one, and in a 
 jifFy the trick is done. . . ." 
 
 Leah sighed. Th'e other girls sighed, too. 
 
 Then they began to speak of a couple of novels 
 by Shomer or Blaustein, which they had read several 
 times. They discussed the heroes and the heroines, 
 and every one of ihem placed herself in the position of 
 the heroine, who was in love with the handsome hero, 
 and they conversed dreamily . . . until Chayke be- 
 gan to sing in the same dreamy mood, at first softly, 
 then in louder tones: 
 
 A good-for-nothing passes along the street, 
 
 Knows not a word of learning. 
 In idleness he spends his days. 
 
 Doing only what's forbidden. 
 
 The other girls joined in the chorus fnd the song 
 echoed with longing. 
 
 Leah suddenly burst out: 
 
 "If only a good-for-nothing would come acourting 
 us, — an ogre, a demon, a devil-may-care who! . . ." 
 
 And they all burst into laughter. 
 
 Somewhat later Mirke returned from her devotions. 
 Leah's companions departed. Then Shlayme-Itsye 
 and old Avrom-Layzer came back, closely followed 
 by little Shlayme. 
 
86 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 They all sat down to the closing meal. Mirke 
 wept as she ate. "God knows what he's eating there 
 now!" Shlayme-Itsye and the old man intoned the 
 Sabbath songs, and stifled tears were audible in their 
 voices. And now came the ding-dong from the 
 Polish church, — ding-dong, ding-dong, — reverberatr 
 ing through the village. . . . And in this ringing all 
 heard the clamor of their souls. 
 
 Little Shlayme recited his prayers hurriedly and 
 again ran off to the synagogue. A wintry dusk hov- 
 ered about the brass hanging-lamps there. Men sat 
 in the comers chanting the Psalms; around the high 
 tile-oven were grouped others: one with his coat-tails 
 gathered before him and his paunch thrust forward, 
 another rubbing his back against the oven. Mottel, 
 too, was there, with his back to the warmth, with both 
 tails of his coat held in his hands, telling a story, as 
 was his wont. Shlayme was fond of listening to 
 his tales, especially in winter, when it was too cold to 
 play outdoors. So he, too, approached the oven. 
 
 "Now, when the wealthy Rappaport married off' his 
 daughter, he made her a wedding-gown of bank-notes, 
 and after the ceremony he gave a banquet, and every 
 poor man present went over to the bride and tore 
 off a bank-note," Mottke was saying. Shlayme's eyes 
 nearly popped out and his mouth opened wide in 
 wonderment. 
 
A SAD SABBATH 87 
 
 "I would have torn off a whole side!" cried Shmeril 
 the cobbler, 
 
 "You're a coarse soul, anyway," retorted Mottel. 
 
 "Well," rejoined Shmeril. "Did they rip apart 
 the whole gown? Down to the last bank-note? Was 
 the bride left with only a shimmy on her back? 
 What?" 
 
 "Are you crazy? You may be sure that imder her 
 gown she wore another." 
 
 "And maybe two," offered Shmeril. "She's got 
 plenty, what? They've got enough. Oy, if I only 
 had a real fortune, — I'd make my daughter a wed- 
 ding-gown of ten-ruble notes, of twenty-fivers, — as 
 true as I'm a Jew, — and distribute it among the 
 poor! . . ." 
 
 "Yes, — a poor man is always charitable." 
 
 "Welli let me, for instance, wish to become a char- 
 ity-giver. What can I give?" insisted Shmeril. "A 
 plague! If only I had Rothschild's wife's ear-rings. 
 They say they weigh a whole forty pounds." 
 
 Mottel started. 
 
 "Forty pounds? What are you talking about, you 
 fool? They'd pull her ears off with their 
 weight. . . ." 
 
 "Why ask such foolish questions, Mottel, when it 
 concerns such a wealthy woman?" replied Shmeril, in 
 deep earnest. "You may depend upon it that they 
 
88 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 were made by a good workman. Maybe they're hol- 
 low." A din of laughter arose. Whereupon Shmeril 
 spat out: 
 
 "What are you laughing at? Don't you believe 
 me? I don't tell any lies, you rascals, a curse on your 
 fathers! They have the gall to laugh at me! . . ." 
 
 He walked off in a huff. 
 
 Shlayme ran ofiF to a circle of urchins who were 
 squatting in a corner telling stories about lay saints,^ 
 demons, spirits and ogres, and brought the news that 
 Rothschild's wife wore ear-rings that weighed a whole 
 pood. . . ? 
 
 The synagogue grew dark. A man peered through 
 a window. "The stars are out already!" Then came 
 a slapping against the reading-desks. "Evening 
 prayers! Evening prayers!" 
 
 "And He, the Merciful" . . . began the congre- 
 gation. 
 
 1 "Lamed-vovniks.'' So named from the Hebrew letters "lamed" 
 [1] and "vov" [v], whose numerical equivalent, when they stand 
 together, is thirty-six. 
 
 ^ Russian weight — 40 potmds. 
 
XIII 
 
 THE FEAST OF ESTHER 
 
 T^HE village was celebrating its Purim feast. The ^ 
 J- lights of the lamps in the Jewish homes danced 
 merrily about. The tables were arrayed in fresh 
 cloths and around them sat fathers, mothers and chil- 
 dren, in holiday attire, sending festive gifts to friends 
 and relatives and receiving gifts likewise, — oranges, 
 sugar-cakes, a flask of raisin-wine and so on. And 
 soon "Ahasuerus" entered in his golden crown, and 
 "Haman," who sufi"ered retribution on the very spot; 
 and when the Purim players left, there entered Sholom 
 the Gentile, garbed in a peasant's coat and bast shoes, 
 with a harmonica in his hands, and gave a song and 
 dance. Outdoors, spring was already in the air. 
 The snow was melting, and the streets were filled with 
 water. The sky looked warmer and more friendly, 
 it seemed. From time to time came the merry twit- j 
 tering of a bird. ""' 
 
 On that night Shlayme was the happiest child in 
 the world. His father, the Hebrew teacher, sent holi- 
 day gifts to his patrons, and Shlayme delivered them. 
 So he ran along through the melted snow clutching a 
 
 89 
 
90 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 plate covered with a piece of cloth; the water splashed 
 under his feet and his little soul, too, splashed within 
 him for joy. He dashed into a brightly iUuminated 
 house where the family was gathered around the fes- 
 tive board. "My father sends you this gift!" And 
 he removed the cloth from the plate, showed the 
 orange and the couple of cakes, had a honey-cake 
 thrown on to his plate, received two kopeks from the 
 head of the house for his trouble, covered the plate 
 again and — off he flew over the snow. . . . 
 
 Into one of the houses he was immediately followed 
 by Sholom the Gentile with the harmonica, who 
 stamped one of his bast shoes upon the floor, spread 
 his legs wide apart, squatted down, and jumped up 
 at once. Then he began to play upon the harmonica, 
 to sing in Russian and twist about, marking time with 
 his shoes. 
 
 Open the gate, 
 
 Poor granny is coming. 
 
 Without a shirt. 
 
 Without a waist. 
 
 And a wallet full of crumbs. 
 
 The town instructor happened to be present, — ^the 
 tall fellow with the tufts of hair upon his cheeks and 
 his jaws, — and he raised a shout: 
 
 "Good heavens! He's playing havoc with Russian 
 grammar!" 
 
 Little Shlayme, however, was not of this opinion. 
 
THE FEAST OF ESTHER 91 
 
 He forgot altogether on what mission he had been 
 sent, and when he beheld Sholom dancing he chimed 
 in: 
 
 Open the gate, 
 
 Poor granny is coming. 
 
 But when Sholom had received his pay and gone 
 off, Shlayme came to himself. "My father sends you 
 this gift," and he tore the cloth off the plate. On his 
 final visit, however, he encountered bad luck. Hav- 
 ing received two kopeks for his trouble and emerged 
 upon the street in high feather, he was pursued by the 
 recipient's little son, with whom he had fought a 
 bloody battle the day before. The son attacked him, 
 and Shlayme found himself in serious straits, — in- 
 deed, in a critical position. In the first place his 
 hands were occupied with the plate wrapped in the 
 cloth. That difficulty, however, might have been over- 
 come. For Shlayme might have tripped his opponent 
 with a well-placed kick. But how could he have the 
 heart to do this to a chap whose father had just 
 lavished two kopeks upon him? That would be the 
 height of ingratitude. . . . So, when Shlayme felt 
 the first blow, he commenced to exhort in the following 
 manner: "I ask you as a friend, Bertchik. ... I 
 don't wish to fight with you. . . ." But Bertchik, a 
 pale, lean youngster with black locks overflowing his 
 temples, lowered his head, showed his teeth, glowered 
 from distended eyes and edged up to him with his 
 
92 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 thin hands outstretched, and spoke with anger through 
 his clenched teeth: 
 
 "Why did you beat me up yesterday? Why did 
 you beat me up yesterday?" 
 
 "I ask you as a friend, Bertchi . . ." 
 
 Before he could finish he received a resounding 
 slap on the cheek that silenced him. The assailant 
 took to his heels. Shlayme followed him with a 
 glance of fury. 
 
 "Cholera enter his bones!" he muttered, as he 
 solaced himself with the thought: "Wait! You just 
 wait till to-morrow!" 
 
 He continued on his way with an angry countenance. 
 Suddenly, however, he caught sight of Sholom the 
 Gentile with an army of gamins tagging at his heels; 
 he forgot Bertchik and the slap, ran home, left the 
 plate of dainties there and was soon capering through 
 the slush like a frisky young bull, running after 
 Sholom with the other children, into the very houses, 
 singing with him: 
 
 Open the gate, 
 
 Poor granny's coming. . . . 
 
XIV 
 
 SPRING 
 
 IVnTH the approach of Passover the Jewish homes 
 ' '^ began to bustle with cleaning, washing, scrub- 
 bing and scouring. And the^ sky, too, overhead, 
 cleansed and washed itself, as did the wood on the 
 hill. ... It was as if secret portals opened in the 
 heavens, permitting issue to streams of warm, golden 
 light, which drove the snow-white clouds across the 
 azure vastness, like icebergs over tke deep blue sea. 
 It seemed that a mysterious flame under the earth 
 melted the snow, sending it streaming across the vil- 
 lage lanes. From the hill that was mantled by the 
 forest, and the knoll on which the tombstones and 
 monuments now stood spangled with gold dust, rivu- 
 lets came rushing down, while sunbeams bathed within 
 the flood. Now and then a solid mass of snow was 
 loosened from the hillside, being dashed to bits at the 
 bottom. . . . Here and there a bit of naked soil, dark 
 and fat, peeped through the thawing snow, as if the 
 earth desired to reveal a glimpse of its powerful body 
 to the sun, so as to awaken its lust for creation even 
 more strongly. . . . The trees on the hill emerged 
 
 93 
 
94 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 from their snowy garb. They had not yet awaked 
 completely from the deep, icy slumber; but they were 
 arising, and stretching toward the sun. The secret 
 of creation hovered over them, — ^the spirit of resur- 
 rection was in the air, — the soul of existence. . . . 
 
 From the landowner's yard just beyond the village 
 a flock of doves arose. They circled above the wood 
 and then cradled themselves in the air. One of them, 
 with pinkish wings, performed some antics there. 
 Now it flew with its head pointed earthward, its pink 
 wings outspread, and now turned somersault, lifted 
 itself higher still, rocked a moment in the air and then 
 turned itself over several times in succession. An- 
 other dove, with a blue belly and white wings, tried 
 to imitate the first, whirling about faster and faster; 
 it seemed they were vying with each other to please 
 their mates. 
 
 On the roofs of the houses, which were still moist 
 from the snow that had been removed, and from whose 
 eaves the water fell in a downpour, there was a merry 
 dance of birds to the accompaniment of gay twitter- 
 ing. . . . 
 
 Large pools obstructed the streets. The market- 
 place was over-flooded. Before the houses were 
 placed plank-bridges, over which women with their 
 skirts raised high, men with gathered coat-tails, and 
 maidens with their fathers' roomy boots made their 
 uncertain way; but on everybody's countenance shone 
 
SPRING 95 
 
 springtide, — the warmth of Nature's holiday and of 
 their own holiday, which was to arrive that day in the 
 village. 
 
 Shlayme, like the other youngsters of the place, 
 worked hard to-day from early morning. He ran 
 to the bath with the Passover vessels to have them 
 purified. Then he ground the matzo in a huge wooden 
 mortar, helped carry the cleansed bedclothes out of 
 the house and in again, fetched sand for the newly 
 scrubbed floor, brought the stones with which the 
 oven was to be scoured, and even helped burnish the 
 candlesticks. To-day he was unusually good and 
 obedient. Not a curse did he receive on this day, 
 whether from his older sister Leah or even his mother 
 Mirke, and his father Mayshe-Itsye the Hebrew 
 teacher went so far as to give him an approving pinch, 
 saying, "That's the way, my good little Shlayme. To- 
 day you're the kind of fellow you should always be!" 
 It was the sun that made Shlayme so good, — and 
 even more than the sim it was the thought that to-night 
 he would quaff wine and mead, eat Passover cracker- 
 meal balls, and that to-morrow and for the whole week 
 of Pesach he would play "nuts" with his com- 
 panions. ... 
 
 The roads were suited to neither sleighs nor carts. 
 The freshets had sunk the small wooden bridges that 
 lay across the ditches on the road to the village. The 
 few peasants whose business took them thither waded 
 
 y 
 
96 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 up to their waists in the flooded trenches, and from 
 that position pulled along their horses and their 
 sleighs. In the stream by the Jewish graveyard swam 
 white ice floes. The water reached on one side of 
 the hill where the shepherd in summer used to pasture 
 his sheep, and on the other it made its way into the 
 young forest, whence it poured over the road to the 
 fence of the Jewish graveyard. 
 
 Over the flooded road, with a loud splashing and 
 splatter, trudged Chayim the commissioner's "Bula- 
 ner" and his cart. Old Chayim and Sholom the Gen- 
 tile, with their coat-tails high in the air, pushed in 
 under their girdles, and their cotton pants drenched, 
 walked at the side of the path over narrow strips of 
 snow that were left here and there. When the cart 
 approached that part of the stream where the road was 
 entirely submerged, they began to circle about the 
 Jewish cemetery, clutching at the fence as they did so. 
 Suddenly a loud splash was heard, as if a heavy 
 object had fallen. The wagon was deep in the water; 
 its wheels were barely visible, and "Bulaner" was 
 submerged up to his belly, casting his eyes in this 
 direction and that with fright, neighing stertorously 
 and heaving about between the shafts. 
 
 "Tfru!" exclaimed Sholom, reaching after the 
 horse. And in a moment he, too, was up to his girdle 
 in water. 
 
SPRING 97 
 
 Old Chayim was left standing at the fence, raised 
 the peak above his eyes and gazed thus toward the 
 sun, toward Sholom, and at his wagon in the water. 
 Sholom was pulling at the reins and shouting, "Hooy, 
 vioh, Bulaner! Vioh! Vioh! — May flames devour 
 you!" 
 
 The horse pulled forward with all his might, but 
 did not succeed in budging the vehicle; he began to 
 snort and puff loudly, swaying his head this way and 
 that. 
 
 Then old Chayim attacked the wagon, crawling 
 into the water up to his waist and pushing the vehicle 
 from the rear. Sholom shouted louder than ever at 
 the animal, and all at once was seized with rage, 
 bellowing at the horse: "Evil spirits seize your father 
 and your grandfather and your whole line of ances- 
 tors!" — He tugged at the horse so strongly in his own 
 direction that he almost pulled it out of the shafts. 
 
 And when the exhausted Bulaner proceeded toward 
 the village with a heavy snorting, old Chayim and 
 Sholom followed behind the wagon, their boots full 
 of water and their clothes dripping from every spot. 
 
 Sholom burst into merry laughter. 
 
 "A fine ablution. Not so, Reb Chayim? And in 
 Passover water, at that. . . ." 
 
 "I'll catch a catarrh from this, all right," replied 
 old Chayim. 
 
98 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 "What do you mean, — catarrh? Laugh it to 
 scorn! You'll gulp down a good glass of Passover 
 brandy, and it's good-by to catarrh. . . ." 
 
 And again he laughed merrily. 
 
 The spring sun and the mood of approaching Pesach 
 induced this joviality, despite the fact that the water 
 whistled in his boots and he was drenched to the mar- 
 row. . . . 
 
 Under old Chayim's hoary mustache, too, a smile 
 began to form. 
 
 Soon they had reached the village, where, through 
 the open windows of the Jewish homes, they recog- 
 nized familiar faces of women and girls, wan with 
 many labors, yet happy, for they were preparing to 
 receive Passover. On the moimds beneath the win- 
 dows goats were sunning themselves. From the 
 houses came the din of pounding and clapping. 
 Through the streets resounded the noise of frolicking 
 youngsters. Over the pools and runnels played a 
 warm light. Spring was in the air, sowing handfuls 
 of life-seeds about, and wherever they fell, there 
 life burgeoned and awoke. 
 
 Within the space of three weeks life had fully 
 awakened, seething and burning on all sides. The 
 village was already dry underfoot; on the sandy 
 streets romped barefoot children with dirty little 
 faces, and on the mounds sat their mothers. Many of 
 them were mending shirts; a number were darning 
 
SPRING 99 
 
 socks on a glass, and one woman sat with a bunch of 
 sorrel in her lap, sorting it and throwing it into an 
 earthen bowl. Through the luminous, golden atmos- 
 phere wafted fragrant incense, as if invisible flowers 
 were blooming there. . . . The wood, too, was in 
 bloom, and the hillock under it. Everything, it 
 seemed, was impregnated with gladness and the joy 
 of life newborn. Hundreds of birds were twittering, 
 and one might have imagined that every green twig, 
 every little leaf, every blade of grass, filled brimful 
 with the sap of life, was chirping its hymn of joy. . . . 
 The hens in the yards were clucking. The roosters 
 wrangled with one another and jumped upon the 
 hens' wings. Near a Gentile's house a gander was 
 chasing a goose, and if any one dared approach his 
 "lady," he would attack the intruder with strange 
 savagery, thrusting out his long neck and menacing 
 him with his sharp bill. A calf was running wildly 
 around the town, kicking about with her hind legs. 
 A hatless, barefoot Gentile gave hot pursuit, crying: 
 "Tshokh! Tshokh! Tshokh! . . ." The village 
 teacher, — the young man with the tufts of hair upon 
 his cheeks and his jaws, — suddenly seemed to have 
 been convinced that every maiden in the place was 
 a ravishing beauty. And when Mayshe-Itsye's school- 
 room passed by, — ^which is to say, the little students 
 from Mirke's house, — he happened to notice red- 
 headed, freckled Leah standing near the mound. 
 
100 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 whereupon she, too, grew suddenly so beautiful that 
 he felt a strange pang in his heart. She became 
 aware that the "teacher" was staring at her, blushed, 
 and drooped her eyelashes. Then she followed him 
 with her glance and heaved a sigh of longing. 
 
 "Maybe . . ." she thought. "Maybe I'll find a 
 sweetheart at this year's fair. . . ." 
 
 And the village shopkeepers on the market-place, 
 as well as the other Jews of the vicinity, were thinking, 
 too, of the annual fair, which would take place soon 
 after Shabuoth (Pentecost) . Now that Passover had 
 gone by, they were all poorer than before. The holi- 
 day had consumed almost all their savings, and now 
 all their hopes were centered upon the fair. . . . 
 
 The nights were white and warm. The soft light, 
 it seemed, was limiinous with desire. The moon 
 looked yearningly down upon the forest, the fields 
 and the valley ; saw the stirrings of life, the blooming 
 of the verdure. . . . Somewhere beyond the town a 
 bull bellowed savagely, and close by, a nightingale 
 trilled its passionate song. Leah lay upon her couch 
 and thought again, with deep longing: 
 
 "Maybe at this year's fair. . . ." 
 
XV 
 
 PREPARATIONS FOR THE FAIR 
 
 HP HE village prepares for the fair with all the 
 -■- avidity of a hungry man looking forward to a 
 banquet. Young and old alike glow with expectation. 
 A few days before the time for the fair has arrived, 
 its spirit is felt throughout the population; the place 
 teems with excitement. Every house is converted into 
 a hostelry, every home is transformed into an inn. 
 There is washing and scrubbing, tidying and sweep-'' 
 ing, cooking, — as if in preparation for a wed- 
 ding. . . . The housewives stand by the glowing oven 
 with rolled-up cloths, — perspiring, toil-worn counte- 
 nances, shoving in pots and taking them out. The 
 daughters, with their sleeves rolled up as far as their 
 shoulders and their hair disheveled, are busy scaling 
 fish, peeling potatoes, kneading dough. Some of 
 them have their faces or their foreheads adorned 
 with fish scales. Others have flour all over their 
 noses. The fathers with their coat-tails gathered out 
 of the way, fetch water from the well or help their 
 wives and daughters carry things about. There is not 
 an idle hand in the house. Everybody is hard at 
 
 101 
 
102 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 work, everybody is hurrying, preparing for the 
 fair. . . . And if a tot happens to get in the way, 
 its mother curses it, its father slaps it, its older sister 
 thrusts it aside, whereupon it throws itself upon the 
 floor, begins to yell and cry and stamp its little heels 
 upon the ground. The cat scampers hither and 
 thither in confusion, from the windows to its haunt 
 under the table, thence behind the oven, then back to 
 the window and out of it on to the turf. There she 
 remains, coils her tail, turns her head back to the open 
 window, rolls her yellow eyes, listens to the din from 
 the kitchen and shakes her transparent ears, as if in 
 amazement. . . . The goat stands on the threshold of 
 the open door, stares through its silly eyes at the busy 
 persons, and chews away. If some one happens to 
 dart out of the house it catches a kick, withdraws 
 from the door and ceases its chewing. Soon, how- 
 ever, it is back in its place in the open door and re- 
 sumes its rumination, until it is struck by a rolling- 
 pin or a broom, whereupon it retreats helter-skelter, 
 lies down somewhere in the entry or runs out into the 
 yard. 
 
 This is no time for disturbance by any one. Every- 
 body is now seriously occupied, consumed by one 
 thought, one hope; there is talk of nothing else, — in- 
 deed, there is little talk at all. If something should 
 be required from outside, the one who needs it dashes 
 out of the house with strange celerity. And should 
 
PREPARATIONS FOR THE FAIR 103 
 
 one on such an errand meet an acquaintance, or even 
 a friend, there is no time for stopping ; there is only a 
 weary nod, and one runs on, breathlessly, each to one's 
 destination. Folks even sniff their tobacco in a dif- 
 ferent manner. Prayers, too, are recited hurriedly; 
 as to meals, it is superfluous to speak of them. Food 
 and sleep are the last thoughts that occur to the Jews 
 
 of B at such a time. ... 
 
 On the market-place stand Jews with axes, ham- 
 mers and saws, chopping, hammering, sawing away, 
 fixing stakes into the earth, surmounting them with 
 canvas frames, making little stands, open chests, bar- 
 rels, on which they lay out their wares. They work 
 in haste, bending and squirming in every direction, 
 squinting strangely, making queer grimaces and pant 
 for breath. From the booths nearby comes a din of 
 hammers and axes, too; the men and women are ar- 
 ranging the goods they have bought for the fair. . . . 
 A dull confusion fills the atmosphere. . . . The 
 heavy-paunched sparrows who have come to pick up a 
 grain of corn or a wisp of straw hop hither and 
 thither in fright; they fly about with a ceaseless chat- 
 tering, pause upon the roofs of the stalls, on the 
 fences, — first a solitary one, then a second, a third, 
 and a fourth. . . . They turn their heads in every 
 direction, flap their wings, hop about, flit from this 
 spot to that, and stare. ... If there be a hero among 
 them, he spreads his wings and darts to the ground. 
 
104 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 followed by the rest. . . . Hammer and axe begin 
 to bang more loudly than ever; a splinter flies into 
 the air; the crash of a broken plate in an open case is 
 heard; whereupon they take to their wings again, 
 with a frightened chatter. . . . The geese, the duck- 
 lings and the hens that usually run about the market- 
 place, now too flee the spot, banished by the hammer- 
 ing, the tumult, and the unusual activity of the village 
 folk. Even the Jewish goats are afraid to approach 
 the precincts whence issues the wild commotion, 
 where persons are dashing hither and thither, bran- 
 dishing hammers and axes and sticks, which glisten 
 in the sun. . . . The dogs in the yards hear the 
 clangorous sounds and growl. If a dog should come 
 forth from behind a gate he runs off in the direction 
 of the market and begins to yelp, then raises his head 
 to the sky and begins to howl; whereupon other canine 
 voices join him in the chorus, — thin, coarse, hoarse 
 canine voices. . . . 
 
 Nor are the children in the cheders at ease. Some 
 of them, hearing the noises from the market-place, 
 feel their hearts quiver with restlessness, and before 
 their mind's eye rises the vision of the fair. . . . 
 And even those whose ears do not catch the din from 
 the square are likewise aware of what is going on 
 now in the market-place and know that at their homes 
 all is being prepared for the coming fair. They all 
 sit there as if on burning coals, waiting impatiently 
 
PREPARATIONS FOR THE FAIR 105 
 
 for the moment of release. They recite their Hebrew 
 lessons so languidly, so unenthusiastically, that at any 
 other time they would be rewarded with many a slap 
 from the teacher. But on this day their instructor, 
 too, is infected with the universal thoughts of the fair, 
 and he himself would gladly have a look at how things 
 are progressing on the square, and find out whether 
 many new guests have arrived, and whether so-and-so 
 and such-and-such has already come. . . . He, too, 
 looks distraught, and his voice sounds languorous, 
 preoccupied. And he wonders: whether the fathers 
 of his pupils will have a profitable season at the fair, 
 and just how much each of them owes him for 
 tuition, . . . 
 
 The pious rabbi, Reb Avrom, who lives upon the 
 market-place, is also enmeshed in sinful thoughts. 
 He hears the din as he sits there and teaches his class. 
 Through the open windows comes the joyous sound: 
 "Buzz-buzz. . . . Bang, bang . . . buzz, buzz! — " 
 And he recalls that at the previous fair certain Jews 
 became involved in differences and appealed to him 
 for judgment. . . . And he recollects the handsome 
 sum he received from them. . . . And he thinks: 
 "Perhaps this year God will have pity upon me and 
 send me Jews with conflicts to settle." . . . But he 
 catches himself. Good heavens! How can he de- 
 sire controversies to arise between Jews? And he re- 
 proves himself with pain in his thoughts; "Ah, ah. 
 
106 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 how sinful is man." , . . And he begins to recite in 
 a louder voice, to drive all sinful thoughts away with 
 the sound of his prayers. . . . But the din from the 
 market-place comes in louder than ever through the 
 window, as if to spite him. Whereupon the pious 
 rabbi sinks again in thought, no longer hears his own 
 voice, which continues to recite automatically, and 
 thinks: "But if Jews must have controversies, it is 
 better for them to let a rabbi settle the trouble." . . . 
 
 Berel-Itsye, too, the wealthy money-lender of the 
 town, is now exceedingly busy. One after the other, 
 — ^men and women, young and old, — come to him to 
 lend money; this one asks a five-ruble note; the other, 
 a ten, and occasionally some one goes as high as a 
 whole twenty-fiver. Some bring him an article in 
 pawn, others merely a note. And he haggles with 
 each and every one, and scolds everybody; his ap- 
 plicants fawn upon him, give him their sacred oath, 
 but at every loan he makes a sour grimace and heaves 
 a deep sigh. 
 
 At the Jewish graveyard there are lively scenes. 
 From the surrounding towns come women who have 
 
 been bom in the village of B , and who left 
 
 it shortly after their marriage. Some of them have 
 a father or a mother reposing in the garden of the 
 dead. On their arrival for the fair their first visit is 
 made to the graveyard, and they are accompanied by 
 a sister, an aunt, or a grown-up male child. . . . 
 
PREPARATIONS FOR THE FAIR 107 
 
 The warden, dressed in his holiday array, receives 
 them with a holiday smile and leads them to the graves 
 amid the trees of the green, tranquil little world. 
 There the women fall upon the graves with wails and 
 lamentations, speak their hearts out, pray for their 
 husbands, for their children, pray for good business, 
 for prosperity. . . . The men who have accompanied 
 the women hither, weep in their hearts, and recall how 
 he who now lies under the mound looked in life, and 
 the splendid virtues he possessed — for the vices have 
 all been forgotten; they recall that at some time or 
 other they, too, will repose underneath just such a 
 mound, and their souls became so weak, and many 
 of them forget about the meaning of the fair alto- 
 gether. . . . Only the warden strolls among the 
 graves with a tranquil mien and strokes his scraggly 
 beard in meditation. The wailing that comes to his 
 ears moves him as little as the tombstones amid which 
 he saunters, and he is engrossed with the speculation 
 as to how much this woman will give him, how much 
 that one, and whether he will earn as much at this 
 year's fair as at the one a year ago. The previous 
 year he took in no less than two rubles from the women 
 that visited the graveyard. ... If he should get that 
 amount this year, it would not be at all bad. . . . 
 
 Now another woman enters; he recognizes her and 
 runs up to her with a holiday smile and with a friendly 
 welcome and leads her directly to the graves. . . . 
 
108 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 And the more women that come, the louder resounds 
 the lamentation, and the greater satisfaction is visible 
 upon the countenance of the warden as he scratches 
 his scraggly beard. 
 
 And when a woman departs from the cemetery with 
 tear-stained eyes, giving him a few kopeks, he wishes 
 her a happy fair and hopes that he may see her again, 
 a year later, in the best of health. . . . She thanks 
 him and then dashes toward the village, to unpack 
 the wares that she has brought to «ell at the fair. . . . 
 
 Every moment brings a new visitor to town, — a 
 man, a woman, aged folks and youngsters, all in 
 Sabbath attire; and each if them is dragging some- 
 thing along, — each of them looks wearied with the 
 labor, and each looks in the same direction, — ^toward 
 the market-place, as if toward a battlefield. . . . 
 
 Suddenly a band of gipsies appears upon the 
 market-place, as if it has sprouted from the earth. 
 The men are dressed in wide, velvet trousers with red 
 shirts; they are broad-shouldered sinewy fellows, 
 without hats and with curly black hair, dark piercing 
 eyes, swarthy faces, pitch-black beards and sound, 
 glistening white teeth; the women are likewise 
 swarthy, black-eyed, strong and muscular, their red 
 kerchiefs knotted at the nape of their necks, wearing 
 yellowish skirts, raised in a special manner at the 
 front, and barefoot. They walk noisily along, with 
 such a powerful step that the dust rises. from Jheir 
 
PREPARATIONS FOR THE FAIR 109 
 
 feet. As they proceed on their way they brandish 
 their arms, cast looks in every direction and talk in 
 a loud voice in their own cant. The shopkeepers run 
 out of their stalls and follow the band with their 
 glances; the people around the canvas booths cease 
 their clapping and their hammering for a moment 
 and eye the gipsies; heads appear in the open windows 
 of the houses; if a child catches sight of them from 
 afar it distends its eyes in fright and darts back into 
 its house; the dogs scent them and begin to bark; 
 the moment a Gentile of the town beholds them he 
 thinks of his horse. . . . 
 
 And somewhat later there begin to appear vans and 
 vans, — K)ne van after the other. . . . They arrive 
 from the farther towns and villages, and come from 
 every direction, over every road, in rapid succes- 
 sion. . . . There is a jangling of bells, a creaking of 
 wheels, a clatter of hoofs, the snap of whips, and the 
 buzzing of conversation amid huge pillars of 
 dust. . . . 
 
 The vans drive into the same yards in which they 
 put up the previous year; the same landlord and 
 landlady, with the same cordial greeting, as a year 
 ago, receive the same guests as on the year before, 
 help them to carry their luggage in and serve them 
 with the same obsequiousness as the past year. 
 
 And soon the same old samovar is chirping upon 
 jhe bible, a.nd the sajije old questions ^re asked by 
 
110 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 the good-humored guests: "How is everybody?" 
 And the same answer as a year ago is given by the 
 host and hostess: "Well, pretty good, thank God!" 
 And the grown-up daughter hears the selfsame com- 
 pliment: "May no evil eye gaze upon her, your girl 
 is growing to be a perfect beauty!" And she re- 
 sponds with the selfsame bashful smile, and her 
 cheeks blush the same fiery red. And among the 
 guests there are always one or two who make a busi- 
 ness of matchmaking, also, and very soon a con- 
 versation is started upon that topic. 
 
 And at evening, when the sun has already set, most 
 of the village yards are already crowded with wagons, 
 many of the houses with guests. Even at the money- 
 lender's house there are a couple of guests, some of 
 the wealthier dealers from a large city. Guests have 
 even been lodged in the synagogues, — Jewish mendi- 
 cants, who have come from a long distance on foot, to 
 beg at the fair. 
 
 And still folks come riding in to town. . . . More 
 vans, more carriages, more wagons, more riders, more 
 bustle and dust. . . . 
 
 Among the recent arrivals, the most noticeable are 
 the Jewish butchers, and the Jewish horse-dealers. 
 Both have shaved necks and wear red girdles. Both 
 are to be distinguished from the other Jews by their 
 gait and their manner and the general expression of 
 their features. The Jewish butchers possess a cer- 
 
PREPARATIONS FOR THE FAIR 111 
 
 tain savagery, look through distended eyes, create a 
 din wherever they go, speak with arrogance and are 
 surrounded by an atmosphere of loud cries. They 
 produce the impression of proclaiming: "Hide from 
 me if you value your life!" There is more of the 
 wild ox in them, it seems, than of the humble Jew. 
 The Jewish horse-dealers^ are similarly distinguished 
 from their more ordinary brethren by their manner 
 of speech, their gait and their expression. They are 
 more like gipsies, it appears, than Jews. 
 
 Night has fallen. A half moon peers down upon 
 the forest and the village, and the din still sounds 
 and cradles itself upon the bright white night. From 
 all sides people come running, — children, men and 
 women, — ^talking or shouting. On the market-place 
 an unusually large number of lights gleams all about. 
 Around the canvas booths are stirring a crowd of 
 people with lanterns in their hands. . . . 
 
 Gradually the streets become less crowded; the 
 dogs, too, disappear like shadows behind the gates of 
 the houses. The din subsides. The lights on the 
 market-place are one after the other extinguished. 
 The hoarse rattle of keys is heard, and the closing of 
 the shop doors. The men with the lanterns crawl un- 
 der the vans. There they go to sleep beside their 
 wares, — this is their abode for the night. , 
 
 The guests sleep in the houses. Husband, wife and "^ 
 child have prepared places for them. The wife has 
 
112 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 gone to rest upon a little bench, with some old gar- 
 ment of her husband's as a pillow. She sleeps in 
 her clothes, with her shoes on. So, too, slumber her 
 grown-up daughters upon another kitchen-bench. 
 The younger children repose upon the floor, which has 
 been sprinkled with yellow sand in honor of the 
 guests. . . . The husband himself has laid down to 
 doze close by the window, upon an improvised bed 
 made of a few chairs; but he is not asleep; he is 
 listening to the noises outside; perhaps some new 
 guest is driving to his house. . . . 
 
 In his van on the market-place lies the teamster, 
 snoring. Under the shelter stands the horse, chew- 
 ing hay and snorting. From the entries comes the 
 sound of the goats' regular breathing as they lie there 
 asleep. 
 
 The village slumbers. The moon has risen higher 
 above the woods and showers silvery dust upon the 
 hamlet. Somewhere a nightingale is trilling. . . . 
 And somewhat later the creaking of wheels is heard 
 anew, and the ring of hoofs resounds throughout the 
 sleeping community. Now guests are arriving. . . . 
 Out of the houses come men, softly, on tip-toe, moving 
 about like shadows, peering into the white night to see 
 jjwho is riding there. . . . 
 
 The following morning the commotion in the village 
 becomes worse than ever. The din has arisen very 
 £arly and is heard from every direction. The syna- 
 
PREPARATIONS FOR THE FAIR 113 
 
 gogues are filled to overflowing. The beadles run 
 about from one guest to another with merry faces and 
 give everybody a hearty welcome. And to those of 
 the newcomers from whom they expect a generous 
 perquisite they ofi"er a pinch of snuff from their snuff- ^ 
 boxes. Prayers are hastened; everybody is in a^ 
 hurry; there is no time. In the yards of the syna- 
 gogues are ranged the newly arrived mendicants, 
 some with canvas wallets and with staffs, — ^men and 
 women, well along in years and in some cases very 
 aged, — ^holding their hands stretched forth to the 
 passers-by, asking alms. The cheder children have 
 been granted a holiday, so they help the teamsters of 
 the vans, lead the horses to the wells, and scamper 
 about among the vans, between the stalls, and with 
 heated faces they hang on behind a wagon or a van 
 and steal a ride. ... -j- 
 
 With every moment the racket grows louder and 
 louder, , . . New vans keep arriving, new wagons, 
 horse-dealers with a veritable herd of horses, cattle- 
 dealers with whole droves of oxen, newcomers on 
 foot. . . . They throng from all sides in flocks ; from 
 every direction comes a jangling of bells, a buzzing 
 of voices; clouds of dust arise as they fill the yards, 
 the houses, and inundate the village. The market- 
 place is already black with people. The shops, the 
 vans and the tables are not to be seen because of the 
 swarming concourse of heads and shoulders that 
 
114 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 sways hither and thither. The birds have taken refuge 
 on the hill in the woods. The geese, the ducks and the 
 hens have disappeared from the square. The goats 
 are in the yards, tied to the fence. Only here and 
 there a dog yelps in some enclosure. From the chim- 
 neys of the houses rises a dense smoke, as if it were 
 mid- winter. Within, the ovens are going full blast; 
 the women are cooking and baking for the guests. 
 The heads of the homes and their children are per- 
 spiring with exertion. To-day they are working even 
 harder than yesterday. From the open windows 
 comes a din and a stifling odor into the street, — a 
 smell compounded of fried fish, roast meat, tobacco, 
 _1. schnapps, beer, kvass and sweat. . . . 
 
 In one of the houses some gipsies are seated with 
 Jewish horse-dealers, drinking and slapping each 
 other over the hands. In another, some Jewish butch- 
 ers are having an altercation, amid shouting and 
 tumult; they curse one another, and are scarcely able 
 to restrain themselves from coming to blows; their 
 arms tug this way and that, like angry dogs at a 
 chain. In a third house are some Jewish dealers in 
 flax and produce, drinking tea, stroking their beards 
 calmly, wiping off their perspiration with their col- 
 ored handkerchiefs, with their sleeves, with their coat- 
 tails, or with their bare five fingers, and discussing 
 business. And yonder is a Jewish maiden, bent be- 
 fore an old gipsy woman who is examining the girl's 
 
PREPARATIONS FOR THE FAIR 115 
 
 hand; the maiden's cheeks are fiery red and her bosom 
 heaves with intense agitation, until she hears from 
 the fortune-teller's lips just what sort of excellent 
 sweetheart she is destined to find. . . . And else- 
 where, at the height of the commotion, they have told 
 the oldest daughter that she is to expect a visit from 
 a prospective husband. Whereupon she grows con- 
 fused and her arms seem to become paralyzed at their 
 labors. Her father seizes the work from her and 
 her mother begins to look about the house to find some 
 secluded spot where the girl may change her clothes. 
 The house is filled with people, so she sends the girl 
 into her shop, where the Passover tableware is stored ; 
 there she may array herself in her best. So the 
 daughter seizes her Sabbath finery out of the ward- 
 robe and dashes into the little shop in a daze, and 
 her mother's eyes follow her sorrowfully, and her 
 mother-heart is on the point of breaking: "Dear God, 
 let this be the poor girl's happy hour! . . . Send her 
 a husband at last. . . ." 
 
 She would gladly go into the place and help her 
 daughter bedeck herself, and make sure that she 
 appears to best advantage by the time the prospective 
 husband arrives. . . . But orders pour in from every 
 direction: schnapps, beer, tea, food. . . . And her 
 exhausted husband cries out: "What's she stopped 
 over there for?" And her sweating children call: 
 "Mama, come here! Mania, come here!" She 
 
116 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 forgets everything and dashes madly to her husband, 
 to her children, helps them serve the guests, seizes a 
 firefork and goes to the oven, where something is burn- 
 ing, and in the meantime new guests arrive, and she 
 and her husband run to greet them; she tries to smile 
 to them in friendly welconle, but her smile is a weary 
 one. 
 
 In another home one of the Jewish wives is scarcely 
 able to stand on her feet; from under her white head- 
 covering peeps a lock of hair that twists like a snake 
 across her heated face; her waist is unpinned and her 
 skirt, too, is half twisted, with the front part in back; 
 but who has time now for attention to such details! 
 Who in all the village now has time to feel tired? . . . 
 
 It grows rather late. The sun will soon set. In 
 honor of the fair preparations are being made for 
 service in the Polish church. The black doors are 
 already open. Outside stands the priest, garbed in 
 deep black, with his white head and youthful face, 
 gazing with a tender smile upon the streams of people 
 and wagons that flow through the village. 
 
 Now peasants begin to appear with their wives and 
 grown-up children. They arrive from every direc- 
 tion upon their carts and on foot. Some of them wear 
 gray woolen short and wide kaftans with red and 
 blue girdles; others come in long linen shirts and linen 
 trousers, with dusty shoes, or barefoot altogether. 
 The women wear white kerchiefs upon their heads, 
 
PREPARATIONS FOR THE FAIR 117 
 
 and white kaftans with ample, flowered sleeves and 
 bosoms, and a few have skirts with flower designs. 
 And all are bringing something to the fair. Here 
 comes a peasant leading a cow by a rope, while his 
 wife helps along at the rear, goading the animal with a 
 rod; there rides another peasant, with a calf and a 
 sheep tied in his cart. The sheep lies comfortably 
 upon its belly, its head turned toward its back, and 
 looks foolishly about. The calf, however, pulls at 
 its fetters, tosses about hither and thither, tries to 
 disentangle its legs from the rope, utters loud cries 
 and foams at the mouth. . . . And yonder a cow has 
 taken it into its head not to go another step, and the 
 peasant tugs away at the rope with a shower of curses. 
 This is of no avail, so his wife strikes it with the rod ; 
 the animal refuses to move, so the peasant seizes its 
 tail and begins to twist it about immercifully. 
 Whereupon the beast dances off in haste. . . . Peas- 
 ant women go by with fowl in their hands. Others 
 carry baskets covered with hay, containing hanks of 
 thread and yam as well as pieces of linen. . . . Wag- 
 ons filled with geese roll by, and others with ducks, 
 hens and baskets. Others still, with flax. Peasants 
 come by with sacks of flaxseed, com and oats. The 
 shopkeepers rush forward to meet them, crying, 
 "Welcome! How do you do!" And they drag them 
 on to the crowded yards and the overcrowded houses; 
 they drag them and dispute for their patronage, seiz- 
 
118 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 ing the customer by the shoulders, his horse by the 
 haher, harness themselves to the wagon and pull it 
 along, shouting and panting as they go. . . . 
 
 The village is wearied with hard labor. It rings 
 with hundreds of different sounds. The very houses 
 seem to shout through the open windows and doors 
 with human voices. The yards clamor with a wild 
 whinnying of horses and a mooing of cows. The 
 market-place shrieks; the ground groans beneath the 
 stamping of hundreds of feet and hoofs, and the 
 crunching of wheels. Over the roofs there is a 
 raucous din. High over the treetops of the forest 
 upon the green hill there is a resounding tumult. 
 The same tumult sounds over the other hill, high above 
 the tombstones and the monuments of the Polish 
 cemetery. Far over the black church edifice echoes 
 the clamor. Far, far off under the beautiful blue 
 heavens the commotion of the village seems to rever- 
 berate. . . . 
 
 The sun sinks to rest behind the forest. The west- 
 em sky is illumined as if by a conflagration. The 
 crests of the trees seem to have been inundated by a 
 red wave of flame. The hill itself is covered with 
 tints of red and gold. The white canvas vans on the 
 market-place are bathed in a crimson glow, which 
 engulfs the dense crowds of people, the horses and the 
 wagons about the booths. The windows of the Polish 
 church are aflame with a blood-red reflection. The 
 
PREPARATIONS FOR THE FAIR 119 
 
 priest disappears behind the black doors. And now 
 the piercing, metallic booming of the bell is heard: 
 Ding, dong! It echoes over the village and is soon 
 swallowed in the noise of the scene. . . , 
 
 The peasants remove their hats and make the sign 
 of the cross. Their wives kneel, and cross them- 
 selves. Instinctively, the Jews shudder. . . . 
 
 Ding, dong! Ding, dong! Clang! Cling! 
 Clinnng! — And the booming of the bell mingles with 
 the surrounding din. . . . 
 
 The sun has set. The flaming red wave is ex- 
 tinguished. The reddish gold reflections of the 
 church windows have been, as it were, wiped off^. 
 The sky becomes more blue, then paler and paler; the 
 atmosphere turns grayer, then darker. Dark shadows 
 dart about the village, mingling with the tumult and 
 the sounds of the church bell and gather before the 
 approaching night. . . . On the square and in the 
 windows of the houses, little lights appear. . . . 
 
 Later, the moon comes out, and once more the 
 village is covered with silver dust. . . . 
 
 For a long time the noises continue to rise into the 
 bright night. And at a very late hour, after the shops 
 have been locked and the men with the lanterns have 
 vanished under the wagons, the village has not yet 
 gone to sleep entirely. To be sure, the shrieking din 
 has subsided, yet the place is not by any means at 
 rest. An uneasy activity is felt, — a slumbering 
 
120 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 bustle, a somnambulous murmuring. . . . Hundreds 
 of peasants have been forced to spend the night upon 
 the streets, since there is not a place in yard or home 
 into which they may be squeezed. So they have un- 
 harnessed their horses, dragged their vehicles to one 
 side of the road, raised the shafts aloft and tied 
 their horses thereto, and laid down to slumber upon 
 their wagons, or on the grass nearby, near the doors 
 of the shops on the market-place, on the mounds be- 
 fore the houses, in the yard of the church and at the 
 foot of the hill on which the Polish cemetery is situ- 
 ated. . . . 
 
 There lies a peasant with his face toward the moon, 
 a pipe in his mouth, telling the peasants grouped 
 about him how a gipsy deceived him with a horse. 
 He smokes as he tells the story, and spits up to the 
 moon, and curses the gipsy. His listeners give vent to 
 expressions of wonder and all are agreed that a 
 gipsy is worse than the devil. 
 
 Farther on lies another old peasant recounting 
 vehemently the suit that his town is waging against 
 the landed proprietor on account of the woods. And 
 the lawyer has already written documents to the gov- 
 ernor and even more, but it's no use. If the pro- 
 prietor catches one of the village men in his woods, 
 he beats him black and blue and has him arrested, 
 and takes away his horse or his cow. There's no jus- 
 tice except at St. Petersburg. And wise folks say 
 
PREPARATIONS FOR THE FAIR 121 
 
 that if they were to send a lawyer to "Peter," justice 
 would certainly be done. 
 
 "True! True! You must send to 'Peter'! To 
 St. Petersburg," chime the peasants about him in 
 unison. 
 
 A peasant woman is telling a woman beside her, 
 in a mysterious tone, how the devil stole into the house 
 of a young soldier's wife from her town. "Since 
 this woman's husband was sent on service somewhere 
 far off in the Caucasian mountains, — they say it's at 
 the other side of the world, even farther than 'Peter,' 
 — since he went off on duty they say that she's become 
 intimate with our priest's son. They began to watch 
 her and they found out that the devil had possessed 
 her. Sometimes he takes the form of the priest's 
 son and at other times he appears in his own person: 
 with a wide red mouth and with ears on the very top 
 of his head. . . ." 
 
 "Aye! Aye!" gasps the listener, crossing herself 
 in terror. 
 
 A peasant youth sits beside a maiden from his 
 village; she is lying with her face toward him, and he 
 is by no means indifferent to her; he is speaking joy- 
 fully. To-morrow he will buy her some sweet beer, 
 sweet cookies shaped like horses and little people, 
 candies and red beads, and a little ring, — if she'll 
 promise to dance with nobody else but him. 
 
 She laughs, showing her white teeth. 
 
122 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 He edges up closer to her, bends over and whispers: 
 
 "I love you, may flames consume you! . . . 
 You're so beautiful, may wolves devour you! . . ." 
 
 She laughs louder than ever, and turns her back to 
 him. 
 
 He begins to whisper with increased passion and 
 more rapid speech, until he notices that she is snor- 
 ing. . . . Then he becomes silent, looks for a mo- 
 ment through sullen eyes at her back, scratches the 
 nape of his neck, expectorates voluminously, heaves a 
 deep sigh, leaves her and lies down to sleep. 
 
 The horses near the wagon chew their hay and 
 breathe stertorously. Every moment a sound, a cry, a 
 voice is heard. Now from this direction, now from 
 that; now nearby, now from a distance; now from a 
 yard, now from a house. From the wagon comes 
 the cry of a hen who has been startled in her basket. 
 A goose cackles reply. From somewhere comes the 
 sleepy mooing of a cow. To these sounds is joined 
 the weeping of an infant in one of the homes. From 
 all sides comes a chorus of snores, sighs and whis- 
 pers. . . . 
 
 * The fathers of the households are sleeping outside 
 to-night, like the peasants; husband, wife and children 
 have ceded their benches and their places upon the 
 floor to the guests. The wife and the older daughter 
 have gone to sleep in the store, where the Passover 
 dishes are kept. The smaller children sleep in the 
 
PREPARATIONS FOR THE FAIR 123 
 
 loft. The husband really doesn't sleep at all. The 
 year is long; he will have plenty of time to sleep. 
 He gropes around among the wagons in his yard, 
 thrusts a sharp instrument into the sacks and thus ex- 
 tracts oats, com and flaxseed, holds the material 
 in his hand and assays its quality, considering 
 how much it will be worth while to offer the 
 peasant for his produce. As he gropes thus 
 among the vehicles, he feels a cow here, a calf 
 there, and inspects everything that is to be offered for 
 sale. For this Jew is a connoisseur of everything; 
 he deals in all these things. He is very careful not 
 to arouse the sleeping peasant and his wife, who are 
 in the wagon; so he steals about on tip-toe with bated 
 breath. -- 
 
 From the blue, nocturnal sky the full moon gazes 
 down upon the forest and pours out its slumbering 
 beams. The treetops are spun with silver. The 
 green hilltop now is white. White, too, are the vans, 
 the roofs of the shops, the roofs of the houses, the 
 somber Polish church, the backs of the horses and the 
 cattle that are bound to the vehicles, the wagonloads 
 of sacks, the baskets, the sleeping persons upon the 
 carts, under them and at the side of the road, the 
 iron wheels of the wagons, the wide sandy path, the 
 grass — everything is white, as if sprinkled with silvery- 
 powder. . . . 
 
 And thus passes the clear summer night, stirred by 
 
124 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 an all-pervading unrest. . . . Every sound reverber- 
 ates through the luminous nocturnal atmosphere with 
 a strange restlessness. 
 
 And now a cool breeze begins to blow, — the herald 
 of the dawn. The night grows paler, grayer. Gray 
 shadows spread through the village. A damp mist 
 arises. The roofs and the grass become moist. The 
 moon becomes pale and the silvery dust vanishes. 
 The crowing of a rooster is heard, followed soon by 
 another and yet another, from near and far and from 
 all directions. The hens in the baskets upon the 
 wagons begin to stir and flap their wings. The geese 
 cackle nervously. The horses stamp and neigh. 
 
 The moon has set. And now the rim of the horizon 
 is girt with flame. In the trees is heard the chirping 
 of birds. The air grows brighter, the heavens clearer, 
 the hillock greener, — the people, the horses, the cattle, 
 the wagons, the houses, the market-place, become once 
 more visible. The morning star shines in all its 
 brilliancy. Golden bands spread over the heavens. 
 And soon the fiery-red sun has quietly heaved into 
 sight, inundating the hill like a wave of flame, splash- 
 ing the tombstones and the monuments of the Polish 
 cemetery with brightest gold and igniting the cross at 
 the top of the church. Every person and everything 
 in the community begins to stir into wakefulness, — 
 in the houses, in the yards, and in the streets. 
 
 From one of the houses a woman has come dashing 
 
PREPARATIONS FOR THE FAIR 125 
 
 with a basket of doughnuts. One of the peasants 
 near a wagon has summoned her and bought several 
 of them. The woman has taken a few groschen, 
 has spat upon them generously, hidden them in a side 
 pocket and walked rapidly ofif. The fair has be- 
 gun. 
 
 • • • 
 
XVI 
 
 THE FAIR 
 
 TWO hours later the fair is in full swing. Every- 
 body and everything has been transported to the 
 market-place, which from afar looks like a huge, 
 black, animated, squirming, tumultuous heap, upon 
 which everything has been piled and mingled — ^human 
 beings, horses, cattle, wagons, shops and vans. . . . 
 Jewish beards are moving about, amid the gray 
 shoulders of the Gentile peasantry. The black head 
 of a gipsy forms a striking contrast to the hoary 
 peasant woman at his side. The head of a Jewish 
 huckstress, with her kerchief awry, looms up from 
 under some beard and at once merges into a white 
 back. Now appears a horse, which, it seems, is carry- 
 ing on its own head the head of a gipsy woman with 
 her many-colored kerchief; yonder is the shaft of a 
 wagon over a cow's back. Boots and bast shoes be- 
 come confused with other shoes and hoofs. Hems 
 of flowered skirts mingle with the white linen trousers 
 of the peasants. For a moment a white van comes 
 into view and is at once swallowed into the black, 
 squirming, screaming heap. . . . 
 /'And there, in the center of the heap, the commo- 
 
 126 
 
THE FAIR 127 
 
 tion is at its greatest. . . . Business is being trans- 
 acted. . . . The crowd has been waiting all year for 
 this one day. . . . And although for the past few 
 days nobody has slept, or eaten, or rested, none feels 
 hunger or weariness. This is the climax of all ef- 
 forts, the height of the turmoil. . . . 
 
 Jews, both men and women, with flaming cheeks and 
 burning eyes are hard at work among the peasants' 
 wagons, quarreling with each other, like famished 
 persons over a crust of bread, buying and selling oats, 
 flaxseed, flax, hides, mushrooms, hog's hair and 
 the Kke, competing against one another with frightful 
 yells; once the bargain is struck they drag the peasant 
 and the wagonload of goods to the village money- 
 lender's yard, where the money-lender's guests, the 
 wealthy dealers from the city, are standing near the 
 bam, beside a scale with large scoops. They deliver 
 the purchased merchandise to the city dealers, and 
 sometimes they come out the gainers by a quarter or 
 a half ruble per customer, while at others they are 
 fortunate to get back their original investment. . . . 
 
 Having finished their business at the money-lend- 
 er's yard, they rush back to the market-place and re- 
 sume their haggling around the peasant's vehicles, 
 competing with each other anew, cursing each other 
 anew, and once again dragging the peasant and 
 their wagons to the money-lender's yard. Their faces 
 are ablaze, their eyes gleam with thirst, their lips are 
 
128 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 parched, their voices hoarse. Hands and feet, heads 
 wearing caps whose peaks are awry, kerchiefs twisted 
 about, eyes distended, beards, temple-locks and 
 shoulders, — all stir incessantly in every direction. 
 
 The shops are thronged with peasants and their 
 women. Near the vans are Jews and Jewesses, young 
 and old, shrieking, panting, tugging at the peasants, 
 offering them calico, various multi-colored kerchiefs, 
 beads, brass chains, brass rings and other adornments. 
 
 On the tables are exposed for sale cakes fashioned 
 into the semblance of animals, doughnuts, strings of 
 candy wrapped in gold, fringed paper, sweet beer, 
 kvass and kisloshtshi. Peasants are purchasing the 
 doughnuts, cramming them into their mouths and into 
 their bosoms, drinking the beer, the kvass, the kis- 
 loshtshi and biting at black bread, which they wrap 
 around with rags. Yonder stands a group of peasants 
 about a wagon containing a heap of new wheels, and 
 they test the wheels by rolling them over the 
 ground. . . . 
 
 Somewhat farther away some women are inspecting 
 earthen vessels upon a wagon, tapping them with 
 their fingers and listening to the ring, to assure them- 
 selves that the vessel is uncracked. 
 
 Behind a wagon laden with geese stands a peasant 
 selling idols. A man and wife are haggling with 
 him over the price of some of his wares, which they 
 are holding in their hands. 
 
THE FAIR 129 
 
 And yonder speeds a gipsy on horseback. Another 
 gipsy, with a tonsured, hatless head, runs after the 
 horse and lashes the animal with a whip; the horse 
 jumps, kicks his hind legs; the gipsy with the whip 
 strikes again, until the beast dashes oflf at a gallop. 
 At a short distance stand some peasants, prospective 
 customsrs, chaffering about the price; nearby, a couple 
 of Jewish horse-dealers, with shaved necks and red 
 girdles, trying to arrange an exchange with the gipsies; . 
 all follow the rider with their eyes. And soon he re- *^ 
 turns. He dismounts, leads the horse to the peasants, 
 rubs his fist against the animal's jaw so hard that the 
 poor beast shudders all over, emits a snort and turns 
 to one side. 
 
 "Tfrroo! Vasko!" cries the gipsy, tugging at 
 the halter and dragging the horse toward him. He 
 grasps the peasant's hands, sells his goods at last 
 and soon disappears with the other gipsy and the 
 Jewish horse-dealers into the crowd behind the 
 vehicles. 
 
 On one of the wagons is seated an old gipsy woman; 
 she is the center of a group of young men and women, 
 and she is reading their palms. Some of them listen 
 to her prophecies with a most serious countenance, 
 as if she were the priest of their town delivering a 
 sermon; others hear their fortune with beaming eyes 
 and bashful smiles. And one of them, indeed, has 
 buried her face in the ample white sleeve of her 
 
130 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 kaftan and begun to sob most pitifully, wbile the old 
 woman reads her palm. . • . 
 
 The children of the village scamper about the shops, 
 around the vans, the coimters and the wagons; their 
 faces are merry and red with exertion, and some of 
 them are sucking at long, golden candy sticks, at the 
 same time grasping cakes; others are drawing strange 
 sounds from the two-kopek harmonicas at their 
 lips. . . . 
 
 Officialdom is represented, too. Every moment, it 
 seems, the police-sergeant appears from among the 
 vehicles, from behind a van, or around the comer of a 
 shop. His beard is nicely groomed, his eyes wander 
 over the heads of the multitude, and his right hand 
 reposes upon his sheathed sword. 
 
 The crowd, however, is so engrossed that it fails to 
 notice the officer. Only when, because of the dense 
 gathering, the sergeant has to force his way through, 
 and he brushes people aside with his powerful shoul- 
 ders, does the crowd perceive the presence of author- 
 ity, first in their ribs and then visually. No sooner do 
 the men and women catch sight of him than they are 
 seized with confusion, grasp their hats, step back 
 deferentially, allow him to pass, humbly bowing be- 
 fore him and smiling meekly. . . . 
 
 The sergeant, however, makes no reply to this sa- 
 lute. He does not even deign to look down upon his 
 subjects. His distended eyes stare sternly straight 
 
THE FAIR 131 
 
 ahead of him. At a distance he sees the apothecary, 
 standing in the open door of his place. The druggist 
 nods to him. And the high dignitary answers the 
 druggist's greeting by raising his hand to his cap in 
 military fashion. For he feels some slight respect 
 for this fellow. Although the druggist in only a Jew, 
 he often plays cards with the higher officials, — with 
 the captain of police. And again, the police-sergeant 
 often suflfers from stomach-aches and cramps, and 
 the apothecary has numerous cures for these afflic- 
 tions. . . . 
 
 The Jewish village instructor appears in the crowd. 
 He walks along with his nose in the air, with the knob 
 of his cane in his mouth, looking distractedly in every 
 direction. A wagon almost runs him down, and he 
 jumps to one side; he is knocked in the teeth by his 
 own cane, whereupon he pulls it out of his mouth and 
 spits upon his hands to see whether he is bleeding; 
 meanwhile a wave of excited human beings dashes 
 against him and washes him along before it. "A fel- 
 low can be killed here!" he tells himself, and pro- 
 ceeds to a spot where there is less crowding. A Jew- 
 ish horse-dealer comes flying toward him on horse- 
 back, with a whizz and a yelling; the instructor jumps 
 back and stumbles against an old peasant woman, 
 who showers him with curses. He becomes more con- 
 fused than ever. "Better get out of this," he tells 
 himself. At this jimcture he catches sight of the 
 
132 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 druggist, and it occurs to him.that he wiU buy a news- 
 paper at the apothecary's and go oflF to the woods to 
 read it. So he begins to elbow through the crowd 
 anew, when suddenly he notices that the sergeant has 
 approached the druggist Now how's a fellow to 
 have a lion heart and not feel fear in such a moment? 
 A sergeant is a sergeant. . . . Well, he doesn't need 
 the newspaper so badly. It's not a matter of life or 
 death. He'll get the paper to-morrow, . . . 
 
 And he disappears behind the shops. . . . 
 
 Some Jewish butchers with shaved necks and red 
 girdles are standing around a flock of cattle raising a 
 din; one of them, a red-headed fellow, is threatening 
 a black-bearded chap with his balled fist. "You 
 thief, you! Swindler!" The other butchers restrain 
 him, holding his sleeve and his coat-tails. The Jew 
 with the black beard sticks his thumb derisively 
 through his index finger and the next, and points 
 this "fig" at the would-be assailant, who shouts "Let 
 me go! I'll bury him on the spot!" The other fel- 
 low turns his back toward him, lifts his coat-tails high 
 in the air and cries: "Did you see this?" The eyes 
 of the red-bearded Jew glitter like those of an infuri- 
 ated bull; the veins of his neck swell, and he bellows: 
 "Let me at him, I say!" He begins to struggle with 
 the men who are holding him, wildly shaking his 
 head about and kicking madly. . . . He tears him- 
 self free at last and makes a dash for the Jew with 
 
THE FAIR 133 
 
 the black beard; the latter rushes likewise upon him 
 and their hands close in a clutch upon each other's 
 shoulders; they glare at each other through blood- 
 shot eyes, gnashing their teeth as they wrestle. The 
 red-beard speaks: "I'll kill you on the spot!" The 
 black-beard: "Well, well! Try it! . . ." Where- 
 upon they begin to kick at each other, without releas- 
 ing their hold upon each other's shoulders; the red- 
 beard and the gnashing teeth get nearer and nearer to 
 the black-beard, and the black-beard with the gnash- 
 ing teeth gets nearer to the red, as if they are crouch- 
 ing forward to kiss each other. . . . And suddenly — 
 thump! The red-beard shudders, his hat falls to the 
 ground, and soon the butcher with the red beard is 
 himself stretched out upon the sod. He springs up, 
 seizes a shaft from one of the wagons and begins 
 to bellow wildly. Men rush over to him and are 
 once again forced to restrain his fury. 
 
 A crowd has gathered: Jews and Jewesses, children, 
 peasants and their women. ... A shout arises: 
 "Hush! The sergeant!" The butcher with the red- 
 beard cannot contain himself. He struggles with 
 those who are holding him, and keeps on crying: "Let 
 me at him, I say! He wishes to fight- with me, does 
 he? He's looking for more, is he? . . ." 
 
 "Hush, Jews!" cries a Jewess. "The lord with the 
 brass buttons is coming!" 
 
 "What do I care for him!" yells the red-bearded 
 
134 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 butcher. "I'll settle with him myself. One funeral 
 will be too few for him!" 
 
 The sergeant comes running up to the scene with 
 his beard in disarray. The crowd steps back and 
 makes way for him. 
 
 "Hey, what?" demands the official in stem tones. 
 
 The bystanders volunteer information. Two Jews 
 who have come to the fair from the outlying towns 
 have been quarreling. 
 
 "Fighting, too?" he asks. 
 
 "Fighting, too." 
 
 The Jew with the black beard approaches the of- 
 ficer. 
 
 "Gaspodin Police-Sergeant, your grace! He is a 
 butcher and I am a butcher, and we both bought this 
 ox here. So he must pay half and I must pay the 
 other half. Well, he didn't have enough money. 
 Then do I owe him half of the ox, ha, your grace?" 
 
 "That's not my affair. And you mustn't dare to 
 fight hereabouts!" replies the sergeant harshly. 
 
 "And I'll rip his guts out for him!" yells the butcher 
 with the red beard, who has just been released by his 
 friends. "He's, a thief and a bandit!" . . . 
 
 "Quiet!" shouts the sergeant. 
 
 "Jew," counsels an aged Jew of the village, ad- 
 dressing the red-beard, "don't have too much to say 
 to the sergeant. . . ." 
 
 "Sergeant, 'pergeant! ! Fie on the governor him- 
 
THE FAIR 135 
 
 self! I've got a passport!" answers the butcher with 
 the red beard, in Yiddish. 
 
 At these words the Jews of the village look in ter- 
 ror toward the policeman, and the black-bearded Jew 
 rushes over to the official excitedly. 
 
 "Your grace, did you hear what he said? He said 
 he isn't afraid of the governor himself! By 
 God! . . ." 
 
 "Ha, what? What did you say?" And the ser- 
 geant turns to the red-bearded butcher. 
 
 "I've got a passport," replies the latter, now intimi- 
 dated. 
 
 "And did you insult the government?" 
 
 "I have a passport," asserts the butcher, in a softer 
 voice than ever, looking about him with increasing 
 uneasiness. 
 
 "I'm asking you: did you insult the government?" 
 
 "No," stammers the butcher. "I have a pass — a 
 pa. . . ." 
 
 "He did make insulting remarks!" interjects the 
 butcher with the black beard. 
 
 Whereupon a commotion arises amid the Jews and 
 the Jewesses. The idea! To think that a Jew should 
 act as informant against another Jew. . . . But they 
 are afraid to venture these remarks aloud in the 
 presence of the sergeant. 
 
 And when the sergeant turns to them, to the Jews 
 of his acquaintance, with the inquiry as to whether 
 
136 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 the man really made any disparaging statements, 
 some of the crowd sneak off, others shrug their 
 shoulders, and still others shake their heads in denial. 
 Nobody has heard any suchthing. 
 
 The sergeant, however, does not release the Jew 
 with the red beard. He has insulted the government. 
 The officer believes the accusing Jew. And such a 
 thing must under no circumstances be permitted. The 
 culprit must come along with him. Whereupon a 
 Jew with terror in his eyes dashes over to the captive 
 butcher and whispers into his ear: "He wishes you to 
 slip something into his hand; slip him a ruble and 
 let him go to . . ." 
 
 A little while later the sergeant has had something 
 "slipped into his hand," and the Jew with the red 
 beard, together with the Jew of the black beard, has 
 gone off to the Rabbi to have him settle the con- 
 troversy. . . . 
 
 Before the day is more than half over, many begin 
 to leave the village. Out of the yards come vans, 
 carts and wagons with a clatter and rattle, going off 
 in all directions, over all the roads, disappearing be- 
 yond the village in clouds of white dust. 
 
 Now there is more room. 
 
 From afar the market may be easily distinguished, 
 with its vans, its tables and its shops. The people 
 and the horses and the wagons may now be made out 
 with no difficulty. 
 
THE FAIR 137 
 
 The tumult, however, is quite as great as be- 
 fore. . . . Many a peasant and peasant woman is 
 still left in the village, and they set about getting 
 drunk and making merry. People guzzle in the 
 houses, in the yardsj and drink and dance upon the 
 market-place. . . . 
 
 Here and there intoxicated peasants may be seen 
 with filmy eyes, holding flasks of schnapps and little 
 glasses, shouting, cursing, and exchanging affectionate 
 kisses. 
 
 In one comer a countryman is playing upon a 
 harmonica, varying the concert with a song in his 
 drunken voice. 
 
 From another comer come the wild, jolly notes 
 of a kamarinskaya, pouring forth from a violin, ac- 
 companied by the stamping of feet to the rhythm of 
 the dance. 
 
 Yonder at the foot of the green hill from which 
 the forest looks down, merry peasant youths and 
 maidens are whirling in a joyous round. The ample 
 white sleeves of the kaftans and the hems of the short 
 skirts sway and flutter as if blown by a strong wind. 
 
 A drunken peasant with drooping head, hatless, 
 his beard trickling with the saliva that has drooled 
 from his mouth, comes driving out of a yard. He 
 squirms hither and thither on his seat. His bony 
 nag drags along as if she, too, were intoxicated, and 
 can barely hold her head up. The driver has let go 
 
138 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 of the reins and is looking for them, groping in the 
 air, moving his lips and mumbling something in a 
 nasal tone, talking to himself. 
 
 The wheels of his wagon lock with those of an- 
 other, and he receives the blow of a whip across his 
 shoulder; this wakes him from his slumber; he stares 
 around through dull, glassy eyes and licks his lips 
 as if he were smacking them over some dainty dish. 
 Then, when his nag has managed to make a fresh 
 start, he finds the reins, lies upon the seat, face 
 downward, and bursts forth into song with great 
 gusto. 
 
 * The sergeant now struts about the village with his 
 hands folded behind his back; he stops before every 
 house and peeks furtively in through the windows, 
 thrusting in half his beard. Whereupon a Jew or a 
 Jewess comes dashing out of the house with a wearied 
 expression, places one hand in that of the official, 
 and fawningly pats him upon the shoulder. He nods 
 most graciously and one of his hands disappears from 
 his back into a pocket. He proceeds on his way, with 
 his hands folded across his back; again his beard is 
 thrust through an open window of some Jewish dwell- 
 ing, and again a wan-faced man or woman hastens out, 
 and the official once more feels the caress of a hand 
 upon his back. . . . 
 
 By nightfall everybody from out of town had rid- 
 
THE FAIR 139 
 
 den home. The last to go was a drunken, bleeding 
 peasant. . . . 
 
 Of the Jewish visitors, only the two wealthy deal- 
 ers remained at the money-lender's home; they had 
 still before them the work of arranging the purchased 
 goods upon the wagons; there were a few more men 
 and women, who were concluding matches between 
 their sons and daughters. 
 
 The village had suddenly fallen asleep, as if after 
 a wild carouse. It was weary and broken up, utterly 
 without strength. Only now did the men and women 
 in the shops begin to feel an aching in their hands 
 and feet, a heaviness in the head and in the eyes. 
 The children were overcome with a burdensome 
 yearning, like after a great holiday which is followed 
 by long, long, dragging weeks filled with gloom. . . . 
 
 And later, when the moon above the wood gazed 
 down upon the village, it beheld upon the market- 
 place heaps of filth, shattered flasks and glasses, 
 broken axles and grease kegs. . . . 
 
 In the houses, too, there was a superabundance of 
 dirt and disorder. The floors were wet, filthy; in 
 the comers lay fragments of broken vessels, on the 
 table stood plates containing abandoned fish soup, 
 fish bones and heads of herring. The benches were 
 overturned. The people, too, were covered with 
 grime, and their faces, their hands and their clothes 
 were no neater than the floor. . . . 
 
140 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 But they had no strength now to think of cleanli- 
 ness. They were unable to think even of the profits 
 that the fair had brought them. They threw them- 
 selves upon their beds and resting-places with heavy 
 heads and eyes, and fell soon asleep like exhausted 
 beasts. . . . 
 
 Not until the next morning did they calculate their 
 gains. Some very early discovered that they had 
 done better the previous year: that they had earned 
 no less than three rubles more a year before. . . . 
 Others found that the present fair had been a most 
 profitable one indeed: they had earned fully ten 
 rubles. . . . Others still wrung their hands: "Woe, 
 woe! How hard we labored, and what did we get 
 out of it? . . ." 
 
 The money-lender was altogether jubilant. He had 
 made his fifty rubles. Mottel made less this year 
 than the year before; all of three rubles less. His 
 wife sobbed at the news, and he consoled her: "You 
 little goose, you. Can a few rubles make such a 
 difference? We should thank God for what He was 
 pleased to send. Better than nothing." 
 
 The Rabbi, too, realized less from controversial 
 fees than he did on the previous year. So, at least, 
 said the Rabbi's wife to Mottel when she came to his 
 shop next morning to purchase two kopeks' worth of 
 oatmeal. Shmeril the cobbler, on the other hand, was 
 in high spirits. This fair day he had made all of 
 
THE FAIR 141 
 
 three rubles on patches, and on the next morning he 
 had gulped down more than one good glass of brandy. 
 He even treated Sholom the Gentile and a few other 
 good fellows to a glass, slapped them across the 
 shoulders and cried enthusiastically: 
 
 "Ha? If every day were only fair-day, ha? 
 We'd live like noblemen, ha? Ha? Isn't that so? 
 Your health! . . ." 
 
 That same day the whole village knew just how 
 each of its inhabitants had fared. So-and-so was 
 highly elated: his daughter had landed a beau, — ^the 
 son of such-and-such; he was a mighty fine fellow, and 
 had exacted a very small dowry. . . . And some 
 other man's son had made a really excellent match: 
 he had been betrothed to a rich butcher's daughter 
 and was to get a fat dowry and board and lodging 
 into the bargain. . . . 
 
 Other mothers and daughters felt gnawing envy 
 awaken in their hearts, but the fathers consoled them: 
 "Well, well. What of it? Who knows? At next 
 year's fair perhaps God will be good to us, too. . . ." 
 
XVII 
 
 LOVE IN THE VILLAGE 
 
 /^N the morning after the fair all was gladness 
 ^^ in the home of Mirke. In the first place, Mirke 
 had made no less than fifteen silver rubles in her 
 shop on the day before. Secondly, — and this was 
 indeed a stroke of fortune, — a sweetheart had been 
 found for Leah. 
 
 As Leah stood in the shop helping her mother 
 because of the increased patronage brought by the 
 fair, she suddenly caught sight of lame Gedaliah 
 passing by in company of a yoimg man; both of them 
 stopped to look at her. Her heart gave a terrible 
 thump and the little shovel, filled with salt, fell out 
 of her fingers. Lame Gedaliah was a botching 
 tailor, a fellow who made his living chiefly by 
 converting second-hand clothes into new garments, 
 turning them inside out, and by sewing new suits for 
 the children out of their parents' cast ofiF clothes. But 
 he conducted another business on the side: match- 
 making. And this was why Leah's heart pounded so 
 excitedly when she noticed Gedaliah and the young 
 man cast eyes upon her. They walked on, but soon 
 returned. And aU at once it dawned upon Leah that 
 
 142 
 
LOVE IN THE VILLAGE 143 
 
 they were headed for her mother's shop. Her face 
 blushed with flame and she glided over to her mother, 
 sobbing out: "Oy, mama, I'm dressed like a slob." 
 Mirke, who happened to be busy with a peasant cus- 
 tomer, was startled out of her wits. "What? 
 What?" But on noticing the presence of Gedaliah 
 and the young man, she very soon realized that this 
 was a matter of matchmaking. She quickly got rid 
 of the customer, giving him his package of cheap 
 native tobacco, wiped her nose, which was covered 
 with flour, and greeted Gedaliah with a jovial mien: 
 
 "What's the good news, Reb Gedaliah?" And 
 meanwhile she stole a glance at the youth, and con- 
 tinued in even more cordial fashion: 
 
 "My little Leah, blessings upon her, is helping me 
 out to-day. I tell you! She has golden, fairy fin- 
 gers. May no evil eye gaze upon her, she's the most 
 industrious creature in the world. I thought that she 
 was good only for cooking, washing, sewing and such. 
 But she's a wonder for business, too; nobody can 
 equal her at it! . . ." 
 
 "Takes after her mother!" responded Gedaliah, 
 grasping his pointed beard in his fist, pulling at it and 
 smiling, and shaking his head in a manner which 
 Mirke found it very easy to interpret, whereupon she 
 beamed with dazzling radiance. 
 
 "The Lord be praised. I needn't be ashamed of my 
 children. You know that, Reb Gedaliah. . . ." 
 
144 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 Leah stood there in a maze, her cheeks as red as 
 fire. She would gladly have run home, yet some- 
 thing restrained her. She desired to get a good look 
 at the young man, and dare not raise her eyes to look 
 at him furtively. . . . 
 
 The youth, tall, broad and sturdy, with a full, 
 florid, good-natured face, a little black beard and a 
 thick neck, whence it seemed that the very blood was 
 spurting, was dressed in a long cloth coat with flap- 
 ping coat-tails, boots, and a white tie over a black 
 shirt-front. 
 
 He glanced at buxom, blooming Leah from the 
 comer of his eye and it was very evident that she 
 pleased him. He ventured to speak, at last, in a 
 half -embarrassed tone: 
 
 "Do you keep hand-rolled cigarettes?" 
 
 "Certainly!" Mirke hastened to reply. "Leah, 
 my darling, give the gentleman the cigarettes!" 
 
 Leah was startled. Cigarettes? She hurried to 
 her mother's side and whispered: "I can't. . . . My 
 eyes are on fire. . . . I'm not decently dressed. 
 How would I look? . . ." 
 
 And she dashed out of the shop. 
 
 "A pure child. Ashamed of a young man. . . . 
 I'll serve you. How many cigarettes would you like, 
 long life to you?" 
 
 "About ten. . . ." 
 
 The young man lighted a cigarette, went out into 
 
LOVE IN THE VILLAGE 145 
 
 the street and stopped near the entrance to the shop, 
 gazing upon the fair, 
 
 Gedaliah was left alone with Mirke. 
 
 "You understand, of course, Mirke, that this is a 
 chance for a match?" 
 
 "You don't have to put it into my mouth, Reb 
 Gedaliah." 
 
 "It's a blessing from God, I tell you. And he 
 took a liking to your girl at first sight. . . ." 
 
 Some peasants entered. Mirke attended to their 
 wants and returned to Gedaliah. 
 
 "Reb Gedaliah, my dear man, go over to Mayshe- 
 Itsye ; if this should really turn out well, you'll prob- 
 ably catch a good fee. . . ." 
 
 While this was going on Leah was in hiding behind 
 a wagon opposite her mother's store, spying upon the 
 young man with a palpitating heart and drinking him 
 in with her eyes. ' When, somewhat later, Gedaliah 
 issued from the store, she heard him say to the youth: 
 "Don't worry. I'll arrange the match for you. 
 She's a wonderful maiden, a blessing from God!" 
 And now something shrieked exultantly within her. 
 "Oh, mother!" And she scurried homeward. . . . 
 
 That night after the fair had come to an end and 
 Mirke sat wearily in her shop her husband Mayshe- 
 Itsye came in. 
 
 "Well? Was Gedaliah to see you?" queried 
 Mirke languidly. 
 
146 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 "That's just what I came to talk over with you. 
 Really . . ." 
 
 "Yes? . . ." 
 
 He told her that the prospective husband was a 
 blacksmith from a nearby village, and had served in 
 the army. As soon as she heard that he had been 
 in the army she declared then and there that a match 
 with a soldier and an ordinary toiler was out of the 
 question. If he were only a goldsmith, or a watch- 
 maker . . ." 
 
 "But a watchmaker or a goldsmith would not, in 
 all likelihood, care to enter our family," retorted 
 Mayshe-Itsye. "Skilled tradesmen, my little goose, 
 and such folk ask for a large dowry. . . ." 
 
 "And how big a dowry does he ask?" 
 
 "A hundred and fifty rubles would satisfy him," 
 answered Mayshe-Itsye. 
 
 "A bargain, indeed! Where does he come in for 
 such a sum? A soldier and a blacksmith, and has 
 the impudence to expect one hundred and fifty 
 rubles! . . ." 
 
 "A hundred and fifty rubles dowry isn't so much 
 for a husband. . . ." 
 
 "And where are you going to get them?" asked 
 Mirke. 
 
 "What do you mean, 'where'? And where is God, 
 do you think?" he retorted, with devotion in his voice. 
 "For the present we can give him a note and God 
 
LOVE IN THE VILLAGE 147 
 
 will be good. Don't worry. The Lord of the Uni- 
 verse has enough to go round for His people of 
 Israel. . . ." 
 
 "Indeed, if God pleases, He sends fortune. — Take 
 this very day, for example. I made fifteen rubles. 
 So let us trust Him to send us a more respectable 
 match, too." 
 
 "Well, praised and thanked be God for the good 
 news," replied Mayshe-Itsye with pious accents. 
 "God is good. I told Leah the same. But she, 
 the wicked creature. ... I slapped her face for 
 her! ..." 
 
 "You slapped Leah? Then may your hands in- 
 deed fall off! What do you think, — that she's one 
 of your Hebrew pupils?" growled Mirke aggres- 
 sively. 
 
 "Then let her not be so impudent. There I was, 
 telling Gedaliah that a soldier is no match for my 
 daughter, when she interrupts with 'Yes, a match! 
 What sort of a match do you expect, anyway, — Roths- 
 child's son? And if your own son is a soldier, must 
 he bury himself on that account?' Did you ever hear 
 such words from a hussy? Such audacity, — ^to med- 
 dle in our affairs. . . ." 
 
 For a few moments Mirke was silent, lost in thought. 
 Then she suddenly exclaimed: 
 
 "Really, what have we got to be so proud about? 
 Our own son is a soldier, and my father was himself 
 
148 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 a toiler, — a capmaker, — and have we reason to be 
 ashamed on that account? Perhaps the match is a 
 predestined one. . . ." 
 
 "But a blacksmith — soldier," grumbled Mayshe- 
 Itsye. 
 
 "Don't be a horse, Mayshe-Itsye. Leah is by no 
 means a young girl. When I was her age I already 
 had almost three children." 
 
 Mayshe-Itsye heaved a deep sigh. 
 
 "We-ell ... I don't know. . . . Maybe. . . ." 
 
 "How about his family?" 
 
 "He has a mother. She came along with him. He 
 also has a cow and a smithy of his own. And broth- 
 ers in America." 
 
 "You don't say! In America?" 
 
 "In America. Beyond aU the seas. Under the 
 earth. . . ." 
 
 "Do you see. A great many Jews, they say, travel 
 from the four comers of the world to America, in 
 these days. . . ." 
 
 "Such notions folks take into their heads." 
 
 "Gedalicih says that everybody there is a Rothschild. 
 They send money to their mothers, five and ten rubles 
 at a time. . . ." 
 
 "Is that so-o-o? So she has rich sons there? Then 
 it looks as if what I heard in Vitebsk, when I was 
 there a year ago, is true after all. . . ." 
 
 "What was that?" 
 
LOVE IN THE VILLAGE 149 
 
 "That in America even the poorest people have 
 meat and rolls to eat every day." 
 
 "Goodness, how can that be? . . ." 
 
 At this moment lame Gedaliah happened to enter. 
 
 "Don't be too particular, Mayshe-Itsye," he warned. 
 "You're letting a blessing from God slip through your 
 fingers. . . ." 
 
 The conclusion was that Mirke asked him to bring 
 the young man and his mother to her house the fol- 
 lowing morning at ten, if God should spare them all 
 until then. 
 
 And now, which is to say the morning after the 
 fair, Mirke's house bustled with preparations for re- 
 ceiving the groom and his mother. The place was 
 as tidy as upon a holiday; the floor was sprinkled 
 with golden sand; the table was decked with a white 
 cloth. Leah had spent the whole night cleaning up. 
 Mirke was arrayed in Sabbath attire, and had sent lit- 
 tle Shlayme to take charge of the shop, with the ad- 
 monition that he must' in God's name under no cir- 
 cumstances purloin any sweets. On this day Mayshe- 
 Itsye sent his little students back home and put on 
 his Sabbath attire, too. So, too, old Avrom-Layzer. 
 As to Leah, she donned her pink dress, braided a blue 
 ribbon into her red hair and went about as in a dream. 
 The younger boys, who had no shoes, were given a 
 kopek apiece for candy, and were sent out upon the 
 street to play; the two younger girls also donned their 
 
150 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 best and likewise braided ribbons into their hair. 
 At last they came. First, lame Gedaliah with his 
 cane; behind him the groom, followed by his mother, 
 — a tall, well-built old woman with a florid counte- 
 nance, hands as red as beets and a kerchief over her 
 head. For years she had served as housemaid in a 
 large city, at the home of a wealthy family; for the 
 past three years, however, she had dwelt in retirement 
 with her son the blacksmith, on the money sent to her 
 from America by her two sons there. 
 
 Leah now became more confused than ever; her 
 face was a glowing flame. Her mother sat her down 
 beside the groom's parent, and herself took a seat 
 at the other side. Mayshe-Itsye placed a flask of 
 braady and a saucer of preserves upon the table. 
 Then he seated himself near the groom, who was 
 beside old Avrom-Layzer, opposite his mother and 
 Leah. Lame Gedaliah was at the end of the table, 
 and was nodding to Leah's two sisters, who were stand- 
 ing to one side, casting furtive glances toward the 
 groom. 
 
 That fellow, the former soldier, who had met more 
 than one girl in the "big city" in which he had served, 
 now eyed Leah far more boldly than on the previous 
 day, and surveyed her from every angle. She felt 
 his glances upon her and kept her eyes lowered. 
 (/ Then the groom's mother propped her chin upon 
 
LOVE IN THE VILLAGE 151 
 
 her hand, shook her head and spoke loud, that all 
 might hear: 
 
 "She's no weakling, — made for hard work. She'll 
 be able to do plenty of labor. She strikes me favor- 
 ably, my son." 
 
 Leah lowered her eyes more than ever, and the 
 groom smiled good-naturedly. 
 
 Mirke burst forth, with a beaming countenance: 
 
 "Girls like Leah simply can't be found in these 
 days, even if you look the whole world over." 
 
 "She strikes me favorably," repeated the groom's 
 mother. "She's no weakling." 
 
 "And what's your name, long life to you?" she 
 suddenly asked, turning to Leah. 
 
 "Leah," replied the latter, bashfully. 
 
 "And how old are you, may you live to a hundred 
 and twenty?" 
 
 "Just turned eighteen, may she live to a hundred 
 and twenty," came the hasty reply from Mirke. 
 
 Lame Gedaliah entered the conversation at this 
 point. 
 
 "I said eighteen, too. For I'm a friend of the 
 family. I know. . . ." 
 
 "She looks to be a little older," commented the 
 prospective husband's mother. "But perhaps that's 
 her nature. Orre, I'm satisfied with her, my 
 son. . . ." 
 
152 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 And here the groom himself became bold enough 
 to venture a word, in a deep, bass voice: 
 
 "No offense, kind folks, but before we go any fur- 
 ther we must make sure that everything's being done 
 methodically. . . . When it comes to marrying, you 
 must understand . . ." 
 
 He began to brandish his powerful fists, with which 
 he had mastered many a horse while shoeing the 
 beast, and continued to speak: 
 
 "You understand? A bride ... a wife. . . . 
 That's no cat in a sack. . . . You've got to have a 
 talk with her, eye to eye. . . . You never can 
 tell. . , . You understand me, of course? No of- 
 fense, I hope. . . ." 
 
 Gedaliah interrupted with, "Of course, of course. 
 He's right, upon my soul. Leah darling, go out for 
 a little walk with him. Show him that you're no fool, 
 God forbid. . . ." 
 
 Mayshe-Itsye rose to object. 
 
 "What do you call this? Like . . . just like . . . 
 we-eU? Fie!" 
 
 Old Avrom-Layzer, too, shook his hoary head in 
 dissent and grumbled: 
 
 "A burly bumpkin!" 
 
 Leah was thrown into confusion. 
 
 Gedaliah cried out angrily: 
 
 "Reb Mayshe-Itsye, don't be a boor. You don't 
 know the world. He simply wishes to have a con- 
 
LOVE IN THE VILLAGE 153 
 
 versation with her, because that's the way things are 
 done these days. Maybe she has some defect? 
 Maybe she is deaf? Maybe she's a stupid nag, a 
 silly cow, a good-for-nothing? . . ." 
 
 "Hush, hush," counseled Mirke smilingly. 
 "What's all the talk about? I'm a modem woman. 
 By all means let them go out and take a walk, in the 
 best of health, and return in the best of health, and, 
 if it is so ordained by heaven, marry in the best of 
 health. Go, daughter. Don't be ashamed. . . ." 
 
 She thrust her daughter forward from the table, and 
 herself arose, too. The groom likewise stood up. 
 
 "A-akh!" groaned old Avrom-Layzer, shaking his 
 head in disapproval. 
 
 "Well, well, well!" grumbled Mayshe-Itsye, shrug- 
 ging his thin shoulders. 
 
 But Mirke shoved Leah out of the door after the 
 groom, with the parting advice: "Don't be ashamed, 
 litde goose, don't be ashamed!" 
 
 Leah was so upset she could not see her way Jf 
 out. . . . 
 
 Mayshe-Itsye hastened to his wife's side. 
 
 "Shameless one, what do you call this? Do you 
 think they're a pair of peasants?" 
 
 Mirke replied in a soft voice: 
 
 "You blockhead, you. Don't meddle. Can't you 
 see that he's on fire for her, and that his very eyes 
 are bulging out of their sockets? We may be able to 
 
154 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 match her off to him without paying a kopek's worth 
 of dowry, and remember that she's twenty-four years 
 old. Silence, may you be stricken dumb! . . ." 
 
 Then she joined the groom's mother, stroked her 
 shoulder fondly, sat down beside her and asked: 
 
 "What is your name, long life to you?" 
 
 "Mariasha," replied the woman. "And you, long 
 life to you?" 
 
 "Mirke. If it is so fated, we will be relatives by 
 marriage." 
 
 "May the Lord of the Universe send that good for- 
 tune. I like the girl. She's none of your skinny, 
 scraggy creatures like the others that we've been to 
 look over. May no evil eye glance at her, she's a 
 maiden as sound as a tree. There's plenty of hard 
 work in her. . . . What good could a weakling wife 
 be to my Orre? You've seen him. May no evil eye 
 harm him, he can break a horseshoe with his five 
 fingers. . . ." 
 
 "So-o-o? A horseshoe? So? An iron one? 
 Heavens! Do you hear, Mayshe-Itsye?" 
 
 "Why not?" came the retort. "He lost no strength 
 in studying the Holy Law, God be praised. If he 
 had been a Talmud scholar, he'd probably have my 
 vigor." 
 
 "Hush!" cried Mirke, glaring daggers at him. 
 
 In the meantime Gedaliah had helped himself to 
 some brandy. 
 
LOVE IN THE VILLAGE 155 
 
 "Your health! . . ." 
 
 "Long life and happiness." 
 
 Mirke offered preserves and brandy to Mariasha. 
 
 Then Mariasha began to speak of her two other 
 sons, who were in America. It was already twenty 
 years since they had gone thither from the city, where 
 they worked for a tinsmith. To-day, thank God, they 
 were wealthy men, and often sent her money from 
 America. They asked her to come to them, but she 
 was afraid to drag her weary old bones to the devil 
 knew where. She would really like to see them. 
 They had such beautiful little children there. She 
 was simply dying to see her grandchildren, but per- 
 haps it was so fated that she shouldn't. Orre had 
 wished to journey thither, too, even before he had 
 been drafted for service, but she had wept and wailed, 
 until she succeeded in preventing his departure. . . . 
 
 "A fine trick, to drag your bones under the earth," 
 declared Mirke. "We'll have plenty of time for that 
 in a hundred and twenty years." 
 
 "By God!" came from Gedaliah's comer. "I'd 
 just like to see what sort of place this America is. 
 One of my niece's children from Minsk journeyed to 
 that country; he was a pauper there, — a tailor, so 
 they tell me, — and in America he became a rich man 
 altogether, — a manufacturer with a factory all his 
 own. . . ." 
 
 "Yes, they really say," interjected Mirke, "that 
 
156 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 the very poorest people there eat meat and rolls every 
 day. . . ." 
 
 "Akh, akh," commented Mayshe-Itsye as he 
 shrugged his shoulders, "women speak only nonsense! 
 You mere woman, you, — where are your brains? 
 How could you ever believe such folly? Now 
 listen," he declared, with the sing-song of the pious 
 readings, "if he eats meat and rolls every day, what 
 does that show? That he is not a poor man. And 
 if he is a poor man, then he can't eat meat and rolls 
 every day. Fool! . . ." 
 
 "He's really right," agreed Mirke. "A man un- 
 derstands more than a woman, after all." • 
 
 Now Gedaliah chimed in: 
 
 "Who can tell what things are like yonder? Per- 
 haps food grows on the trees over there? . . . The in- 
 structor who teaches my children writing, once told 
 me, that when we have day, it's night in America, 
 and when we have night, they have daylight. Every- 
 thing is just the opposite to what we have. Why, a 
 Jew may become even a policeman over there. . . ." 
 
 "Who can say? They tell all manner of miracles 
 about the country," said old Avrom-Layzer all at 
 once. "Only a short while ago I was told a host of 
 wonders about another country somewhere. . . ." ' 
 
 "Argentina!" cried Gedaliah. "That was several 
 years ago. That plan of Baron Hirsch's. . . . Yes, 
 yes, of course. . . ." 
 
LOVE IN THE VILLAGE 157 
 
 "And to-day — who, what, when?" continued 
 Avrom-Layzer. "They've forgotten that country and 
 they're talking about another. Ah, wherever God 
 sends His aid, there folks eat meat, rolls, and even 
 marchpanes.^ And if the Lord withholds His help, 
 then it's . . . it's . . . bad everywhere!" 
 
 By this time Leah and Orre returned from their 
 walk. Orre's face wore a smile of satisfaction; Leah 
 had shed her embarrassment and felt now un- 
 restrained, her pleasure visible upon her glowing 
 countenance. He was highly pleasing to her, and 
 felt that she was no less agreeable to him; on their 
 stroll to the outskirts of the village they had met girls 
 of her acquaintance, who had stolen envious glances 
 at them. These she had detected. Her soul was 
 jubilant. ... 
 
 The next evening the wedding contract was drawn 
 up and Mayshe-Itsye gave, as dowry, a note for one 
 hundred and fifty rubles, which, he devoutly hoped, 
 the good Lord in Heaven would help him meet on the 
 day of the wedding. . . . 
 
 And on the day following the engagement, when the 
 groom was supposed to leave for home, Leah felt 
 that he was taking her heart away with him, and when 
 he met her alone in the entry, she wept. He under- 
 stood, and placed his arms about her waist in such a 
 
 ^ The English sense of something dainty has become obsolete ; that 
 connotation is still common in Yiddish. 
 
158 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 manner that she all but shrieked. And his kiss, the 
 first kiss that she had ever received from a young man, 
 robbed her of her voice, took her breath away and 
 almost deprived her of her reason. . . . 
 
XVIII 
 
 NEWS OF AMERICA IN THE VILLAGE 
 
 T^HE match with Orre was altogether a fortunate 
 J- one. At the wedding, which was celebrated in 
 Mirke's home soon after the first days of Succoth 
 (The Feast of the Tabernacles) — for such was the 
 groom's desire — Mayshe-Itsye was unable, as may 
 have been foreseen, to pay the one hundred and fifty 
 rubles dowry, for which he had given a note, but the 
 marriage was not interfered with by that contingency. 
 And from America came a gift of no less than a 
 hundred rubles for the bride and bridegroom. 
 
 After the wedding Leah left with her husband for 
 his town, whence she sent her parents letters filled 
 with her happiness. 
 
 Thus winter passed. . . . 
 
 Once — three weeks after Passover — ^Leah and her 
 husband came on an unexpected visit to her parents. 
 They arrived to say farewell. They were going off 
 to America. . . . 
 
 Mirke wrung her hands and broke into lamenta- 
 tions: 
 
 "Woe is me, are you crazy?" 
 
 159 
 
160 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 Mayshe-Itsye, too, was horrified. 
 
 "What does this mean? Can it be possible? . . . 
 Is that Orre's idea?" 
 
 "No, papa, it's my own notion. I persuaded him 
 and mother-in-law to go. He has wealthy brothers 
 there, who ask us to come, and it would be foolish 
 for us to remain here. Must he be a blacksmith all 
 his life? We've already received our tickets from 
 America and we've sold the smithy, too, and every- 
 thing, and we're going to America!" 
 
 In vain were Mirke's weeping, Mayshe-Itsye's ar- 
 guments, and old Avrom-Layzer's entreaties. Noth- 
 ing could avail. . . . 
 
 Then Mirke ram to her mother's grave, and cried in 
 despair: 
 
 "Mother! Mother! Woe is me! Misfortune is 
 me! The crown of our heads, Leah, the light of our 
 eyes, is forsaking us! She is dragging her youthful 
 bones away off to America, woe is me! Mother! 
 Mother! She will have to sail over deep, deep seas, 
 across vast deserts, deep under the earth, woe is her 
 mother! Mother! Mother! Pray to God that He 
 at least bring her there in safety! . . ." 
 
 This was the first time that the graves of the Jewish 
 
 graveyard in the village of B had heard the 
 
 name of America. . . . 
 
 A week later the entire vicinity was astir with the 
 news that Leah, the daughter of Mirke, had gone to 
 
NEWS OF AMERICA IN THE VILLAGE 161 
 
 America with her hushand. . . . The women seated 
 upon turf -mounds spoke of it, the shopkeepers on the 
 market-place and the girls with whom she had for- 
 merly mingled, found no other topic of conversation. 
 Friday, somebody related in the bath-house that she 
 was journeying to wealthy brothers-in-law, who were 
 veritable Rothschilds in America, who dwelt in golden 
 palaces and rode about in golden carriages, and that 
 night, at Sabbath eve prayer, every synagogue buzzed 
 with the news; the next day, when the maidens of the 
 village were seated under the trees in their bright 
 Sabbath dresses, with the colored ribbons in their 
 heads, they did not sing the usual songs, but spoke 
 only of Leah, of America, of Leah's rich brothers-in- 
 law with their palaces and golden carriages. . . . 
 
 "There was luck for you," exclaimed winsome, 
 buxom Chayke, the daughter of Mottel, enviously. 
 "It happens, of course, that a beautiful maiden some- 
 times lands a fortune; but such a — may God not pun- 
 ish me for my words — such an ugly creature with a 
 face like a crow, a red cat. . . ." 
 
 "There, — ^that's just the kind that have all the luck," 
 offered Chyene, Shmeril the cobbler's daughter, the 
 village belle, — a maiden with the face of a young 
 gipsy girl, with thick, black, lustrous braids and 
 charming black eyes that glowed with flame. Every 
 time the sergeant of the village saw her upon the 
 street, he would stop his cart and cry to her: 
 
162 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 "Hey there, Chyene, would you like a ride? 
 Come, ride a bit with me." 
 
 And when she showed her white teeth in derision, 
 answering, in Yiddish, "Ride to hell, will you!" he 
 would burst into laughter, not being able to under- 
 stand what she was saying, would stroke his beard 
 and repeat his invitation: 
 
 "Come, Chyene. I'll buy you cake and candy." 
 Thereupon she would reply in Russian, with a coquet- 
 tish smile: 
 
 "Very well, noble sir. I'U send out my brother 
 Selig, and you'll give him the candy and the sweets 
 for me. . . ." 
 
 "No. You come yourself, Chyene. . . ." 
 
 Then she would bubble over with laughter and go on 
 her way. 
 
 And after he had whipped his horse and the vehicle 
 had started off, he would look back more than once 
 through the cloud of dust that whirled after the car- 
 riage, and cry out: 
 
 "You Jewess! You Jewess!" 
 
 She, too, was envious of Leah's good fortune. 
 
 Among the girls to-day was also Sholom the Gen- 
 tile's oldest daughter, Broche the forelady, a healthy 
 blonde with a pale face, a perk, snub nose and blue 
 eyes, closely resembling a Lettish maiden. For three 
 years she had been working in one of the city stores, 
 and had come for a few days on a visit to her town. 
 
NEWS OF AMERICA IN THE VILLAGE 163 
 
 to see her mother. She was dressed in better style 
 than her companions, and considered herself an ur- 
 bane personage amid a set of provincial girls. The 
 girls all looked upon her with respect, because they 
 knew that yonder in the big city she was conducting 
 a clandestine love affair with a certain clerk, just like 
 a heroine in one of Shomer's or Blaustein's novels. 
 She suddenly appealed to her companions: 
 "Girls, if you'll promise not to let it out, I'll tell 
 you something that nobody in the world knows except 
 me and a certain other party." 
 
 And she uttered the words "and a certain other 
 party" with such a mysterious expression that it 
 seemed they had been whispered out of her blue 
 
 CyCb* • • • 
 
 The girls broke into a goose-like cackle: 
 
 "Oh, do tell us! Tell us! We won't breathe a 
 word! . . ." 
 
 And they edged up closer to her, crawling over the 
 grass on their knees, stretching out their necks and 
 focussing their eyes hungrily upon her lips. 
 
 "First swear that you will tell nobody." 
 
 "May our tongues be paralyzed!" 
 
 "May we not live to speak to our fathers and moth- 
 ers!" vowed others. 
 
 "And may you not live to speak to your sweet- 
 hearts, ha?" demanded Broche. 
 
 "Yes," they chorused. 
 
164 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 "Then remember," she cried, and began to divulge 
 her secret in a hushed voice: 
 
 "Girls, I, too, am going to America." 
 
 "You? ! . . ." 
 
 "Hush, hush! Not so loud!" whispered Broche. 
 "My sweetheart," — she uttered this word with mys- 
 terious tones, — "has wished to make the journey for 
 a long time. As soon as we receive our tickets from 
 there, we'll be off ! . . ." 
 
 A silence descended upon her hearers; they looked 
 at one another in speechless amazement. 
 
 "Remember, now. For the present, not a word, 
 girls! . . ." 
 
 "Not a sound!" they began to assure her from all 
 sides. And every girl felt more respect for her than 
 ever. 
 
 All at once, one of the girls asked softly: "And 
 you're not at all afraid to sail over -the deep seas?" 
 
 And from a second: 
 
 "And is America really under the earth?" 
 
 "I'm sure I don't know what silly things folks 
 imagine in this little village of yours!" replied 
 Broche. "America isn't under the earth; it's you 
 people who are deep down!" 
 
 "True," agreed Chayke, Mottel's daughter. "That 
 is the truth itself, Broche dear. We're all of us 
 buried deep in the earth, here!" 
 
 "And in America," continued their informant, 
 
NEWS OF AMERICA IN THE VILLAGE 165 
 
 "they welcome one of us girls with open arms. It's 
 the girls who receive the dowries, not the fellows. 
 Now take a girl like you, Chyenke, — or like you, 
 Chayke, — or even like you, Roshke, — over there you'd 
 marry nothing less than a Count. They'd fall all over 
 themselves running after you." 
 
 The faces of the three girls she had indicated blazed 
 like a conflagration. 
 
 "Really?" 
 
 "You don't say!" 
 
 "And they actually chase after girls like us?" 
 
 "Yes, and shower you with gold into the bargain," 
 asserted Broche. 
 
 "How have you learned all this? You were never 
 there, Broche?" asked one of the homely maidens 
 who had, indeed, all been off"ended at Broche's failure 
 to include them together with the three she had men- 
 tioned by name. 
 
 "Who then should know? You, perhaps?" re- 
 torted Broche with scorn. "My dear little girl, I 
 know a great many things that you don't. But I'll 
 tell you how I know. My sweetheart's brother-in- 
 law and sister write all these things to him in their 
 letters. My sweetheart's sister married a man there 
 who covers her, as big as she is, from head to foot 
 with diamonds. ... If you could only see their 
 photographs, girls, that they sent from America. I 
 tell you, they live like ki-i-ings! . . ." 
 
166 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 The maidens were all plunged into thought. A 
 dream shone in their eyes. 
 
 And now several young men happened to come 
 walking along. 
 
 Broche called out to them, winking at the same time. 
 
 "Behold the cavaliers! Such long faces on them! 
 Temple-locks, and bits of cotton-wadding stuck in their 
 ears, and snot running from their noses. Oh, mother 
 of mine, I'll faint!" 
 
 "Well, and yours?" asked one of the group. 
 
 "Mine? Aha! Not to be mentioned in the same 
 breath. . . . An up-to-date fellow, a cavalier, with 
 such a bewitching mustache! . . ." 
 
 And Broche passed her fingers across her upper lip, 
 winking as she did so. 
 
 Later, when the young men began to get lively, 
 stealing glances in the direction of the girls, the 
 maidens all arose and left the spot. Somehow or 
 other these familiar provincial fellows had lost all 
 attraction in their eyes. . . . 
 
XIX 
 
 THE FIRST LETTER FROM AMERICA 
 
 T^HE first letter from Mirke's daughter Leah has 
 J- arrived from America, and it is filled with good 
 news. Mirke weeps for joy and hegs her Mayshe- 
 Itsye to read it for her, over and over again. . . . 
 Mayshe-Itsye reads it and is so deeply moved that he 
 keeps pulling at his nose and swallowing his tears. 
 Old Avrom-Layzer bends over toward his son-in-law, 
 with his ear well-cocked to catch the wards, the end 
 of his flowing white beard clutched in his fist; he is 
 careful not to lose a word of the letter, and his coun- 
 tenance glows with an expression of wonderment. 
 Leah's sisters read the letter, too, in agitated voices, 
 and tears of joy glitter in their eyes. Even little 
 Shlayme is seized with the happiness of the occasion ; 
 during the past year he has grown taUer, paler, thin- 
 ner, but he has remained the same mischievous crea- 
 ture as before. And for sheer joy he begins to beg: 
 "Mama, give me a kopek!" And for sheer joy 
 Mirke gives him a kopek at once, bestowing the same 
 largess upon the other children, too. Then she seizes 
 
 the letter and dashes off with a glowing face to the 
 
 167 
 
168 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 market-place, that the shopkeepers may read the won- 
 
 /erful news. 
 And somewhat later Mottel is standing before his 
 store, reading the selfsame letter in a loud voice, 
 with Mirke beside him, surrounded by all the store- 
 keepers and the women who own the market stands; 
 all listen to the letter with mouths agape and eyes dis- 
 tended in wonder. Mirke drinks in every word, 
 smiles with enthusiasm, wipes her eyes and every 
 other moment interrupts Mottel's reading. "Oh, 
 thanks be to God! Do you hear? Well, what do 
 you say to that, ha? . . ." 
 
 And the rest shake their heads, smack their lips 
 and murmur their wonderment. 
 
 "My, my! Ay! Ay! . . ." 
 '' "Why not confess it?" reads Mottel. "Never in 
 my life have I seen what I saw at the home of 
 my brothers-in-law in New York. On the very 
 sidewalk lay precious things such as I only wish 
 you could have on your table for the holidays. 
 It's only too bad that people step all over them with 
 their feet. And there are golden mirrors here that 
 reach to the ceiling. And there isn't a trace of a 
 lamp in all New York. And at night you press the 
 wall, and a lot of moons in glass cases light up, just 
 J„ like on the ship on which we came across. . . ." 
 
 "Well !" interrupts Mottel. "What do you think of 
 that? Ha? . . ." 
 
THE FIRST LETTER FROM AMERICA 169 
 
 "Do you hear?" adds Mirke, and her whole 
 countenance is one smile of exaltation. 
 
 "My, my! Ay, ay!" chorus the listeners. 
 
 Mottel resumes his reading: 
 
 "And the walls here are so red and velvety. I 
 touched one of them, and it's so soft and even, and 
 I thought to myself: 'I hope I had a cloak made of 
 it!' " 
 
 "She knows what's good to have!" called one of 
 the women shopkeepers. 
 
 "And as for eating," the letter went on, "they eat 
 of the very best here. They don't lack even bird's 
 milk! Roast hens in the middle of the week and so 
 many other dainty dishes that I don't know how to 
 name them. . . ." 
 
 "There's a Rothschild existence for you!" inter- 
 jects Mottel once more, continuing to read: 
 
 "And the buildings in New York are so high that 
 even when you turn back your neck you can barely 
 see the roof. And over the roofs there fly machines 
 filled with people, and the people aren't at all afraid, 
 and my brothers-in-law tell me that none of the ma- 
 chines has ever fallen down. . . ." 
 
 "My, my! Heavens! Ay, ay!" 
 
 " — ^And they rented a home for us in which even 
 a count might live. Six rooms in a fine building. 
 And in three of the rooms, on the floor they've laid 
 down a kind of oil-cloth with such nice squares, and 
 
170 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 in the hall on the floor they put a big piece of velvet 
 with flowers painted on it. I don't let anybody into 
 the house, because I don't want them to step on it. 
 Then I've got chairs, a bureau and what not else, 
 which they sent in. It simply dazzles your eyes to 
 look at them. And mother-in-law is living with us. 
 And there's water in our home. All you have to do 
 is turn a faucet and water comes from the wall. And 
 you don't need any lamps, either, for when you want 
 light, you simply turn a sort of screw and you bring 
 a match close to it and it gets light. And there's no 
 oven here, either. When you wish to cook you turn 
 another screw, and pretty soon the stove is hot and 
 you put your pots on top of it and you make the 
 finest dishes. And my brothers-in-law have taken 
 Orre into their iron factory, where they make iron 
 ceilings and stairs for the buildings, and they pay 
 him, thank God, twenty dollars a week. In our 
 money that's every bit of forty rubles." 
 
 "Listen, folks! Just listen to that!" cries one of 
 the wlomen. "I could pinch my cheeks. . . ." 
 
 "Read on, Reb Mottel!" urges Mirke with ardor, 
 drying her eyes. 
 
 Mottel continues: 
 
 "Yes, where was I? 'In our money that's every 
 bit of forty rubles. And later, say my brothers-in- 
 law, he'll get even more.' " 
 
 Mirke can no longer restrain her sobs. 
 
THE FIRST LETTER FROM AMERICA 171 
 
 "Well? Ha? Well?" 
 
 " — I hope to God that I'll be able to send for all 
 of you, and bring you across. And my brothers-in- 
 law tell me that in New York there are a good many 
 Jewish policemen, too. . . ." 
 
 "That's so," cries Mottel. "I heard that long ago, 
 — ^that Jews over there have equal rights!" 
 
 "Really?" asks one. "And they have Jewish po- 
 licemen there, too?" 
 
 "What do you think?" shouts Mottel in reply, his 
 voice ringing with confidence. "Even Jewish intel- 
 ligence-officers. . . ." 
 
 "You don't say!" 
 
 "It would pay to pawn our wives and children and 
 take a trip over there!" jests one of the men. 
 
 "And the men, too!" retorts one of the women. 
 "But I'm afraid Berel-Itsye the money-lender wouldn't 
 advance a groschen on them." 
 
 The rest of the women burst into laughter. 
 
 "Unless the Gentile butcher would give something 
 for them as impure meat," ^ suggests another woman. 
 
 "Shoo, ladies!" exclaims a shopkeeper, and waves 
 his hands at them as if he were driving geese along. 
 
 The laughter waxes louder. Both the women and 
 the men are now guffawing. 
 
 Mirke now stands with the letter in her hand, taking 
 
 ^I. e., not kosher; a pun upon the meaning of impure as referring 
 also to meat not prepared according to the dietary laws of Moses. 
 
 \ 
 
172 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 no part in the general merriment. She feels pro- 
 voked that they should not now be talking of her 
 daughter's good fortime. For a moment she remains 
 thus, then she remarks: 
 
 "And I, fool that I was, tried to keep her from 
 going! . . ." 
 
 Nobody notices her reflection. Out of envy, they 
 all pretend not to have heard anything that she had 
 said. So she approaches close to one of the women 
 with whom she is wont to quarrel aU the year long, — 
 Elke, the daughter of Chaye-Dvoshe, a gaunt woman 
 with a crooked nose, wearing a white bonnet under a 
 red, flowery kerchief, — thinking to herself, "Let her 
 burst with envy!" and she says: 
 
 "What do you say to that, Elke? Such a fool I 
 was trying to hold her back. . . ." 
 
 "You never can tell," replies Elke maliciously. 
 "Maybe your heart told you that she ought not to go? 
 Maybe. . . . Who knows what misfortxme may yet 
 befall her there! . . ." 
 
 Mirke, flaming with rage, almost jumps upon her. 
 
 "Tfu! Tfu! Tfu!" She spits out thrice. "On 
 your head! May it befall your own wicked person! 
 You crooked serpent, you! Burst with envy! Ex- 
 plode with jealousy! Aha! Who's daughter has a 
 husband that makes forty rubles a week? Aha? 
 Burst! Burst! Burst!" 
 
 And she dashes into her shop. Elke replies with a 
 
THE FIRST LETTER FROM AMERICA 173 
 
 volley of curses. The other women set up a clamor. 
 The men hold their sides with laughter, while Mottel 
 cries: "Livelier, Elke, livelier!" 
 
 "Hush! Here comes the lord with the brass but- 
 tons! . . ." 
 
 The sergeant issues forth from the apothecary's, 
 stops and eyes the crowd around the shops. 
 
 And when the sergeant disappears, Mottel cries to 
 one of his neighbors, in a voice breathless with won- 
 der: 
 
 "And in America there are even Jewish police- 
 men. There's no grief of Exile over there. Full 
 rights. . . ." 
 
 For the next few weeks there was talk of this let- 
 ter all over the town, and of the "full rights," and on 
 a certain Saturday morning, when Mottel caught hold 
 of little Shlayme in the synagogue and asked him: 
 "Well, youngster, are you going to sail to America, 
 too?" Shlayme replied, "You bet! I'll be a police- 
 man there! . . ." 
 
 At about this time Sholom the Gentile entered the 
 home of Shmeril the cobbler, whistled mysteriously 
 and held out both his hands. 
 
 Shmerel happened to be holding a shoe in his lap, 
 heel upwards, and his mouth was filled with wooden 
 nails; he stared at Sholom in amazement, removed the 
 nails from between his lips and asked, quietly: 
 
174 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 "What's the matter?" 
 
 "From Broche . . ." he managed to utter in a 
 stifled voice, making a pitiable attempt to smile. 
 "She is . . . phew! . . ." 
 
 Again he whistled and brandished his arms. 
 
 "Well, what about your Broche? Speak. . . ." 
 
 "Sailed for America yesterday." 
 
 "America? Your Broche? . . ." 
 
 "Yes, yes. Broche, my Broche. . . . She fell in 
 love, in the city, with a rascal of a salesman and he 
 turned her head with stories of America, and go try 
 to talk her out of it! . . . I and my wife Gittel rushed 
 to the city, begged of her, wept before her: 'What do 
 you mean by this sudden craze for America? To for- 
 sake your father and mother, your brothers and sis- 
 ters, — the whole world? What do you mean by it, the 
 devil take your father? Haven't you any pity?' . . . 
 But you might as well have spoken to the wall! She 
 went away! And my Gittel came back from the city 
 half dead; she could scarcely drag her feet along. 
 She just left for the burial-ground, to pray at her 
 mother's grave. . . . Oh, may she at least arrive there 
 in safety. . . . Did you ever hear such a tale, 
 Shmeril? It's a terrible blow. Come, let's have a 
 glass of brandy! . . ." 
 
 Shmeril arose, shook out his black apron with his 
 black, grimy hands, and said: 
 
 "Drinking a glass of brandy is by no means the 
 
THE FIRST LETTER FROM AMERICA 175 
 
 most foolish thing a fellow can do! But that you 
 should be sorry to have her go, my friend, — ^now 
 that's folly! I've been thinking this America over, 
 and it seems to me that it's not a bad place to go to." 
 
 "Are you crazy, Shmeril? What are you talking 
 about?" 
 
 "Just what you hear! I have heard about America 
 for a long time, and that it's possible to work your- 
 self up to something over there. And ever since 
 Mirke's daughter Leah went there and sends such let- 
 ters from her place, I can't get America out of my 
 mind. I keep thinking all the time: Shmerel, what 
 will all your striving here come to? You've got four 
 sons and three daughters. The sons — one of them is 
 going around altogether idle until he'll be taken 
 away as a soldier; one is a tinsmith, earns twice noth- 
 ing, not even enough to provide water for porridge; 
 the third calls himseK a dealer, and makes nary a 
 groschen from his business; and the fourth, may the 
 devil seize him! — I taught him the cobbler's trade, 
 and he's as much a cobbler as I am a Rabbi. Every 
 day he catches a blow with the bootleg from me. Is 
 that any prospect for me? Maybe things would turn 
 out altogether differently over there? They say that 
 America is a great country, even vaster than Rus- 
 sia. ... If it was all right for the Jew to travel 
 deep into Russia, why not yonder? . . ." 
 
 "But deep Russia isn't under the earth. . . ." 
 
176 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 "Much that should worry you. . . . Isn't it true 
 that there's bread and something to chew there? And 
 that you don't have to worry about your sons? And 
 that Jews have full rights? And that you don't have 
 to give girls a dowry when they marry? Then who 
 cares whether it's in the earth or under the earth, as 
 long as it's a merry life over there?" 
 
 "And how about my never seeing my Broche again, 
 and her never being able to see me again, and not 
 even my grave, when I die? Ha?" asked Sholom 
 with deep gloom. 
 
 "Well, isn't it possible that you and your family 
 will sail there sometime?" 
 
 "I? You're talking like a fool, indeed, Shmeril! 
 I wouldn't go there even if I knew that I'd get rich 
 yonder. Here in the village my father lived, — ^my 
 grandfather and my great-great-grandfather, may they 
 add to my years, and they lie in our graveyard here, 
 and there I, too, shall lie, in a hundred and twenty 
 years. . . ." 
 
 They entered a tavern and ordered a half-quart. 
 After they had drained the contents, Sholom became 
 gloomier than ever; he beat himself over the heart and 
 sobbed: 
 
 "She was the apple of my eye, and now I'll never 
 see her again. . . ." 
 
 Shmeril, on the other hand, became lighter-hearted 
 
THE FIRST LETTER FROM AMERICA 177 
 
 than before, and suddenly bent over toward Sholom, 
 and whispered a secret: 
 
 "I'm selling my place and getting ready to go to 
 America with my two oldest sons and Chyenke. May 
 we both so truly enjoy long life as I'm telling you the 
 truth. , . ." 
 
 And his words were accompanied by a powerful 
 blow across the shoulder with his black, grimy palm. 
 
XX 
 
 THE VILLAGE WANES 
 
 T^WO weeks later the village again seethed with 
 -'- news from America. Mirke's son, the soldier, 
 had left for America from the city where he had 
 served, and Sholom, moreover, had received a very 
 enthusiastic letter from his daughter Broche, saying 
 that she and her husband were working in a shirt 
 factory and were earning "big .money." Now it was 
 Sholom who ran with Broche's letter from shop to 
 shop on the market-place and to the synagogue, hand- 
 ing it to everybody to read, smiling with intense satis- 
 faction, while the assembled hearers broke into ex- 
 clamations of wonder and smacked their lips. . . . 
 The village was now more than ever filled with dreams 
 of America. Fathers and mothers looked furtively 
 upon their grown-up sons, whispering to each other 
 mysteriously. Chayke, Mottel's daughter, secretly 
 wrote a letter to her former chum Leah, asking her for 
 advice as to whether she, too, should travel thither 
 or not. She gave the letter to Mirke to send away 
 together with her own. And Shmeril the cobbler 
 really sold his home and place of business. . . . 
 
 178 
 
THE VILLAGE WANES 179 
 
 It was a cold, cheerless, rainy day shortly after the 
 Rejoicing of the Law. At the Jewish graveyard stood 
 Shmeril the cobbler before a grave, leaning against 
 a tombstone; close by were his two oldest sons, and 
 the three of them were gulping down their tears. 
 Beautiful Chyenke, with a large kerchief thrown 
 across her shoulders, lay upon a grave and wailed 
 aloud: 
 
 "Mama! Mama! I and your sons Yoshke 
 and Layzer are forsaking you. We are journeying all 
 the way to America, very far from here. Darling 
 little mother! Oh, mother of my heart, intercede 
 with God for us, and entreat Him that your children 
 may not, God forbid, be lost upon the way! . . . 
 
 At these words Shmeril suddenly burst forth into 
 sobs that sounded like the bellowing of an ox; he 
 cast himself prone upon the grave and shuddered all 
 over. Round about moaned the autumn wind, and 
 the trees, from which the last leaves had fallen upon 
 the graves below, swayed and groaned in the rain. 
 
 When Chyenke rose from her mother's grave and 
 placed the large kerchief over her shapely head, 
 Shmeril bent over the mound, gazed at it and was 
 silent for a long time, unable to speak. He could 
 only move his lips. Soon, however, his children 
 heard his choking voice: 
 
 "Zelde. . . . Our little children, our tender little 
 children. ... I told them to go. . . . You under- 
 
180 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 stand our position exactly, don't you? . . . Four 
 sons. . . . What will become of them here? Is there 
 any future for them? And the girls? A dowry? A 
 curse. And one of them is taller than the next. How 
 can a father keep an eye on them? Yonder God 
 will send them husbands, and they won't have to bring 
 a groschen with them. . . . Zelde, let them journey 
 thither in the best of health. Well, how can we help 
 ourselves, you little goose? Not pleasant, is it? 
 What can we do? . . . We must suffer for the chil- 
 dren of our flesh and blood, silly woman! ... Do 
 your best for them there! Win them a bit of luck. 
 And if God will only help them yonder, they'll send 
 money for a new tombstone for you. . . . Zelde, I 
 entreat you, you're their own mother, do your best 
 for them! . . ." 
 
 Two days later, when Chyenke and her two broth- 
 ers were already seated upon Chayim the commis- 
 sioner's wagon, which was to take them to the city, 
 whence they were to leave for America, the entire 
 village gathered about the vehicle. Chyenke kissed 
 all the women and girls farewell. And Mirke cried 
 to her: "Don't forget, my dear little Chyenke, in the 
 name of the Lord, to remember me to my children. 
 I've given you their address!" And Chayke shouted 
 to her: "Tell them in America that I'll soon be there, 
 too!" And from the other maidens came a similar 
 chorus: "Here's hoping to meet you in good season. 
 
THE VILLAGE WANES 181 
 
 in America!" Shmeril alone stood beside the wagon, 
 silent in the midst of the tumult. 
 
 And when his children had once again kissed 
 him good-by, he was still unable to muster a sound, 
 and could only sigh through his nose and bite his 
 lips. 
 
 When the wagon began to move, however, he 
 started after it, running along with uncertain step, 
 suddenly stopping and gazing after the vehicle with 
 moist eyes, mumbling strangely. And when the 
 wagon and his children had disappeared into the au- 
 tumn fog he turned to a group of men and women 
 that had remained nearby, talking about America, 
 stretched forth both his grimy hands and exclaimed 
 in agitation: 
 
 "Maybe . . . ha? . . . Maybe I shouldn't have 
 let them go, ha? Done! . . . They're gone! . . . 
 Too late! . . , Children. . . . Own flesh and 
 blood. . . . Three limbs sundered at a blow. . . . 
 Ha?" 
 
 And with wavering gait and lowered head he walked 
 off. 
 
 Across the heavens wandered spiritless clouds. A 
 cold drizzle began to descend upon the village. Life 
 in the woods was languishing; life in the village had 
 withered. . . . 
 
 Ah, what a celebration there was at Shmeril the 
 cobbler's when he received his first letter from 
 
182 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 America! This occurred two months later; the village 
 was bedecked with snow and the sky overhead glowed 
 red with the frost. 
 
 His children wrote that Broche and her sweetheart 
 had taken them into the shirt-factory, where they were 
 each earning, thank God, more than they had ever ex- 
 pected: Yoshke, seven dollars, which meant fourteen 
 rubles, per week. Layzer six dollars and Chyenke 
 seven dollars, too. At the same time they wrote that 
 Broche and her sweetheart were making even more, 
 and that Leah, Mirke's daughter, was becoming a 
 wealthy woman altogether, because her husband was 
 working for his rich brothers. And Leah's brother, 
 too, — the one that had been a soldier — had advanced 
 to a good position. He too, worked in the factory 
 owned by Leah's brothers-in-law, and was drawing 
 good wages. In fact, people said it was as high as 
 twenty-four rubles per week. 
 
 For sheer joy Shmeril did not work all day. He 
 hxmted up Sholom the Gentile, and after having drunk 
 each other's health more than once, they sauntered 
 off toward Mirke's shop, for they felt that a kind of 
 relationship now existed between her and them. 
 America had created the bonds. Mirke called in Mot- 
 tel and he read the letter for her, whereupon Mirke 
 summoned the rest of the shopkeepers, while Mottel 
 had to read the letter a second time, for the benefit 
 of the entire assembly. Mirke's countenance shone 
 
THE VILLAGE WANES 183 
 
 with exaltation, and she cried out enthusiastically: 
 "Well, ha? Well, ha? Now do you believe that my 
 daughter, long life to her, has become a rich woman 
 yonder?" And Shmeril the cobbler drunkenly 
 slapped every man upon the shoulder, laughing and 
 shouting: "I'm going to sail there, too, with all my 
 family, may you and I so truly live happily!" And 
 Sholom, himself a little the worse for brandy, shouted 
 even louder than Shmeril: "But what do you say to 
 my Broche? And I didn't care to let her go. Ah, 
 the devil take my father and my grandfather!" 
 
 And once again the shopkeepers shook their heads 
 in wonderment, smacked their lips and uttered ex- 
 pressions of amazement, and they were all envious of 
 Mirke, Shmeril and Sholom. Almost every one of 
 them thought to himself: "I ought to send my children 
 yonder! . . ." 
 
 Just before Passover the first money arrived in the 
 village from America. Shmeril received fifteen 
 rubles; Sholom, ten; Mirke, twenty-five, together with 
 a letter from Leah, saying that she was soon sending 
 out two tickets and a little extra money, that Mirke's 
 two other grown-up daughters might come to America. 
 This caused the greatest commotion that the village 
 had yet known, and fanned the flames of enthusiasm 
 for the New World. To the inhabitants of the place, 
 who waited all year long for the day of the fair as 
 the one opportunity of making any money, America 
 
184 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 now appeared in the light of a vast, continuous fair 
 that lasted the entire year. Mottel gave expression to 
 the selfsame idea: 
 
 "Over here our eyes creep out of our heads before 
 the day of the fair comes round again, and the way it 
 seems, over there it's fair-day every day, and people 
 know what money looks like." 
 
 On a beautiful day shortly after Shabuoth (Pen- 
 tecost) the Jewish graveyard once more resounded 
 with feminine lamentations. On one of the graves lay 
 Mirke, entreating her mother with loud wailing to 
 intercede for her two other daughters, who were to 
 venture the voyage over vast seas and endless 
 deserts. On another grave lay Nahum's wife, tear- 
 ing the bonnet from her head, beating upon the mound 
 with both her fists, moaning horribly: "Mama! 
 Mama, they're taking my little Chayke, the crown of 
 my head, away to America!" Further on were three 
 more women, kneeling over mounds and naming 
 America in their plaints, and one of them cursed 
 America with bitter imprecations: "Oh, that 
 America might have been drowned beneath a deluge 
 before it was ever discovered; then my Rachel, the 
 apple of my eye, wouldn't be dragging her youthful 
 bones thither, woe is her mother! . . ." 
 
 The months speed by, one after the other. The 
 years flow by, one after the other. And the living 
 
THE VILLAGE WANES 185 
 
 stream from the village to America still flows along, 
 stronger and more impetuous than ever. One draws 
 the other along, one follows the other — sisters, broth- 
 ers, children, parents. . . . Yonder, in that unknown 
 land, the Jew may prosper; he enjoys full rights; 
 there his children may make a place for themselves, — 
 both his sons and his daughters. . . . 
 
 Here and there upon the market-place stands a 
 closed shop, like a tombstone for the people who lived 
 and labored there year after year. Under the shelter 
 opposite the stores no longer may be seen Rashke 
 the widow before her counter of dainties, Yoche the 
 soldier's wife with her doughnuts, Bayle the crooked- 
 nose with her kvass. They have all gone to join their 
 children in America. There are but few children to 
 be found upon the streets. Rarely may one encounter 
 a grown-up girl. And the young men that are tb be 
 met appear altogether different — livelier, merrier. 
 Here and there a youth has shorn his temple-looks and 
 strolls about with a cane. And when the villagers 
 catch sight of such a fellow, they can tell from his 
 shorn locks and his cane that he is preparing to sail 
 to America. 
 
 A gaunt, tall Jew with a yellow goatee goes about 
 the village, looking distractedly in all directions. 
 Old Chayim the commissioner halts him: 
 
 "Where are you coming from, Zelig? . . ." 
 
 "Just been to the graveyard, Reb Chayim. . . . 
 
186 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 Said fareweU. Who knows whether I'll ever see my 
 parents' grave again?" he replies, gloomily and in a 
 preoccupied manner. 
 
 "When are you leaving?" 
 
 "To-morrow, with God's help." 
 
 He sighs, looks about in all directions, up to the 
 sky and down upon the earth, as if he would like to 
 suck the whole village into his being and take it with 
 him. Then he continues, while a deep yearning rings 
 in his voice: 
 
 "I didn't care to go. I really didn't. It's so hard 
 to tear yourself away from home. True, we never 
 licked honey here, the Lord be praised. But a home 
 is a home after all. My great-grandfather was born 
 in this village. Why, Reb Chayim, it's even hard to 
 wrest a cat or a dog from a home in which it has 
 grown up. Then you can imagine how it is for a 
 man, may heaven pardon the comparison. . . . But 
 what's a fellow to do? My children, long life to 
 them, are over there, and I am drawn to their 
 side. . . ." 
 
 "Yes," answers old Chayim, sighing, "a fellow does 
 feel like being with his children. Without children, 
 you're like a withered tree whose branches have been 
 lopped off and whose leaves have fallen to the ground. 
 But I have no desire to join my children over there. 
 I'm almost seventy, Zelig, with one foot in the next 
 
THE VILLAGE WANES 187 
 
 world. ... If I were as young as you, perhaps I'd 
 go, too. Well, let them be happy, there without me. 
 Thank God, at least, that they are doing well and that 
 they think of me now and then. Every month I re- 
 ceive some money from them, thank God. Well, may 
 you have a pleasant voyage, Zelig. May God land 
 you there safe and sound." 
 
 "Good-by, Reb Chayim. . . ." 
 
 "Wait a moment, Zelig! I have a request to make. 
 I have already written to my son David-Layb about 
 it, as a matter of fact, but it won't do any harm if you 
 call it to his attention again. Tell him not to forget 
 that his father, his grandfather (may he rest in peace) 
 and all our ancestors, were upright, pious Jews, and 
 that he shall see to it, in God's name, that his children 
 be God-fearing Jews as well. Tell him that, Zelig, be- 
 cause he writes me that his children go to school 
 there. . . . You understand, don't you?" 
 
 He shakes his hoary head sadly, and sighs again. 
 Zelig replies, too, with a sigh: 
 
 "I'll surely tell him, Reb Chayim. Good-by." 
 
 "Farewell. . . ." 
 
 A pale little child of six, with his flapping shirt- 
 tail soiled, is standing and holding converse with a 
 little girl of his own age who has black curly locks 
 and large, dark eyes. 
 
 "Etta, aha, I have a brand new suit." 
 
188 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 "Where is it? . . ." 
 
 "In the house. In the closet. Mama says I'U put 
 it on when we get to America, aha! . . ." 
 
 "And my mother'U buy me a new pair of shoes and 
 a new dwess in Amewica," she gurgles. "Itsye, wi' 
 you pway wi' me when we get to Amewica?" 
 
 "Yes. And every day I'U give you a piece of 
 pretzel." 
 
 "And sugar cakes, too?" 
 
 "Yes, sugar-cakes, too." 
 
 "A whole one, Itsikl?" 
 
 "A piece. Here, such a big piece," and he indi- 
 cates the length of the piece on his finger. 
 
 "That's fine." She is content. 
 
 And thus one familiar face disappeared after the 
 other from the village, even as leaves in autumn, or 
 as forest-life during a storm in fall. Shmeril the 
 cobbler had long ago sailed for America with all his 
 children. Mirke, her husband, and the rest of her 
 children journeyed thither likewise. Only old 
 Avrom-Layzer was left. Mottel and his entire house- 
 hold had already gone. Even the village teacher had 
 left for America in company of a girl. Berel-Itsye 
 the money-lender moved to another town, for America 
 had ruined his business. The apothecary, too, was 
 preparing to move, and the sergeant was not at aU 
 
THE VILLAGE WANES 189 
 
 pleased with America's ever having been discov- 
 ered. . . • 
 
 With the exception of Sholom the Gentile, only old 
 men and their wives were left in the village, and all 
 of them lived upon the money that they received from 
 America. . . . 
 
 A few more years passed by. It was a beautiful 
 day after the close of Shabuoth, — ^the annual fair- 
 day. The village was silent; for the fair, too, had 
 moved to another town. The market-place looked 
 like a graveyard; the boarded shops appeared to be 
 tombstones. Under the shelter lay some goats, and 
 a big hog was rubbing his hide against the wall. 
 
 The rustling of the woods was audible, and the 
 twittering of birds, as from a silent burial-ground. 
 Aged men and women tottered about the village, bent 
 over and treading as softly as they sighed. Some of 
 them thought of the fair that once upon a time was 
 held here upon this day, and they groaned: 
 
 "Our poor village has crumbled to ruins ! . . ." 
 
 The entire village, indeed, might well have been 
 compared to a Home for the Aged, where old folks 
 waited for their death. , . . From the house in which 
 dwelt Avrom-Layzer came the sounds of his pious 
 chanting. 
 
 On his turf-moimd sat Sholom the Gentile, with his 
 
190 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 wife Gittel, and both were examining the photograph 
 of their second grandchild, which their daughter 
 Broche had sent them. Gittel was sobbing. 
 
 "If I had wings, I would fly to them there. I would 
 run there on foot, just to have a look at them. . . ." 
 
 "Bah, woman!" grumbled Sholom. Then she 
 starts crying again. "Such a pretty little doU of a 
 grandchild! We ought to rejoice over it, — ^not 
 weep!" 
 
 "But I'd like to see him with my own eyes, woe 
 is me! Behold him, hear him call me grandma, mis- 
 fortune is me! . . ." 
 
 "Indeed. . . . When it comes to wishing, I'd like it 
 myself!" 
 
 He heaved a sigh. 
 
 "Sholom, what is our life without our children?" 
 
 "A pinch of snuff", Gittel. . . ." 
 
 "If you take a cat's kittens away, she whines and 
 looks everywhere for them. . . ." 
 
 "True, Gittel. But such is our fate, so don't prat- 
 tle in vain. . . ." 
 
 He stood up, with the photograph in his hand, 
 looked at it once more and suddenly smacked his lips 
 at it: 
 
 "Ah, you little rascal! You don't know me, ha? 
 I'm your granddad, my boy! . . ." 
 
 He chuckled softly, wiped a tear from his eye with 
 his bare hand, and entered the house. 
 
THE VILLAGE WANES 191 
 
 Gittel remained seated upon the turf-mound and 
 wept in silence. 
 
 Lame Gedaliah was limping from house to house 
 with a letter in his hand, begging to be told the mean- 
 ing of certain words it contained. He went into 
 Avrom-Layzer, who was seated at the table reciting 
 Psalms. 
 
 "Tell me, pray, Reb Avrom-Layzer; your children 
 write often; maybe you know the meaning of 'I am 
 all-right'?" . . . 
 
 The old man merely shrugged his shoulders and 
 continued his reading with a dreary chant. Then 
 Gedaliah hastened off to the old Rabbi with the let- 
 ter, but not even this worthy could tell him the mean- 
 ing of "all right." . . . 
 
 Later the men repaired silently to the synagogues, 
 with subdued sighs, and prayed there in old, cracked 
 voices, with bloodless lips. Not a fresh, youthful 
 voice was to be heard, as if only the shadows of the 
 living worshiped there. . . . 
 
 And between the afternoon and the evening prayers 
 they conversed about their children, their grandchil- 
 dren, their daughters-in-law, whom they did not 
 know; of their unknown sons-in-law, of the genera- 
 tions that had sprung from them, in that remote 
 land beyond all the seas, — so far, so far from 
 them, and yet so near; and they sighed, and yearned, 
 yearned. ... 
 
192 A LITHUANIAN VILLAGE 
 
 '' Once the aged Rabbi sent for several men and an- 
 nounced to them in a sad voice: 
 
 "Fellow Jews, I have just received a letter with 
 terrible tidings. Our people is being massacred. 
 Pogroms. To-morrow we must have a general 
 fast. . . ." 
 
 All the Jews in the village fasted and chanted 
 Psalms. And fearing a pogrom in the village, the 
 Rabbi and two other elders went to the sergeant. 
 
 "Don't be afraid," replied the oflficial. "There wiU 
 be no pogrom here. Who is there to attack? . . ." 
 
 As they left the sergeant, the Rabbi said: 
 
 "Gentlemen, perhaps God really created America 
 to rescue Jews from pogroms, ha? . . ." 
 
 Old Avrom-Layzer died. All the inhabitants of 
 the village thronged to the burial-groimd ; only old 
 men and women were there. Over the place hovered 
 an autumnal mist; the wind howled through the dying 
 trees and the rain came pouring down. The aged 
 folk bemoaned the passing of the elder, and each of 
 them thought, despairingly: 
 
 "To think of it! Ah! None of his children was 
 with him at his death and none at his burial. And 
 who will there be at ours, ha? Who?" 
 
 The old Rabbi, in his stifled voice, filled with tears, 
 said prayers over Avrom-Layzer's grave. 
 
 Suddenly the bell of the Polish church began to 
 toll. Ding, dong! Ding, dong! And the metallic 
 
THE VILLAGE WANES 193 
 
 tones reverberated over the dead village, mingled with 
 the fog, with the rain, were wafted to the Jewish 
 graveyard and echoed with a hopeless grtfan in the 
 souls of all the sad, abandoned aged folk who were 
 gathered about the fresh grave: 
 
 "Ame-ri-ca! Ah! Ame-ri-ca! Ah!" it rang. 
 
 Was it the groaning of the old folks' souls, or the 
 tolling of the bell? 
 
 Somewhere in Lithuania there once nestled the vil- 
 lage of B 
 
 Written in Brooklyn, N. Y., 1914. 
 
 THE END