Jewish Children Part 6

"Fool of the night! If I were to tell you to cut off your nose, must you do it? You idiot! You animal with the horse's face, you! Ha! ha! ha!"

"Be quiet, at any rate, you Goyetzel, you. And let me not see your forbidding countenance."

And he turned away from himself, sat sulky for a few minutes, sc.r.a.ping the earth with his fingers. He covered the hole he had made, as he sang a little song under his breath.

"Do you know what I will tell you, Getzel?" he said to himself a few minutes later. "Let us forgive one another. Let us be friends. The Lord helped me. It was my luck to win so many nuts--may no evil eye harm them! Why should we not enjoy ourselves? Let's crack a few nuts. I should think they are not bad! Well, what do you say, Getzel?"

"Yes, I also think they ought not to be bad," he answered himself. He thrust a nut into his mouth, a second, a third. Each time, he banged his teeth with his fists. The nut was cracked. He took out a fat kernel, cleaned it round, threw it back in his mouth, and chewed it pleasurably with his strong white teeth. He crunched them as a horse crunches oats.

He said to himself:

"Would you also like the kernel of a nut, Getzel? Speak out. Do not be ashamed."

"Why not?"

That was how he answered himself. He stretched out his left hand, but only smacked it with his right.

"Will you have a plague?"

"Let it be a plague."

"Then have two."

And he did not cease from cracking the nuts, and crunching them like a horse. It was not enough that he sat eating and gave none to the other, but he said to him:

"Listen, Getzel, to what I will ask you. How, for example, do you feel while I am eating and you are only looking on?"

"How do I feel? May you have such a year!"

"Ah, I see you've got a temper. Here is a kernel for you."

And Getzel's right hand gave the left a kernel. The right turned upside down. The left hand smacked the right. The left hand smacked the right cheek. Then the right hand smacked the left cheek twice. The left hand caught hold of the right lapel of his coat, and the right hand at once tore off the left lapel, from top to bottom. The left hand pulled the right earlock. The right hand gave the left ear a terrible bang.

"Let go of my earlock, Getzel. Take my advice, and let go of my earlock!"

"A plague!"

"Then you'll have no earlock, Getzel."

"Then you, Goyetzel, will have no ear."

"Oh!"

"Oh! Oh!"

EPILOGUE

For several minutes our Getzel rolled on the ground. Now he lay right side up, and now he lay left side up. He held his pocketful of nuts with both hands.... One minute Goyetzel was victorious. The next it was Getzel, until he got up from the ground covered with dirt, like a pig.

He was torn to pieces, had a bleeding ear, and a torn earlock. He took all the nuts from his pocket, and threw them into the mud of the river, far away, behind the mill. He muttered angrily:

"That's right. It's a good deed."

"Neither you--nor me."

A Lost "L'Ag Beomer"

Our teacher, "_Reb_" Nissel the small one--so called on account of his size--allowed himself to be led by the nose by his a.s.sistants. Whatever they wanted they got. When the first a.s.sistant said the children were to be sent home early that day, he sent them home early. The second a.s.sistant said that the boys would turn the world upside down, and ought to be kept at school, and he kept them at school. He could never decide anything for himself. That was why his a.s.sistants controlled the school, and not he. At other schools the a.s.sistants teach the children to wash their hands and say the blessing. At our school, the a.s.sistants would not do this for us, nor fetch us our meals, nor take us to school on their shoulders. No, they liked to go for our meals. They ate them themselves on the road. We did not dare to tell the master of this. The a.s.sistants kept us in fear and trembling. If a boy whispered a word of their doings to the teacher, he would be flogged, his skin would be cut.

Once, a daring boy told the master something; and the a.s.sistant beat him so terribly that he was laid up in bed for months. He warned the boys never to tell the master anything, no matter what the a.s.sistants did.

This period of our schooldays might be called the Tyranny of the a.s.sistants.

And it came to pa.s.s that we were under the yoke of the a.s.sistants. One year, we had a cold "_L'ag Beomer_." It was a cold, wet May, such as we sometimes had in our town, Mazapevka. The sun barely showed itself. A sharp wind blew, brought us clouds, tore open our coats, and threw us off our feet. It was not pleasant out of doors.

Just then the a.s.sistants took it into their heads to take us for a walk outside the town, so that we might play at wars, with swords and pop-guns and bows and arrows.

It is an old custom amongst Jewish children, to become war-like on the "_L'ag Beomer_." They arm themselves from head to foot with wooden swords, pop-guns and bows and arrows. They take food with them, and go off to wage war. Jewish children who are the whole year round closed up in small "_Chedorim_," oppressed by fears of the master, and trembling under the whips of the a.s.sistants, when "_L'ag Beomer_" comes round, and they may go out into the open, armed from head to foot, imagine that they are giants who can overcome the strongest foe and reduce the world to ruins. All at once they grow brave. They step forward eagerly, singing songs that are a curious mixture of Yiddish and Russian.

"One, two, three, four!

Jewish children Learn the '_Torah_,'

Believe in miracles, Are not afraid.

Hear, O Israel! Nothing matters.

We are not afraid of any one, Excepting G.o.d."

And we carried out the old custom. We took down our swords of last year from the attic, and we made bows from the hoops of old wine barrels.

Pop-guns the a.s.sistants provided us with, for money, of course--fine guns with which one could shoot flies if they only stood still long enough. In a word, we had all the Jewish weapons to frighten tiny infants to death. And we provided ourselves with food in good earnest, each boy as much as the Lord had blessed him with, and his mother would give him, out of her generosity. We arrived at "_Cheder_" armed from head to foot, and our pockets bulging out with good things--rolls, cakes, boiled eggs, goose-fat, cherry-wine, fruit, fowls, livers, tea and sugar, and preserves and jam, and also many "_groschens_" in money.

Each boy tried to show off by bringing the best and the largest quant.i.ty. And we wished to please the a.s.sistants. They praised us, and said we were very good boys. They took our food and put it into their bags. They placed us in rows, like soldiers, and commanded us.

"Jewish children, take hands, and march across the bridge, straight for Mezritzer fields. There you will meet the sea-cats, and do battle with them."

"Hurrah for the sea-cats!" we shouted in one voice. We took hands and went forward, like giants, strong and courageous.

We called the Free School boys sea-cats because they were short little children in the A B C cla.s.s. They appeared to us "_Chumash_" boys like flies, ants. We imagined that with one blow--phew! we would make an end of them. We were certain that when they saw us, how we were armed from head to foot with swords and bows and arrows and pop-guns, they would surely fly away. It was no trifle to encounter such giants. You play with "_Chumash_" boys, warriors with long legs!

We had never fought the sea-cats before. But we had every reason to believe, we were convinced, we would conquer these squirrels with a glance, destroy them, make an end of them. Along with giving them a good licking, we would take spoil from them, that is to say, their food, and let them go hungry.

We were so full of our own courage, and so enthusiastic about the brave deeds we were going to do that we pushed each other forward, clapped each other on the shoulder. Then, too, the a.s.sistants urged us forward.

"Why do you crawl like insects?" they asked us. They themselves stopped frequently, opened the bags, and tasted our food and cherry-wine, which they praised highly.