Yiddish Tales Part 6

The more I forgot, the more I was inclined to be quit of my torments and trials--to make an end of them by agreeing to a Christian name, but whenever the bad thought came into my head, he appeared before me, the same Shochet, and I heard his voice say to me, "Keep your name, remain a Jew!"

And I knew for certain that it was no empty dream, because every time I saw him _older_ and _older_, his beard and earlocks greyer, his face paler. Only his eyes remained the same kind eyes, and his voice, which sounded like a violin, never altered.

Once they flogged me, and he stood by and wiped the cold sweat off my forehead, and stroked my face, and said softly: "Don't cry out! We ought to suffer! Remain a Jew," and I bore it without a cry, without a moan, as though they had been flogging _not_-me.

Once, during the last year, I had to go as a sentry to a public house behind the town. It was evening, and there was a snow-storm. The wind lifted patches of snow, and ground them to needles, rubbed them to dust, and this snow-dust and these snow-needles were whirled through the air, flew into one's face and p.r.i.c.ked--you couldn't keep an eye open, you couldn't draw your breath! Suddenly I saw some people walking past me, not far away, and one of them said in Yiddish, "This is the first night of Pa.s.sover." Whether it was a voice from G.o.d, or whether some people really pa.s.sed me, to this day I don't know, but the words fell upon my heart like lead, and I had hardly reached the tavern and begun to walk up and down, when a longing came over me, a sort of heartache, that is not to be described. I wanted to recite the Haggadah, and not a word of it could I recall! Not even the Four Questions I used to ask my father.

I felt it all lay somewhere deep down in my heart. I used to know so much of it, when I was only six years old. I felt, if only I could have recalled one simple word, the rest would have followed and risen out of my memory one after the other, like sleepy birds from beneath the snow.

But that one first word is just what I cannot remember! Lord of the Universe, I cried fervently, one word, only one word! As it seems, I made my prayer in a happy hour, for "we were slaves" came into my head just as if it had been thrown down from Heaven. I was overjoyed! I was so full of joy that I felt it br.i.m.m.i.n.g over. And then the rest all came back to me, and as I paced up and down on my watch, with my musket on my shoulder, I recited and sang the Haggadah to the snowy world around. I drew it out of me, word after word, like a chain of golden links, like a string of pearls. O, but you won't understand, you couldn't understand, unless you had been taken away there, too!

The wind, meanwhile, had fallen, the snow-storm had come to an end, and there appeared a clear, twinkling sky, and a shining world of diamonds.

It was silent all round, and ever so wide, and ever so white, with a sweet, peaceful, endless whiteness. And over this calm, wide, whiteness, there suddenly appeared something still whiter, and lighter, and brighter, wrapped in a robe and a prayer-scarf, the prayer-scarf over its shoulders, and over the prayer-scarf, in front, a silvery white beard; and above the beard, two shining eyes, and above them, a sparkling crown, a cap with gold and silver ornaments. And it came nearer and nearer, and went past me, but as it pa.s.sed me it said:

"It is well!"

It sounded like a violin, and then the figure vanished.

But it was the same eyes, the same voice.

I took Schpol on my way home, and went to see the Old Man, for the Rebbe of Schpol was called by the people Der Alter, the "Schpol Grandfather."

And I recognized him again, and he recognized me!

WHENCE A PROVERB

"Drunk all the year round, sober at Purim," is a Jewish proverb, and people ought to know whence it comes.

In the days of the famous scholar, Reb Chayyim Vital, there lived in Safed, in Palestine, a young man who (not of us be it spoken!) had not been married a year before he became a widower. G.o.d's ways are not to be understood. Such things will happen. But the young man was of the opinion that the world, in as far as he was concerned, had come to an end; that, as there is one sun in heaven, so his wife had been the one woman in the world. So he went and sold all the merchandise in his little shop and all the furniture of his room, and gave the proceeds to the head of the Safed Academy, the Rosh ha-Yeshiveh, on condition that he should be taken into the Yeshiveh and fed with the other scholars, and that he should have a room to himself, where he might sit and learn Torah.

The Rosh ha-Yeshiveh took the money for the Academy, and they part.i.tioned off a little room for the young man with some boards, in a corner of the attic of the house-of-study. They carried in a sack with straw, and vessels for washing, and the young man sat himself down to the Talmud. Except on Sabbaths and holidays, when the householders invited him to dinner, he never set eyes on a living creature. Food sufficient for the day, and a clean shirt in honor of Sabbaths and festivals, were carried up to him by the beadle, and whenever he heard steps on the stair, he used to turn away, and stand with his face to the wall, till whoever it was had gone out again and shut the door.

In a word, he became a Porush, for he lived separate from the world.

At first people thought he wouldn't persevere long, because he was a lively youth by nature; but as week after week went by, and the Porush sat and studied, and the tearful voice in which he intoned the Gemoreh was heard in the street half through the night, or else he was seen at the attic window, his pale face raised towards the sky, then they began to believe in him, and they hoped he might in time become a mighty man in Israel, and perhaps even a wonderworker. They said so to the Rebbe, Chayyim Vital, but he listened, shook his head, and replied, "G.o.d grant it may last."

Meantime a little "wonder" really happened. The beadle's little daughter, who used sometimes to carry up the Porush's food for her father, took it into her head that she must have one look at the Porush.

What does she? Takes off her shoes and stockings, and carries the food to him barefoot, so noiselessly that she heard her own heart beat. But the beating of her heart frightened her so much that she fell down half the stairs, and was laid up for more than a month in consequence. In her fever she told the whole story, and people began to believe in the Porush more firmly than ever and to wait with increasing impatience till he should become famous.

They described the occurrence to Reb Chayyim Vital, and again he shook his head, and even sighed, and answered, "G.o.d grant he may be victorious!" And when they pressed him for an explanation of these words, Reb Chayyim answered, that as the Porush had left the world, not so much for the sake of Heaven as on account of his grief for his wife, it was to be feared that he would be sorely beset and tempted by the "Other Side," and G.o.d grant he might not stumble and fall.

And Reb Chayyim Vital never spoke without good reason!

One day the Porush was sitting deep in a book, when he heard something tapping at the door, and fear came over him. But as the tapping went on, he rose, forgetting to close his book, went and opened the door--and in walks a turkey. He lets it in, for it occurs to him that it would be nice to have a living thing in the room. The turkey walks past him, and goes and settles down quietly in a corner. And the Porush wonders what this may mean, and sits down again to his book. Sitting there, he remembers that it is going on for Purim. Has someone sent him a turkey out of regard for his study of the Torah? What shall he do with the turkey? Should anyone, he reflects, ask him to dinner, supposing it were to be a poor man, he would send him the turkey on the eve of Purim, and then he would satisfy himself with it also. He has not once tasted fowl-meat since he lost his wife. Thinking thus, he smacked his lips, and his mouth watered. He threw a glance at the turkey, and saw it looking at him in a friendly way, as though it had quite understood his intention, and was very glad to think it should have the honor of being eaten by a Porush. He could not restrain himself, but was continually lifting his eyes from his book to look at the turkey, till at last he began to fancy the turkey was smiling at him. This startled him a little, but all the same it made him happy to be smiled at by a living creature.

The same thing happened at Minchah and Maariv. In the middle of the Eighteen Benedictions, he could not for the life of him help looking round every minute at the turkey, who continued to smile and smile.

Suddenly it seemed to him, he knew that smile well--the Almighty, who had taken back his wife, had now sent him her smile to comfort him in his loneliness, and he began to love the turkey. He thought how much better it would be, if a _rich_ man were to invite him at Purim, so that the turkey might live.

And he thought it in a propitious moment, as we shall presently see, but meantime they brought him, as usual, a platter of groats with a piece of bread, and he washed his hands, and prepared to eat.

No sooner, however, had he taken the bread into his hand, and was about to bite into it, than the turkey moved out of its corner, and began peck, peck, peck, towards the bread, by way of asking for some, and as though to say it was hungry, too, and came and stood before him near the table. The Porush thought, "He'd better have some, I don't want to be unkind to him, to tease him," and he took the bread and the platter of porridge, and set it down on the floor before the turkey, who pecked and supped away to its heart's content.

Next day the Porush went over to the Rosh ha-Yeshiveh, and told him how he had come to have a fellow-lodger; he used always to leave some porridge over, and to-day he didn't seem to have had enough. The Rosh ha-Yeshiveh saw a hungry face before him. He said he would tell this to the Rebbe, Chayyim Vital, so that he might pray, and the evil spirit, if such indeed it was, might depart. Meantime he would give orders for two pieces of bread and two plates of porridge to be taken up to the attic, so that there should be enough for both, the Porush and the turkey. Reb Chayyim Vital, however, to whom the story was told in the name of the Rosh ha-Yeshiveh, shook his head, and declared with a deep sigh that this was only the beginning!

Meanwhile the Porush received a double portion and was satisfied, and the turkey was satisfied, too. The turkey even grew fat. And in a couple of weeks or so the Porush had become so much attached to the turkey that he prayed every day to be invited for Purim by a _rich_ man, so that he might not be tempted to destroy it.

And, as we intimated, _that_ temptation, anyhow, was spared him, for he was invited to dinner by one of the princ.i.p.al householders in the place, and there was not only turkey, but every kind of tasty dish, and wine fit for a king. And the best Purim-players came to entertain the rich man, his family, and the guests who had come to him after their feast at home. And our Porush gave himself up to enjoyment, and ate and drank.

Perhaps he even drank rather more than he ate, for the wine was sweet and grateful to the taste, and the warmth of it made its way into every limb.

Then suddenly a change came over him.

The Ahasuerus-Esther play had begun. Vashti will not do the king's pleasure and come in to the banquet as G.o.d made her. Esther soon finds favor in her stead, she is given over to Hegai, the keeper of the women, to be purified, six months with oil of myrrh and six months with other sweet perfumes. And our Porush grew hot all over, and it was dark before his eyes; then red streaks flew across his field of vision, like tongues of fire, and he was overcome by a strange, wild longing to be back at home, in the attic of the house-of-study--a longing for his own little room, his quiet corner, a longing for the turkey, and he couldn't bear it, and even before they had said grace he jumped up and ran away home.

He enters his room, looks into the corner habitually occupied by the turkey, and stands amazed--the turkey has turned into a woman, a most beautiful woman, such as the world never saw, and he begins to tremble all over. And she comes up to him, and takes him around the neck with her warm, white, naked arms, and the Porush trembles more and more, and begs, "Not here, not here! It is a holy place, there are holy books lying about." Then she whispers into his ear that she is the Queen of Sheba, that she lives not far from the house-of-study, by the river, among the tall reeds, in a palace of crystal, given her by King Solomon.

And she draws him along, she wants him to go with her to her palace.

And he hesitates and resists--and he goes.

Next day, there was no turkey, and no Porush, either!

They went to Reb Chayyim Vital, who told them to look for him along the bank of the river, and they found him in a swamp among the tall reeds, more dead than alive.

They rescued him and brought him round, but from that day he took to drink.

And Reb Chayyim Vital said, it all came from his great longing for the Queen of Sheba, that when he drank, he saw her; and they were to let him drink, only not at Purim, because at that time she would have great power over him.

Hence the proverb, "Drunk all the year round, sober at Purim."

MORDECAI SPEKTOR

Born, 1859, in Uman, Government of Kieff, Little Russia; education Hasidic; entered business in 1878; wrote first sketch, A Roman ohn Liebe, in 1882; contributor to Zedernbaum's Judisches Volksblatt, 1884-1887; founded, in 1888, and edited Der Hausfreund, at Warsaw; editor of Warsaw daily papers, Unser Leben, and (at present, 1912) Dos neie Leben; writer of novels, historical romances, and sketches in Yiddish; contributor to numerous periodicals; compiled a volume of more than two thousand Jewish proverbs.

AN ORIGINAL STRIKE

I was invited to a wedding.