Astir with restless, hurried life, and spanned

By arches that with thund'rous trains resound,

And throbbing wires that galvanize the land;

Gin palaces in tawdry splendor stand;

The newsboys shriek of mangled bodies found;

The last burlesque is playing in the Strand--

In modern prose, all poetry seems drowned.

Yet in ten thousand homes this April night

An ancient people celebrates its birth

To Freedom, with a reverential mirth,

With customs quaint and many a hoary rite,

Waiting until, its tarnished glories bright,

Its God shall be the God of all the Earth."

 

 

To an imaginative child like Esther, _Seder_ night was a charmed time. The strange symbolic dishes--the bitter herbs and the sweet mixture of apples, almonds, spices and wine, the roasted bone and the lamb, the salt water and the four cups of raisin wine, the great round unleavened cakes, with their mottled surfaces, some specially thick and sacred, the special Hebrew melodies and verses with their jingle of rhymes and assonances, the quaint ceremonial with its striking moments, as when the finger was dipped in the wine and the drops sprinkled over the shoulder in repudiation of the ten plagues of Egypt cabalistically magnified to two hundred and fifty; all this penetrated deep into her consciousness and made the recurrence of every Passover coincide with a rush of pleasant anticipations and a sense of the special privilege of being born a happy Jewish child. Vaguely, indeed, did she co-ordinate the celebration with the history enshrined in it or with the prospective history of her race. It was like a tale out of the fairy-books, this miraculous deliverance of her forefathers in the dim haze of antiquity; true enough but not more definitely realized on that account. And yet not easily dissoluble links were being forged with her race, which has anticipated Positivism in vitalizing history by making it religion.

 

The _Matzoth_ that Esther ate were not dainty--they were coarse, of the quality called "seconds," for even the unleavened bread of charity is not necessarily delicate eating--but few things melted sweeter on the palate than a segment of a _Matso_ dipped in cheap raisin wine: the unconventionally of the food made life less common, more picturesque. Simple Ghetto children into whose existence the ceaseless round of fast and feast, of prohibited and enjoyed pleasures, of varying species of food, brought change and relief! Imprisoned in the area of a few narrow streets, unlovely and sombre, muddy and ill-smelling, immured in dreary houses and surrounded with mean and depressing sights and sounds, the spirit of childhood took radiance and color from its own inner light and the alchemy of youth could still transmute its lead to gold. No little princess in the courts of fairyland could feel a fresher interest and pleasure in life than Esther sitting at the _Seder_ table, where her father--no longer a slave in Egypt--leaned royally upon two chairs supplied with pillows as the _Din_ prescribes. Not even the monarch's prime minister could have had a meaner opinion of Pharaoh than Moses Ansell in this symbolically sybaritic attitude. A live dog is better than a dead lion, as a great teacher in Israel had said. How much better then a live lion than a dead dog? Pharaoh, for all his purple and fine linen and his treasure cities, was at the bottom of the Red Sea, smitten with two hundred and fifty plagues, and even if, as tradition asserted, he had been made to live on and on to be King of Nineveh, and to give ear to the warnings of Jonah, prophet and whale-explorer, even so he was but dust and ashes for other sinners to cover themselves withal; but he, Moses Ansell, was the honored master of his household, enjoying a foretaste of the lollings of the righteous in Paradise; nay, more, dispensing hospitality to the poor and the hungry. Little fleas have lesser fleas, and Moses Ansell had never fallen so low but that, on this night of nights when the slave sits with the master on equal terms, he could manage to entertain a Passover guest, usually some newly-arrived Greener, or some nondescript waif and stray returned to Judaism for the occasion and accepting a seat at the board in that spirit of _camaraderie_ which is one of the most delightful features of the Jewish pauper. _Seder_ was a ceremonial to be taken in none too solemn and sober a spirit, and there was an abundance of unreproved giggling throughout from the little ones, especially in those happy days when mother was alive and tried to steal the _Afikuman_ or _Matso_ specially laid aside for the final morsel, only to be surrendered to father when he promised to grant her whatever she wished. Alas! it is to be feared Mrs. Ansell's wishes did not soar high. There was more giggling when the youngest talking son--it was poor Benjamin in Esther's earliest recollections--opened the ball by inquiring in a peculiarly pitched incantation and with an air of blank ignorance why this night differed from all other nights--in view of the various astonishing peculiarities of food and behavior (enumerated in detail) visible to his vision. To which Moses and the _Bube_ and the rest of the company (including the questioner) invariably replied in corresponding sing-song: "Slaves have we been in Egypt," proceeding to recount at great length, stopping for refreshment in the middle, the never-cloying tale of the great deliverance, with irrelevant digressions concerning Haman and Daniel and the wise men of Bona Berak, the whole of this most ancient of the world's extant domestic rituals terminating with an allegorical ballad like the "house that Jack built," concerning a kid that was eaten by a cat, which was bitten by a dog, which was beaten by a stick, which was burned by a fire, which was quenched by some water, which was drunk by an ox, which was slaughtered by a slaughterer, who was slain by the Angel of Death, who was slain by the Holy One, blessed be He.

 

In wealthy houses this _Hagadah_ was read from manuscripts with rich illuminations--the one development of pictorial art among the Jews--but the Ansells had wretchedly-printed little books containing quaint but unintentionally comic wood-cuts, pre-Raphaelite in perspective and ludicrous in draughtsmanship, depicting the Miracles of the Redemption, Moses burying the Egyptian, and sundry other passages of the text. In one a king was praying in the Temple to an exploding bomb intended to represent the Shechinah or divine glory. In another, Sarah attired in a matronly cap and a fashionable jacket and skirt, was standing behind the door of the tent, a solid detached villa on the brink of a lake, whereon ships and gondolas floated, what time Abraham welcomed the three celestial messengers, unobtrusively disguised with heavy pinions. What delight as the quaking of each of the four cups of wine loomed in sight, what disappointment and mutual bantering when the cup had merely to be raised in the hand, what chaff of the greedy Solomon who was careful not to throw away a drop during the digital manoeuvres when the wine must be jerked from the cup at the mention of each plague. And what a solemn moment was that when the tallest goblet was filled to the brim for the delectation of the prophet Elijah and the door thrown open for his entry. Could one almost hear the rustling of the prophet's spirit through the room? And what though the level of the wine subsided not a barley-corn? Elijah, though there was no difficulty in his being in all parts of the world simultaneously, could hardly compass the greater miracle of emptying so many million goblets. Historians have traced this custom of opening the door to the necessity of asking the world to look in and see for itself that no blood of Christian child figured in the ceremonial--and for once science has illumined naive superstition with a tragic glow more poetic still. For the London Ghetto persecution had dwindled to an occasional bellowing through the keyhole, as the local rowdies heard the unaccustomed melodies trolled forth from jocund lungs and then the singers would stop for a moment, startled, and some one would say: "Oh, it's only a Christian rough," and take up the thread of song.

 

And then, when the _Ajikuman_ had been eaten and the last cup of wine drunk, and it was time to go to bed, what a sweet sense of sanctity and security still reigned. No need to say your prayers to-night, beseeching the guardian of Israel, who neither slumbereth nor sleepeth, to watch over you and chase away the evil spirits; the angels are with you--Gabriel on your right and Raphael on your left, and Michael behind you. All about the Ghetto the light of the Passover rested, transfiguring the dreary rooms and illumining the gray lives.

 

Dutch Debby sat beside Mrs. Simons at the table of that good soul's married daughter; the same who had suckled little Sarah. Esther's frequent eulogiums had secured the poor lonely narrow-chested seamstress this enormous concession and privilege. Bobby squatted on the mat in the passage ready to challenge Elijah. At this table there were two pieces of fried fish sent to Mrs. Simons by Esther Ansell. They represented the greatest revenge of Esther's life, and she felt remorseful towards Malka, remembering to whose gold she owed this proud moment. She made up her mind to write her a letter of apology in her best hand.

 

At the Belcovitches' the ceremonial was long, for the master of it insisted on translating the Hebrew into jargon, phrase by phrase; but no one found it tedious, especially after supper. Pesach was there, hand in hand with Fanny, their wedding very near now; and Becky lolled royally in all her glory, aggressive of ringlet, insolently unattached, a conscious beacon of bedazzlement to the pauper _Pollack_ we last met at Reb Shemuel's Sabbath table, and there, too, was Chayah, she of the ill-matched legs. Be sure that Malka had returned the clothes-brush, and was throned in complacent majesty at Milly's table; and that Sugarman the _Shadchan_ forgave his monocular consort her lack of a fourth uncle; while Joseph Strelitski, dreamer of dreams, rich with commissions from "Passover" cigars, brooded on the Great Exodus. Nor could the Shalotten _Shammos_ be other than beaming, ordering the complex ceremonial with none to contradict; nor Karlkammer be otherwise than in the seven hundred and seventy-seventh heaven, which, calculated by _Gematriyah_, can easily be reduced to the seventh.

 

Shosshi Shmendrik did not fail to explain the deliverance to the ex-widow Finkelstein, nor Guedalyah, the greengrocer, omit to hold his annual revel at the head of half a hundred merry "pauper-aliens." Christian roughs bawled derisively in the street, especially when doors were opened for Elijah; but hard words break no bones, and the Ghetto was uplifted above insult.

 

Melchitsedek Pinchas was the Passover guest at Reb Shemuel's table, for the reek of his Sabbath cigar had not penetrated to the old man's nostrils. It was a great night for Pinchas; wrought up to fervid nationalistic aspirations by the memory of the Egyptian deliverance, which he yet regarded as mythical in its details. It was a terrible night for Hannah, sitting opposite to him under the fire of his poetic regard. She was pale and rigid, moving and speaking mechanically. Her father glanced towards her every now and again, compassionately, but with trust that the worst was over. Her mother realized the crisis much less keenly than he, not having been in the heart of the storm. She had never even seen her intended son-in-law except through the lens of a camera. She was sorry--that was all. Now that Hannah had broken the ice, and encouraged one young man, there was hope for the others.

 

Hannah's state of mind was divined by neither parent. Love itself is blind in those tragic silences which divide souls.

 

All night, after that agonizing scene, she did not sleep; the feverish activity of her mind rendered that impossible, and unerring instinct told her that David was awake also--that they two, amid the silence of a sleeping city, wrestled in the darkness with the same terrible problem, and were never so much at one as in this their separation. A letter came for her in the morning. It was unstamped, and had evidently been dropped into the letter-box by David's hand. It appointed an interview at ten o'clock at a corner of the Ruins; of course, he could not come to the house. Hannah was out: with a little basket to make some purchases. There was a cheery hum of life about the Ghetto; a pleasant festival bustle; the air resounded with the raucous clucking of innumerable fowls on their way to the feather-littered, blood-stained shambles, where professional cut-throats wielded sacred knives; boys armed with little braziers of glowing coal ran about the Ruins, offering halfpenny pyres for the immolation of the last crumbs of leaven. Nobody paid the slightest attention to the two tragic figures whose lives turned on the brief moments of conversation snatched in the thick of the hurrying crowd.

 

David's clouded face lightened a little as he saw Hannah advancing towards him.

 

"I knew you would come," he said, taking her hand for a moment. His palm burned, hers was cold and limp. The stress of a great tempest of emotion had driven the blood from her face and limbs, but inwardly she was on fire. As they looked each read revolt in the other's eyes.

 

"Let us walk on," he said.

 

They moved slowly forwards. The ground was slippery and muddy under foot. The sky was gray. But the gayety of the crowds neutralized the dull squalor of the scene.

 

"Well?" he said, in a low tone.

 

"I thought you had something to propose," she murmured.

 

"Let me carry your basket."

 

"No, no; go on. What have you determined?"

 

"Not to give you up, Hannah, while I live."

 

"Ah!" she said quietly. "I have thought it all over, too, and I shall not leave you. But our marriage by Jewish law is impossible; we could not marry at any synagogue without my father's knowledge; and he would at once inform the authorities of the bar to our union."

 

"I know, dear. But let us go to America, where no one will know. There we shall find plenty of Rabbis to marry us. There is nothing to tie me to this country. I can start my business in America just as well as here. Your parents, too, will think more kindly of you when you are across the seas. Forgiveness is easier at a distance. What do you say, dear?"

 

She shook her head.

 

"Why should we be married in a synagogue?" she asked.

 

"Why?" repeated he, puzzled.

 

"Yes, why?"

 

"Because we are Jews."

 

"You would use Jewish forms to outwit Jewish laws?" she asked quietly.

 

"No, no. Why should you put it that way? I don't doubt the Bible is all right in making the laws it does. After the first heat of my anger was over, I saw the whole thing in its proper bearings. Those laws about priests were only intended for the days when we had a Temple, and in any case they cannot apply to a merely farcical divorce like yours. It is these old fools,--I beg your pardon,--it is these fanatical Rabbis who insist on giving them a rigidity God never meant them to have, just as they still make a fuss about _kosher_ meat. In America they are less strict; besides, they will not know I am a _Cohen_."

 

"No. David," said Hannah firmly. "There must be no more deceit. What need have we to seek the sanction of any Rabbi? If Jewish law cannot marry us without our hiding something, then I will have nothing to do with Jewish law. You know my opinions: I haven't gone so deeply into religious questions as you have--"

 

"Don't be sarcastic," he interrupted.

 

"I have always been sick to death of this eternal ceremony, this endless coil of laws winding round us and cramping our lives at every turn; and now it has become too oppressive to be borne any longer. Why should we let it ruin our lives? And why, if we determine to break from it, shall we pretend to keep to it? What do you care for Judaism? You eat _triphas_, you smoke on _Shabbos_ when you want to--"

 

"Yes, I know, perhaps I'm wrong. But everybody does it now-a-days. When I was a boy nobody dared be seen riding in a 'bus on _Shabbos_--now you meet lots. But all that is only old-fashioned Judaism. There must be a God, else we shouldn't be here, and it's impossible to believe that Jesus was He. A man must have some religion, and there isn't anything better. But that's neither here nor there. If you don't care for my plan," he concluded anxiously, "what's yours?"

 

"Let us be married honestly by a Registrar."

 

"Any way you like, dear," he said readily, "so long as we are married--and quickly."

 

"As quickly as you like."

 

He seized her disengaged hand and pressed it passionately. "That's my own darling Hannah. Oh, if you could realize what I felt last night when you seemed to be drifting away from me."

 

There was an interval of silence, each thinking excitedly. Then David said:

 

"But have you the courage to do this and remain in London?"

 

"I have courage for anything. But, as you say, it might be better to travel. It will be less of a break if we break away altogether--change everything at once. It sounds contradictory, but you understand what I mean."

 

"Perfectly. It is difficult to live a new life with all the old things round you. Besides, why should we give our friends the chance to cold-shoulder us? They will find all sorts of malicious reasons why we were not married in a _Shool_, and if they hit on the true one they may even regard our marriage as illegal. Let us go to America, as I proposed."

 

"Very well. Do we go direct from London?"

 

"No, from Liverpool."

 

"Then we can be married at Liverpool before sailing?"

 

"A good idea. But when do we start?"

 

"At once. To-night. The sooner the better."

 

He looked at her quickly. "Do you mean it?" he said. His heart beat violently as if it would burst. Waves of dazzling color swam before his eyes.

 

"I mean it," she said gravely and quietly. "Do you think I could face my father and mother, knowing I was about to wound them to the heart? Each day of delay would be torture to me. Oh, why is religion such a curse?" She paused, overwhelmed for a moment by the emotion she had been suppressing. She resumed in the same quiet manner. "Yes, we must break away at once. We have kept our last Passover. We shall have to eat leavened food--it will be a decisive break. Take me to Liverpool, David, this very day. You are my chosen husband; I trust in you."

 

She looked at him frankly with her dark eyes that stood out in lustrous relief against the pale skin. He gazed into those eyes, and a flash as from the inner heaven of purity pierced his soul.

 

"Thank you, dearest," he said in a voice with tears in it.

 

They walked on silently. Speech was as superfluous as it was inadequate. When they spoke again their voices were calm. The peace that comes of resolute decision was theirs at last, and each was full of the joy of daring greatly for the sake of their mutual love. Petty as the............