Rabbi and Priest Part 11

"Yes, aunt; I fear I shall be sick," answered Mendel, faintly.

"Nonsense; we will take care of that," replied Hirsch. "But where is Jacob?"

Mendel burst into tears, the first he had shed since his enforced departure from home. In as few words as possible he told his story, accompanied by the sobs and exclamations of his hearers. In conclusion, he added:

"Either Jacob wandered away in his delirium and is perhaps dead in some deserted place, or else the soldiers have recaptured him and have taken him back to Kharkov."

"Rather he be dead than among the inhuman Cossacks at the barracks,"

returned his uncle. "G.o.d in His mercy does all things for the best!"

"The poor boy must be starving," said Miriam, and she set the table with the best the house afforded, but Mendel could touch nothing.

"It looks tempting, but I cannot eat," he said. "I have no appet.i.te."

The poor fellow stretched himself on a large sofa, where he lay so quiet, so utterly exhausted, that Hirsch and his wife looked at each other anxiously and gravely shook their heads.

A casual stranger would not have judged from the unpretentious exterior of Bensef's house, that its proprietor was in possession of considerable means, that every room was furnished in taste and even luxury, that works of oriental art were hidden in its recesses. Persecuted during generations by the jealous and covetous nations surrounding them, the Jews learned to conceal their wealth beneath the mask of poverty.

Robbers, in the guise of uniformed soldiery and decorated officers of the Czar, stalked in broad daylight to relieve the despised Hebrew of his superfluous wealth, and thus it happened that the poorest hut was often the depository of gold and silver, of artistic utensils, which were worthy of the table of the Czar himself. Nor was this fact entirely unknown to the surrounding Christians. Not unfrequently were persecutions the outcome of the absurd idea that every Jewish hovel was the abode of riches, and that every hut where misery held court, where starving children cried for bread, was a mine of untold wealth. The condition of the race has changed in some of the more civilized countries, but in Russia these barbarous notions still prevail.

Hirsch Bensef, by untiring energy and perseverance as a dealer in curios and works of art, had become one of the wealthiest and most influential men in the community. He was _parnas_ of the great congregation of Kief, and was respected, not only by his co-religionists, but also by the n.o.bles with whom he transacted the greater portion of his business.

His wife, who had in her youth been styled the "Beautiful Miriam," even now, after twelve years of married life, was still a handsome woman. Her dark eyes shone with the same bewitching fire; her beautiful hair had, in accordance with the orthodox Jewish custom, fallen under the shears on the day of her marriage, but the silken band and string of pearls that henceforth decked her brow did not detract from her oriental beauty. Hirsch was proud of her and he would have been completely happy if G.o.d had vouchsafed her a son. Like Hannah, she prayed night and morning to the Heavenly throne. Such was the family in whose bosom Mendel had found a refuge.

After a while, the boy asked for a gla.s.s of water, which he swallowed eagerly. Then he asked:

"When did you leave Togarog, uncle; and how are father and mother?"

Bensef sighed at the recollection of the sad parting and tearfully related the events of that memorable night.

"After the soldiers had carried you off," he said, "the little band that followed you to the confines of the village, returned sorrowful to their homes. I need not tell you of our misery. It appeared as though G.o.d had turned his face from his chosen people. We spent the night in prayer and lamentations. In every house the inhabitants put on mourning, for whatever might befall the children, to their parents they were irretrievably lost."

"Poor papa! poor mamma!" murmured Mendel, wiping away a tear.

"On the following morning," continued Bensef; "all the male _Jehudim_ went to Alexandrovsk and implored an audience of the Governor. He sent us word that he would hold no conference with Jews and threatened us all with Siberia if we did not at once return home. What could we do? I bade your parents farewell, and after promising to do all in my power to find and succor you and Jacob, I left them and returned home, where I arrived yesterday. Thank G.o.d that you, at least, are safe from harm."

Mendel nestled closer to his uncle, who affectionately stroked his fevered brow.

"Oh! why does G.o.d send us such sufferings?" moaned the boy.

"Be patient, my child. It is through suffering that we will in the end attain happiness. When afflictions bear most heavily upon us, then will the Messiah come!"

This hope was ever the anchor which preserved the chosen people when the storms of misfortune threatened to destroy them. The belief in the eventual coming of a redeemer who would lead them to independence, and for whose approach trials, misery and persecution were but a necessary preparation, has been the great secret of Israel's strength and endurance.

During the evening, a number of Bensef's intimate friends visited the house and were told Mendel's history. The news of his arrival soon spread through the community, awakening everywhere the liveliest sympathy. Many parents had been bereft of their children in the self-same way and still mourned the absence of their first-born, whom the cruel decree of Nicholas had condemned to the rigors of some military outpost. Mendel became the hero of Kief, while he lay tossing in bed, a prey to high fever.

In spite of the care that was lavished upon him, he steadily grew worse.

Fear, hunger, exposure and self-reproach had been too much for his youthful frame. For several days Miriam administered her humble house-remedies, but they were powerless to relieve his sufferings. The hot tea which he was made to drink, only served to augment the fever.

On the fifth day, Mendel was decidedly in a dangerous condition. He was delirious. The doctors in the Jewish community were consulted, but were powerless to effect a cure. Bensef and his wife were in despair.

"What shall we do?" said Miriam, sadly. "We cannot let the boy die."

"Die?" cried Hirsch, becoming pale at the thought. "Oh, G.o.d, do not take the boy! He has wound himself about my heart. Oh, G.o.d, let him live!"

"Come, husband, praying is of little avail," answered his practical wife; "we must have a _feldsher_" (doctor).

"A _feldsher_ in the Jewish community? Why, Miriam, are you out of your mind? Have you forgotten how, when Rabbi Jeiteles was lying at the point of death, no amount of persuasion could induce a doctor to come into the quarter. 'Let the Jews die,' they answered to our entreaties; 'there will still be too many of them!'"

Miriam sighed. She remembered it well.

"What persuasion would not do, money may accomplish," she said, after a pause. "Hirsch, that boy must not die. He must live to be a credit to us and a comfort to our old age. You have money--what gentile ever resisted it?"

"I will do what I can," said the man, gloomily. "But even though I could bring one to the house, what good can he do. It is merely an experiment with the best of them. They will take our money, make a few magical incantations, prescribe a useless drug, and leave their patient to the mercy of Fate."

Hirsch Bensef was right. At the time of which we speak, medicine could scarcely be cla.s.sed among the sciences in Russia, and if we accept the statement of modern travellers, the situation is not much improved at the present day. The scientific doctor of Russia was the _feldsher_ or army surgeon, whose sole schooling was obtained among the soldiery and whose knowledge did not extend beyond dressing wounds and giving an occasional dose of physic. Upon being called to the bedside of a patient, he adopted an air of profound learning, asked a number of unimportant questions, prescribed an herb or drug of doubtful efficacy, and charged an exorbitant fee. The patient usually refused to take the medicine and recovered. It sometimes happened that he took the prescribed dose and perhaps recovered, too. On a level with the _feldsher_ and much preferred by the peasantry, stood the _snakharka_, a woman, half witch, half quack, who was regarded by the _moujiks_ with the greatest veneration. By means of herbs and charms, she could accomplish any cure short of restoring life to a corpse. "The _snakharka_ and the _feldsher_ represent two very different periods in the history of medical science--the magical and the scientific. The Russian peasantry have still many conceptions which belong to the former. The majority of them are now quite willing, under ordinary circ.u.mstances, to use the scientific means of healing, but as soon as a violent epidemic breaks out and scientific means prove unequal to the occasion, the old faith revives and recourse is had to magical rites and incantations."[5]

Neither of these systems was regarded favorably by the Hebrews. The _feldshers_ were, by right of their superior knowledge, an arrogant cla.s.s; and it was suspected that on more than one occasion they had hastened the death of a Jew under treatment, instead of relieving him.

The Israelites were equally suspicious of the _snakharkas_; not because they were intellectually above the superst.i.tions of their times, but because the incantations and spells were invariably p.r.o.nounced in the name of the Virgin Mary, and no Jew could be reasonably expected to recover under such treatment.

What was to be done for poor Mendel? Hirsch, a.s.sisted by suggestions from his wife, cogitated long and earnestly. Suddenly Miriam found a solution of the difficulty.

"Why not send to Rabbi Eleazer at Tchernigof?"

Hirsch gazed at his wife in silent admiration.

"To the _bal-shem_?" he asked.

"Why not? When Chune Benefski's little boy was so sick that they thought he was already dead, a parchment blessed by the _bal-shem_ brought him back to life. Is Mendel less to you than your own son would be?"

"G.o.d forbid," said Hirsch; then added, reflectively: "but to-day is Thursday. It will take a day and a half to reach Tchernigof, and the messenger will arrive there just before _Shabbes_. He cannot start on his return until Sat.u.r.day evening, and by the time he got back Mendel would be cold in death. No; it is too far!"

"_Shaute!_" (Nonsense!) e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed his wife, who was now warmed up to the subject. "Do you imagine the _bal-shem_ cannot cure at a distance as well as though he were at the patient's bedside? Lose no time. G.o.d did not deliver Mendel out of the hands of the soldiers to let him die in our house."

One of the most fantastic notions of Cabalistic teaching was that certain persons, possessing a clue to the mysterious powers of nature, were enabled to control its laws, to heal the sick, to compel even the Almighty to do their behests. Such a man, such a miracle worker, was called a _bal-shem_.

That a _bal-shem_ should thrive and grow fat is a matter of course, for consultations were often paid for in gold. To the wonder-working Rabbi travelled all those who had a pet.i.tion to bring to the Throne of G.o.d--the old and decrepit who desired to defraud the grave of a few miserable years; the unfortunate who wished to improve his condition; the oppressed who yearned for relief from a tyrannical taskmaster; the father who prayed for a husband for his fast aging daughter; the sick, the halt, the maim, the malcontent, the egotist--all sought the aid, the mediation of the holy man. He refused no one his a.s.sistance, declined no one's proffered gifts.

It was finally decided to send to the _bal-shem_ to effect Mendel's cure. But time was pressing, Mendel was growing visibly worse and Tchernigof was a long way off!

Hirsch rose to go in search of a messenger.

"Whom will you send?" asked his wife, accompanying him to the door.

"The beadle, Itzig Maier, of course," rang back Hirsch's answer, as he strode rapidly down the street.

Let us accompany him to Itzig Maier's house, situated in the poorest quarter of Kief. In a narrow lane stood a low, dingy, wooden hut, whose boards were rotting with age. The little windows were covered for the most part with greased paper in lieu of the panes that had years ago been destroyed, and scarcely admitted a stray beam of sunlight into the room. The door, which was partially sunken into the earth, suggesting the entrance to a cave, opened into the one room of the house, which served at once as kitchen and dormitory. It was damp, foul and unhealthy, scarcely a fit dwelling-place for the emaciated cat, which sat lazily at the entrance. The floor was innocent of boards or tiles, and was wet after a shower and dry during a drought. The walls were bare of plaster. It was a stronghold of poverty. Misery had left her impress upon everything within that wretched enclosure. Yet here it was that Itzig Maier, his wife, and five children lived and after a fas.h.i.+on thrived. In one respect he was more fortunate than most of his neighbors; his hut possessed the advantage of housing but one family, whereas many places, not a whit more s.p.a.cious or commodious, furnished a dwelling to three or four. The persecutions which limited the Jewish quarter to certain defined boundaries, the intolerance which prohibited the Jews from possessing or cultivating land, or from acquiring any trade or profession, were to blame for this wretchedness.

A brief review of the past career of our new acquaintance, Itzig Maier, will give us a picture of the unfortunate destiny of thousands of Russian Jews.