XXI OUT OF THE OMNIBUS

EVERYBODY cried; even our servants and the neighbouring peasants, and indeed it must have been a pathetic sight, to see a lonely little boy, packed in among all sorts of people, venturing out into the far world by way of the omnibus.

It was very difficult, this going away to school. All our relatives had to be convinced that it was not a terrible tempting of providence. Many remained unconvinced, and their prophecies of dire consequences were not reassuring.

The fitting out was upon a generous scale. Seamstresses were busy and the tailor, a deaf mute, measured me in his rough way, making notches upon long, paper tape; for he couldn’t read even figures. Fortunately, clothes, so long as they were generously large, were regarded as satisfactory. What did not fit me then, might, another year. Feather-beds and pillows whose contents had been contributed by many generations of Sabbath geese, were packed, sewed into linen sheets; but what appealed to me most was a basketful of goodies. Poppy-seed cakes, cheese cakes, twisted Sabbath bread, a generous portion of roast goose, and with it all, many admonitions not to eat everything at once.

How hard it was for me to cry, how glad I was when it was all over, and what a sense of freedom possessed me—in spite of the fact that I was packed into the omnibus like a sardine, and that my fellow passengers had no special regard for a little Jewish boy.

I doubt that were I now to fly in an air-ship, I should feel such exaltation, and were I to be chief among the distinguished citizens who ride on some patriotic errand, would I feel anything akin to the pride which then filled me. The higher emotions wipe out the lower differences, and my racial and other enemies seemed like brothers during those last, fast fleeting moments of my boyhood’s life.

Good-bye, my brother by vaccination, now a shoemaker’s apprentice, passing the omnibus whistling. He stood there with puckered lips, silent for a second; then a smile passed over his dirty face, his brotherly instinct overcame all barriers, he jumped on to the step of the vehicle and shook my hand, saying: “Z’Boghem”—“with God.”

Good-bye, you son of the Pany; you tried to humiliate me when I was king. I knew he, too, would have shaken hands with me; but one of his class has to be careful, and a French governess and social proprieties are higher barriers than old scores. He nodded his head and smiled, and I thanked him for the smile.

Good-bye, you miller’s sons, looking like two huge, penny rolls, leaning against the walls of the mill.

True sons of their Teutonic father, they grasped my hands, leaving huge flour spots on my new suit.

My neighbour in the omnibus scolded, for she, too, had to brush her coat; but what are flour spots compared with warm, fraternal handshakes?

“Aufwiedersehn!” the miller’s sons called after me. That was what they carved on their sister’s tombstone, “Aufwiedersehn.”

Ah, Martha! My first, pure love! I shall never forget your kiss or your brother’s warm hand-shake.

Good-bye, all ye goose girls, geese and goslings. The earth seemed covered by them.

Good-bye, you Lutheran pastor, who once gave me a glimpse of a Christian’s heart and a Christian’s vision. He was tightly buttoned, and scarcely nodded his head. I understand it now; it was ministerial dignity.

Good-bye, St. Florian, guarding your huts and stables against fire. You looked neglected, your halo was tarnished and the damp had spotted your saintly robes. Was it because a fire engine had been brought to town?

Good-bye, St. Peter, keeper of the gate of Heaven, with a smile upon your face as if it were all a joke, this locking and unlocking of the abode of bliss. You didn’t look as if you would keep a poor Jewish lad out of Heaven.

Good-bye, blessed Virgin Mary, standing upon a crescent moon and a pillar of cloud. You beautiful Jewish mother of the Son of God!

The women in the omnibus said: “Oh! Virgin Mary, intercede for us!” For some reason, the Virgin never appealed to me until in riper years I saw the Sistine in the Dresden gallery. I think I now understand why the women adore her.

Good-bye, faithful old priest; you always looked like a Sphinx to me. Your face was like that of a Cæsar and not of the Christ. You were a Roman and not a Jew. Yet they loved you and you were on your way to make some one’s dying easier. I never liked your acolytes—they were always cruel to me, and I ran whenever I saw one. They told me once when they were piled on top of me, that I crucified the Christ and that they beat me “for the love of God.”

What a black eye—the first black eye I ever had—I got for “the love of God”! It hurt, though, just as much as if I had got it because of their love for the devil.

Good-bye, you Jewish dead, who lie by the dusty road. My buoyant spirits flagged as I passed the thorn hedge, beyond which they lay in dire confusion.

Good-bye, old teacher, whom they drew out of the muddy river. They put you closest to the gate and your grave is level with the roadway. It was terrible to lose the love of your wife and have her unfaithful to you. I know now why you despaired. I have read Hosea since, and I understand your grief. It was not because the child was “Lo ami”—not my people—that you despaired; but because the people were harlots and did not understand your “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity.” It isn’t easy to have faith at such a time, old teacher, and yet Hosea, in his grief, said: “Come let us return unto the Lord. For He hath torn and He will heal us. He hath smitten and He will bind us up.” Too bad we couldn’t have read Hosea together.

Good-bye, Adèle, whose grief I shared. Love—I understand it now. Love and not wrath is a consuming fire. All those who love, suffer, especially when love tries to break the barriers of class or race.

Good-bye, old Jewish soldier, you three-quarters of a man, who showed me “Old Glory” and interpreted to me the riddle of the Stars and Stripes. Thanks, many thanks for the patron saint under whose care you put me—“Honest Abe!” The church calendar may not mark his name; but what is a church calendar compared with the record made by those whose chains he broke, or in whose hearts he inspired the hope that chains can be broken?

Good-bye, my father, whom my eyes never saw and my fingers never touched. I could not weep at your grave. How can we miss what we never had? Now, with children of my own, I understand how hard your dying was; how brave your life. Not because you fought for your country, most men are too cowardly to be cowards in time of war; but you went alone where “the pestilence walketh in darkness.” You were not afraid of the “terror by night.” You may even have been afraid of those guns—I fear them and my children after me. I do not believe you ever killed a Prussian. They may have called you coward, but you were not afraid of the cholera. You comforted the sick and buried the dead, when strong men fled and mere brute strength was unavailing.

I wonder whether you ever struggled as I struggled, whether you suffered just as I suffered. There is no picture of you. I often wished that I could see your features and read in them the story of your inner life. Mother always looked more longingly into my face than into the faces of the other children. They said she spoiled me because I looked like you. Sometimes I think I feel you in me—some one—not quite myself—sometimes many who are not myself—is it you? Is it you, father, and all the passing generations? Is it a race? Is this the way we live on—in one another? Is this the way we bless or curse the world? I am much I do not wish to be. I do more I do not wish to do. How much am I just myself? How much you? How much this strong, pathetic race to which I belong, against whose ill I have striven, whose good I have not always understood, whose ignominy I have had to share? I tried to run away from that inheritance, father; I did not understand when I rode past your grave that morning in the omnibus—a little boy, packed in among Magyar, Slav, Lutheran and Catholic, who hated me because I was your son.

I have travelled in many an omnibus since. I have seen greater griefs than mine. I now laugh at that pathetic little boy in the omnibus; others will do the same—but although I laugh at that little boy I do not understand. I cannot understand.

One thing you have not left me. One thing which neither you nor your father nor your race nor any one has left me—is hate. If it was ever in me—lurking somewhere—she loved it out of me—your wife, my mother.