Sholem Aleichem - Tevye the Dairyman and Motl the Cantor's Son

“Oh, if only God would grant me a different salve, maybe someday I’d be able to see my mother and father,” she says with tears in her sick eyes.

It makes my heart ache. I can’t bear to hear her talk about her mother and father. I can’t bear to see her crying. I say to her, “Do you know what, Goldele? Soon I’ll be going to America. When I start making a living, I’ll send you a different salve.”

“You aren’t joking? Swear a holy oath on that,” says Goldele, and I swear a holy oath that I won’t forget her. If God will help me, as soon as I start to make a living in America, I’ll send her a different salve right away.

D.

I know for sure that on Saturday morning we are leaving for London. We’re already preparing for the journey. My mother, Bruche, and Teibl go from one inn to the next saying goodbye to the emigrants — not only saying goodbye but pouring their hearts out to one another.

We realize we are kings compared to other emigrants. Among the emigrant shlimazels are some who actually envy us. Their woes are not to be described. At home they were prosperous businesspeople and lived well. Their children married well. They always had room at their table for poor people. Now they would be happy to have what they once gave away. Today they are all paupers! What strange people!

I am fed up with their stories. At one time when they talked about pogroms, I was all ears. Now when I hear the word pogrom, I take off. I prefer happier stories, but no one tells anything happy. The barber-surgeon Beaver was happy. He was a liar. But he too is in America now.

“He’s probably filling people’s ears with plenty of lies!” says our friend Pinni.

“They won’t let him fill their ears for long. Don’t worry, in America they hate people like that. In America a liar is worse than a bastard!” says my brother Elyahu, and Bruche asks him how he knows that. A quarrel follows. I and Pinni side with Elyahu, Teibl sides with Bruche. Whatever one says, the other one says the opposite.

WE, THE MEN: America is a country of pure truth.

THEY, THE WOMEN: America is a country of liars.

WE, THE MEN: America is built on truth, justice, and compassion. THEY, THE WOMEN: On theft, murder, and immorality!

Luckily my mother interrupts. “Children, why do you have to fight over America when we’re still in Antwerp?”

She’s right. We’re still in Antwerp. But not for long — soon, soon we will be leaving for London. Everyone is leaving, all the emigrants, the whole gang of them.

What will become of Antwerp?

A.

When we depart Antwerp, I have feelings of regret that I’ve had for no other city. But more than Antwerp and its people, I’ll miss the emigrants, and even more I’ll miss my friends. Many left earlier — Vashti, Alteh, and Big Motl are now in America making a living. The ones remaining are Mendl the bar mitzvah boy (Bruche gave him the nickname Colt) and Goldele, the girl with the bad eyes. No one else stayed on.

What will the Ezra, who helps the emigrants, do? Whom will they help now? I feel sorry for Antwerp. I’ll miss it, a fine city with fine people. They all deal in diamonds. People in Antwerp carry precious stones in their pockets, ready for business. They all know the trade: cutting, grinding, and polishing stones. Whomever you meet is either a diamond cutter, grinder, or polisher. Some of the boys from our gang remained on here and became diamond cutters.

If we weren’t so eager to get to America, my family would have apprenticed me to a diamond cutter. My brother Elyahu likes the trade, and so does our friend Pinni. They say if they were a little younger, they would become diamond polishers. Bruche laughs and says that precious stones are better to wear than to polish. Pinni’s wife agrees with her. She also likes to wear precious stones. Every day they go looking in the display windows and can’t get enough of the stones. Diamonds and other jewels are everywhere to be seen, enough to make your head spin and dazzle your eyes. The women go out of their minds. Pinni laughs and says all these stones are ridiculous, and anyone impressed with them is mad. Don’t you think he wrote a song about it? This is how it goes:

And that’s all I remember.

B.

To remember all of Pinni’s songs, you’d have to have the mind of a government minister. My brother Elyahu is always battling with him over his songs. He says that if the Ezra finds out that Pinni is writing songs about Antwerp, they’ll drive us out. And we need the Ezra to help us leave. We go there every day. We’re like old friends. Fräulein Zaichik knows who we are by name. She loves me as if I were her own child. My mother is like a sister to her. Even Bruche says Fräulein Zaichik is the reincarnation of a Jewish girl with a Jewish soul. The entire gang of emigrants has fallen in love with her, especially since she speaks to us in Yiddish, not in German.

Everybody else speaks German in Antwerp, there’s nothing for it! Pinni says the country doesn’t even belong to the Germans, and the Jews could very well speak Yiddish — it wouldn’t do them any harm. All the Jews on this side of the border dislike Yiddish and like German. Even the beggars speak German. They’ll die of hunger so long as their last words are in German! This is what Bruche says, and she urges us to go to London. She’s sick and tired of Antwerp and its language. Wherever you go, all you hear about is jewels and diamonds!

“If only a little tiny diamond would attach itself to us! If only someone was willing to lose a few diamonds and I would find them!” Bruche’s eyes glow with hope. I don’t know why she’s so excited by diamonds and jewels. I’d give away all the precious stones in the world for one box of paints and a paintbrush. Not long ago I drew a ship with a pencil on paper, a ship with a gang of emigrants, crowded one on top of the other. I gave the drawing to Goldele, who showed it to Fräulein Zaichik, who showed it to everyone at the Ezra.

My brother Elyahu also saw it. I heard from him, “Figures! Will you ever stop drawing figures?” He beat me harder than ever. I told Goldele about it, and she told Fräulein Zaichik, who asked my brother Elyahu why he beat me. She showed him the drawing and argued with him for a long time. He heard her out, and when he came home, I really got it from him. My brother says he has to beat the crazy desire for drawing figures out of me.

C.

Today is our last time to go to the Ezra. I don’t know why we go. My brother Elyahu is complaining about something. Pinni is waving his arms around. Bruche is constantly interrupting. My mother is crying. The people of the Ezra are talking to us, as usual, in German. Three of them sit there competing to see who can speak better German. Don’t ask me what they say. My mind is now on the ship sailing the sea, or in London, or in America.

Suddenly Goldele comes running over and says in one breath, “Are you really going?”

“I’m going.”

“When?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Where to?”

“To London.”

“And from there?”

“To America.”

“And I have to stay here with my sick eyes! Who knows when I will see my mother and father?” Goldele cries her heart out.