9My journey to America began, then, in Mohilev on the Dnieper, right after Passover, in 1882, on a steamship named the Marusia.
All that I remember of the first day I spent on that ship is this: that it was cold, that I huddled into my chocolate-colored overcoat, and that it took a long time before the passengers stopped feeling strange to one another.
On the way lies the town of Ragatshav, in the Mohilev province. When we arrived there, police came up onto the landing-ramp and ordered everyone to go ashore. I looked for a pretext to stay on the ship. But it was no use. Every passenger was driven out of every corner. I had to walk across the “kladke” (gangplank) onto the shore.
At the side of the “kladke” stood a police inspector (nadziratel), who looked over every passenger coming down and ordered him to show his passport.
Perhaps he has a list of the people being sought, and I am one of them? — I reasoned. I felt almost like the victim of a sea-robber who 10drives his captive across a plank into the water. So that the inspector should not notice my eyes, I tried to keep them lowered; ostensibly looking at the water. If he should demand that I look him in the eyes, then we would see.
Luck was with me. The police inspector was busy with those who went ahead of me, and he simply neglected me. He did not stop me.
Directly opposite, by the river, on a little hill, stood a tavern; so I made my way there. As I entered the tavern, right behind me came a policeman, and he ordered me to show my papers. When I handed him my passport, he took it with the top down and the bottom up. He pretended he could read, and he left me in peace.
We traveled on. More than a full day and night passed.
Little by little I began to feel that I was in Little Russia (Ukraine). Groups of peasants appeared in tall lambskin hats. Such hats I had seen before only in pictures. They spoke Little-Russian among themselves — a language I had previously met only word by word, in Russian literature, or in songs that were sung. Most of them were drunk, and they behaved like the drunken peasants of my birthplace. A few of them had simply fallen down and lay stretched out in the filth on the deck (paluba) like dead men.
Around Nezhin, new Jews began to appear. One of them was a rabbi, or some other “kli-koydesh” (man of religious office). He wore a black, shiny, not-too-tall, cylindrical hat, and he had a pair of black, 11curled sidelocks. He spoke with a Volhynian accent, which grated in my ears. He cast a glance at me and fastened upon me with questions —
— Where are you traveling?
— To Berditshev, — I answered.
— What will you do in Berditshev?
— I am going there about a sugar business.
— What kind of sugar business?
— I will sell sugar there.
— What? From Lithuania you will travel to sell sugar in Berditshev? In Berditshev sugar is surely much cheaper than where you come from.
All this he said with a poisonous little smile. Had I been able to, I would have thrown him into the Dnieper.
— Well then, I'll buy sugar there, — I tried to make a joke of it.
To me there also attached himself a tall young man, a blond one, who was traveling from Mohilev to Kiev (so he said). He horsed around with everyone and never stopped telling about a position he held with the Kiev millionaire, Tereshchenko. He too asked me where I was traveling. How I managed to talk my way around the question, I do not remember.
The whole journey lasted two days and one night. We arrived in Kiev at night. I see 12now before my eyes how thousands of flames glitter and sparkle. A magic city. By the landing (pristan, harbor) stood a gendarme officer, who looked every passenger straight in the face. Again I remembered my troublesome eyes! If there is a warrant out about me, he will recognize me by them…
I hit upon this plan: one of my fellow travelers, a Mohilev Jew, a tall man with a little brown beard, had two small trunks; so I offered to help carry one of them down. My intention was that, holding the trunk on my shoulder, I would conceal one of my eyes, and the officer would see only one — and with one eye a man is not “cross-eyed” (kosoke).
The officer looked into my free eye, and — whether he had a report about me or not — he let me go.
I crossed the “kladke” ahead of the owner of the trunk, and he did not know where I had gone. When I was already on shore, I heard him shout at the top of his voice: “Kruglanski! Kruglanski!” He thought I had made off with his baggage.
But to go back and pass the officer again was not worth my while; so I waited until my anxious fellow traveler had come across to the shore with his second trunk. He was very agitated, and kept shouting: “Kruglanski!”
— Hush, don't shout! Here is your trunk, — I quieted him.
Up on the hill, above the river, stood a hotel; we went in there for the night's lodging. The two of us 13and some third Jew. Soon Tseytlin, the householder, came in to us and explained that for the night one could stay with him, but no longer, because Jews are not allowed to live in Kiev, and now it is stricter than ever.
Some time before, there had been the pogrom in Kiev, and many Jews there were preparing to travel to America. About this, and about the new severities toward Jews, Tseytlin talked with us. I remember how my fellow travelers spoke to him with submissiveness, the way poor people speak to a rich man; and how Tseytlin answered their questions with the self-assurance of a man who belongs to a higher class.
It was Thursday evening. I remember it, because in the morning I hurried to leave Kiev, so that I should not have to remain there over the Sabbath. To travel on the Sabbath I could not, because of the role I was playing as an old-fashioned young Jewish man with sidelocks. For the morning (Friday) at dawn I reckoned that after midday, before the Sabbath came in, I could reach Pastov, where Jews were permitted to live.
Until the train's departure I had about three hours' time. I set off to look over the city. Walking along a street that climbed uphill, I fell in with a young man, a tallish one, with a little blond beard. I turned to him with some question; he answered me, and chatting so, we walked together. I remember his voice and his Volhynian accent, as he told me that he was a “tobacco cutter” (tutun-shnayder).
14He told me that a great many Jewish families were getting ready to leave for America.
We came to a place where Jewish women stood beside worn furniture and all sorts of other household goods. My companion explained to me that many of them were victims of the Kiev pogrom; that they were selling their things in order now to travel to America. Several dozen such women were there, a few men too; but chiefly women.
That scene is one of the strongest that have remained in my memory from my journey to America.
When I realized that little time was left before the train's departure, I stopped a young Jewish cabman (izvoshtshik) and asked him whether he would make it in time (paspien) to bring me to the station.
— It surely won't take long (gedavern), — he answered me.
I remember his voice, his pronunciation, and his little sing-song. That instead of “gedoyern” one should say “gedavern” — this was for me a comical novelty. But that was not the reason the cabman left an impression on me.
When we drove up to the station, the train had already gone. We were a quarter of an hour late. The cabman had known that it would indeed “take long.”
I began to quarrel with him over why he had deceived me; but he still had complaints against me, and I did not want to make too much noise.
A Jew pointed out to me that right nearby, by the station, there was a little suburb named Solomenka, where Jews were allowed to live; so I decided 15to spend the Sabbath there. I found a Jewish inn (akhsanye) there, and I stopped.
On the Sabbath the guests spent a whole afternoon cracking “semetshkes” (sunflower seeds). That is not a Lithuanian food. The semetshkes are, in my mind, bound up with the pronunciation, and chiefly with the sing-song, of the Volhynian Yiddish. These small things greatly increased the feeling of loneliness in my heart. Incidentally, the Volhynian Jews made fun of my Lithuanian Yiddish. They mimicked me, mocked me and all of Lithuania.
For the first time in my life I was made to feel that I was a “Litvak,” and that “Litvak” is a term of abuse.
I, too, did not stay behind; but I was one against several, and in a strange camp. More than all the others, a red-haired Jew from Dubno got under my skin. The name of his town was well known to us, the people of Vilna; for in those years Vilna happened to have a town-preacher (magid) from Dubno, not to speak of the fact that the town is known to everyone through the famous Dubno Magid.
We, however, called it “Dubne” and not “Dibne,” as he did. That this Jew called his own town by a “twisted” pronunciation made an unpleasant impression on me. To add to all the troubles, he also spoke through his nose. And yet, despite all that, despite all the mimicking and the “bloodlettings” I had to endure from him, an impression remained with me that he was a likable person.
16The train to the border was due to leave on Saturday night. To buy a ticket myself I did not want, for at the ticket window of every station there used to stand a gendarme, and what if he noticed my eyes and had read a notice about me? I asked the householder's daughter, and she bought me the ticket.
I entered the railway car, took a place by a window, sat, and looked at the other passengers. What I saw here can today be called a historic scene. But here, first, a few introductory remarks are needed.
In earlier times very few Jews traveled from Russia to America, and the little that did go was from Lithuania and Poland — the poorest regions. From my own town, for example, in the seventies only a few families emigrated to America, and the town buzzed with talk of them. From Kovno, which lies not far from us, the emigration was greater, chiefly from Aleksot, a suburb that lies on the other side of the river Niemen. Aleksot belonged not to the Kovno province but to the Suwałki province. And from the Suwałki province more Jews traveled than from other provinces, except for the “Greater-Polish” ones — that is, those that lie near the German border, for from that region people also traveled to America.
And even from the Suwałki province and from Greater Poland people went only in small numbers. Mostly singly — one from here, one from there.
17From Little Russia, from Bessarabia — from the whole south of Russia, where a Jew had lived better, no one had dreamed of emigrating. Now, however, as a result of the pogroms, it was precisely in those regions that a great emigration-wave (khvalye) began. And people went from there not singly, and not in small groups, but by the hundred and by the thousand at once; and not from single towns or villages, but from everywhere.
The masses of new emigrants left their homes in order to seek a new home not for themselves alone, but for the entire Jewish people — although the majority of the wanderers did not have this purpose in mind. Each meant to better his own situation; whether he traveled because he too had been ruined in a pogrom, or because things were not going well for him anyway, or because he had simply caught the new spirit — he set off to seek a better fortune in the far country. About the people as a whole, intelligent idealists did the thinking — the “Americans,” who organized parties for this purpose. But the entire emigration, taken in general, was called forth by causes that showed every Jew that not only he alone, but the whole Jewish people, must seek a new home. Emigrating, therefore, every Jew had a consciousness that his journey was not only a personal journey, but a part of a great mass-migration, which is a historic event in the life of the Jewish people. The most ignorant emigrant knew this.
One more thing: into the idealistic side of the movement were drawn quite ordinary Jews as well. They became inspired together with the 18educated ones. Quite ordinary Jews, artisans and tradesmen, for whom life in Russia had not been bad, sold everything and joined the parties that were going to found a new Jewish life in America. With a religious fervor they did this; and along with it there were many examples of self-sacrifice, many golden moments recorded in those days.
That was the beginning of the Jewish emigration from southern Russia, and that was the beginning of the great Jewish emigration to America from everywhere. For no sooner had a great migration begun in southern Russia than its effect began to be felt in Lithuania, in Poland, and even in Galicia, where antisemitism then had no significance. Every poor Jew was dreaming of America.
It so happened that the train on which I had seated myself was the largest emigrant-train that had ever left Kiev. Groups of emigrants had gone from there, from Odessa, and from other places still earlier. But those groups were much smaller. The great mass that had gathered for the road had waited until after Passover, until the start of warmer days; and the Saturday night of which I speak here was the first Saturday night after Passover (the last day of Passover was a Tuesday; so people had waited until the end of the week). At the same time a great emigrant-train set out from Odessa, and along the way, at many stations on these railway lines, other Jews waited to travel with the same trains.
That Saturday night may be marked as the evening on which the great Jewish emigration 19to America began. On that very Saturday night a broad stream began that flowed for nearly two generations, made America into a great center of Jewish population, and had an effect on the life of the entire Jewish people.
In the year in question (1882) the number of Jews in the United States was fewer than a hundred thousand. As these lines are being written, some forty-odd years later, it already stands at close to four million.
When I entered the car, there were still about twenty minutes before the train's departure. The car was already full, however — full of Jews who were traveling to America, and of their friends. People were taking leave of one another. No “governor's passport” for crossing the border did anyone have. Nevertheless, everyone spoke openly of the journey as a journey to America.
Many of the passengers were victims of the pogrom, and others had suffered from it indirectly. Still others had resolved to emigrate under the influence of the general emigration-mood that the pogroms had created.
Directly opposite me stood a company of young Jews, who were escorting a handsome young man with a blond beard. They had a flask of wine, and they drank and sang. I remember the tune. Such things are not forgotten.
Beside me sat a youth of about sixteen, with the face of a gymnasium student, but with the cap of an artisan, and the cap was too small for him. Near him stood his father, a Jew with black hair, with red cheeks, with a pleasant smile and with the 20general look of a merchant. The father looked me over and said to me:
— You are surely traveling to America too. My son is traveling as well. I beg you, keep an eye on him along the way. — And lowering his voice still further, he added: — He is a gymnasium student; you are surely a university student. I beg you, keep an eye on him.
That, despite my cap and my sidelocks, he had guessed I was “surely a student,” was for me an unpleasant surprise.
The family name of the young man and his father was Broida. I promised the father to watch over his son. No other details of the scene, before the car began to move, do I remember. In my memory there has remained only a general impression of a tumult, at once joyful and sorrowful. Singing and leave-takings, weeping and laughter. The train was a long one, and I knew that in every car such scenes were taking place.
We passed through Pastov, and in the morning we arrived at Berditshev. In our train there appeared a whole company of educated young men and women. They came in with a merry uproar, speaking Russian. They were all traveling to America. I soon learned that this was the Berditshev branch of the party “Am Olam,” which had been founded in Odessa, Kiev, and several other cities, with the aim of emigrating to the New World. From Odessa such a party had set out some months 21earlier. And now the “Kiev Am Olam” and a second Odessa branch were on the road. To the “Kiev Am Olam” had joined organizations from other places as well.
These Russian-speaking young people from Berditshev were thus traveling as members of the Kiev “Am Olam.” The Kievans of the “Am Olam” themselves were getting ready to set out a few days later.
I sat in my car, looking over the educated young people and listening to their merry conversations. Not the same sort of people as the educated Jews of our regions; they carried themselves differently, and their Russian pronunciation, too, sounded a little different from ours — but still, people of my own class.
One of the group was a student of the Zhitomir teachers' institute. In him I took a special interest; for in all of Russia there were only two teachers' institutes for Jews: one in Vilna and the second in Zhitomir. So I regarded this institute-fellow as a relative whom one sees for the first time. His “uniform” (forme) was a little different from ours.
Among the Berditshev people was a tall, slim young man who wore boots with high, shiny boot-tops (kholyaves). He walked about the station, throwing out his long booted legs and chatting cheerfully with his fellow townsmen.
We had to take new tickets, and I wanted to buy a ticket all the way to the very border; but a few of the passengers said that one need not: you settle it with the conductor. And indeed: soon there 22came in a conductor (a Christian, naturally), and he uttered a Hebrew word, “sheloshe” (three), or “shnayim” (two). I do not remember exactly how much. Since I had to be cautious until I had crossed the border, it would have been better for me to buy a ticket and pay the full price. But to stand apart from the group one cannot; so I paid the “shnayim” or the “sheloshe,” and we traveled on.
We came to a station named Zdolbunova. There we had to change trains. It turned out that we had to wait a couple of hours. It was a fine day in the month of May. The sun shone and warmed. The emigrants strolled about.
I walked about with my young new friend Broida. At last our train arrived, and we traveled on.
No sooner had we settled ourselves on the benches than smugglers (kontrabandshtshikes) appeared. They proposed to us to “steal” across the border. One of them was a Jew with a dark-red little beard and a hoarse voice; several passengers who sat around me turned away from him. They did not trust him. I, however, questioned him thoroughly, and I convinced myself that he meant nothing other than business.
But one had to put together a group, otherwise it would not be worth his while. So I set about looking for partners, and that did not come easy to me. One young passenger looked me over with great suspicion. I assured him that the red little Jew meant nothing bad. He, however, made a cold face. Speaking 23with a hard Volhynian tongue, with heavy, sharp r's (reshn), he declared that he too was going to the border. A couple of other passengers did accept my proposal, and we gave the red, hoarse Jew earnest-money. The upshot was that the young man with the hard r's joined us too.
He made on me the impression of an artisan, chiefly of a ladies' tailor.
The arrangement with the smuggler was that we should travel by rail as far as Dubno, and from there they would take us on a wagon, through the region that lies near Radziwiłł, to the Austrian border. On the other side of the border lies the Galician town of Brod. Radziwiłł then belonged to Russia, and Brod to Austria.
In Dubno we waited until it grew dark. Then two young Little-Russian peasants appeared. They led us for a good while. At last we stopped at a peasant house, a small hut (khatke), freshly whitewashed outside and inside — quite different from the peasant dwellings in the villages of Lithuania. One of the two “sheygets-lads” who led us I remember: he was tall and barefoot, and at his side hung a little keg. He had smuggled schnapps from Austria into Russia, for in Austria there was no duty on liquor and in Russia it was dearer; so the smugglers from Russia into Austria “packed across” cigarettes and cigarette-tobacco.
In the peasant cottage we had to wait very long. We lost our patience and began 24to suspect that they were keeping us on purpose, in order to frighten us and wheedle more money out of us. And so indeed it was.
At last they took us and led us on; on foot they led us, over fields and meadows. They made great ceremony of it. Every little while the tall “sheygets” gave us a sign with his finger that we should keep “sha” (quiet), or else there would be God knows what.
We walked and walked. The hoarse smuggler had vanished. Along the way there joined us a tall, broad Jew, a sallow one, clean-shaven. He spoke with quite a different accent from the Volhynian Jews. He was a man of Brod, and he was going home with a bit of contraband.
The whole time I held my Polish passport in my hand. Should we fall into the hands of the police and it come out that I was wanted for revolutionary offenses, a Polish passport would be worse than no passport at all. And besides me, the Mohilev clerk (sborshchik) who had forged my passport would have suffered. Therefore I kept the document ready, to throw it away if need be.
Further I remember only the moment when we were told the good tidings, that we were already on the Austrian side of the border. There they again set us up on a wagon.