Not very far off, hard by a wall, a Jewish woman was giving birth to a child. Presently a Gentile woman with a basket half filled with loot took pity on the child and took it home, giving the policeman her address, while the mother was left bleeding to death.
It was also in this district of toil and squalor where the most desperate fighting was done by the Jews. One lane was held by five of them against a mob of fifty for more than half an hour until the five men were lugged off to jail, and then the remaining inhabitants of the lane became the victims of the most atrocious vengeance in the history of the day. A mother defended a garret against a crowd of rioters by brandishing a heavy crowbar in front of them. The maddened Gentiles then scaled the wall and charged the roof with axes and sledge-hammers. Part of the roof gave way. The woman continued to swing the crowbar until she fell in a swoon.
The houses of the richest Jews were closely guarded by the soldiery and, barring one exception, rioters were kept at a safe distance from them. Even the house of Ginsburg, the most repugnant usurer in town, was taken care of. Some army officers, indeed, directed various bands of roughs to the place on the chance of having their promissory notes destroyed, but the roughs failed to get near it. There was an instinct in official circles that the wrecking of wealthy Jewish homes was apt to develop in the masses a taste for playing havoc with “seats of the mighty.” For after all a man like Ginsburg and a titled plunderer of peasant lands are not without their bonds of affinity. The great point was that in dealing with Jewish magnates Popular Fury was liable to confuse the Jew with the magnate, the question of race with the question of class.
As to the Gentile magnates their attitude toward the rioters was one which seemed to say: “You fellows and we are brothers, are we not?” And their mansions were safe. Members of the gentry openly joined the rioters, some out of sheer hatred of the race, others for the sport of the thing, still others honestly succumbing to the contagion of beastliness. In the horrid saturnalia of pillage, destruction and rapine many a peaceful citizen was drawn into the vortex. A man stands looking on curiously, perhaps even with some horror, and gradually he becomes restless as do the legs of a dancer when the floor creaks under a medley of sliding feet. But then there was a large number of Gentiles who acted like human beings. Among these were members of the priesthood, although there were holy “little fathers” who pointed out the houses of their Jewish neighbours to the mob.
The best friend of the Jews during that day of horrors was Vodka. The sons of Israel were made a safety valve of by the government and Vodka rendered a similar service to the sons of Israel. It saved scores of lives and the honour of scores of women. Hundreds of the fiercest rioters were so many tottering wrecks before the atrocities were three hours old, while by sundown the number of dead and wounded looters was as large as the number of murdered and maimed Jews. Two men were found drowned in casks of spirits into which they had apparently let their heads sink in a daze of intoxication. A handsome young rioter in a crimson blouse staggered over the balustrade of a balcony, hugging a Jewish vase, and was killed on the spot. One man was killed in a struggle over a Jewish woman and several others had simply drunk themselves to death, while a countless number were bruised and disabled in the general mêlée, falling, fighting, injuring themselves with their own weapons of destruction.
Toward evening some of the streets had the appearance of a battlefield after action. Hundreds of men and women, swollen, bleeding, were wallowing in the gutters, in puddles, on the sidewalks, between piles of debris, in a revolting stupor of inebriety. Some of them slept several hours in this condition and then struggled to their feet to resume drinking. The trained rioters had thoughtfully seen to it that some casks of vodka, as also some accordions, should be reserved for the closing scenes of the bacchanalia.
The moon came out. Her soft mysterious light streamed through the rugged holes of shattered unlit windows; over muddy pavements carpeted with silks, velvets, satins; over rows and rows of debris-mounds on streets snowed under with down; over peasants driving home with waggons laden with plunder; over the ghastly figures of sprawling drunkards and the beautiful uniforms of patrolling hussars. Silence had settled over most of the streets. For blocks and blocks, east and west, north and south, there was not an unbroken window pane to be seen, not a light to glitter in the distance. The Jewish district, the liveliest district in town, had been turned into a “city of death.” In other places one often saw a single illuminated house on a whole street of darkness and ruin. The illuminated house was invariably the abode of Christians. Officers on horseback were moving about musingly, the hoofs of their horses silenced by thick layers of down. Most streets were impassable for the debris. Here and there the jaded sounds of revelry were heard, but there were some peasants who had come out of the day’s rioting in full control of their voices.
Seated on empty boxes and barrels, their fingers gripping new accordions, their eyes raised to the moon, a company of rioters on Little Market were playing and singing a melancholy, doleful tune. The Jews were in their hiding places.