And the scissors-grinder went forth in search of other customers, merrily whistling the while and leaving Mendel Greenberger behind, plunged in deep reflection.
THE SHLEMIHL.
Novo-Kaidansk was a most shlemihlig sort of place, and Yerachmiel Sendorowitz was the most shlemihlig of all its inhabitants. Indeed, his character as such was so pronounced and universally known that he was seldom referred to by his proper cognomen, but usually spoken of as “Yerachmiel Shlemihl,” or, in shorter form, “the Shlemihl.” For the benefit of those of my readers who are not familiar with the Judæo-German idiom, I will explain that the noun “Shlemihl” is generally supposed to be a corruption of the first name of Shelumiel ben Zuri-shaddai, one of the princes of Israel in the wilderness, of whom Heine has sung, and who, according to Jewish tradition, was a most awkward sort of fellow, who was continually getting into all sorts of scrapes. The noun “Schlemihl,” accordingly, signifies an aggravated sort of ne’er-do-well, a hopeless incapable; and the adjective derived therefrom is synonymous with all that is utterly unprogressive and wretched.
THE MAN WAS A WOE-BEGONE SPECIMEN OF HUMANITY, WITH HUNGRY EYES GAZING AT YOU OUT OF A CARE-WORN, FURROWED COUNTENANCE
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Both Novo-Kaidansk and Yerachmiel Sendorowitz were deserving of these appellations in fullest measure. The town was a collection of miserable huts and shanties, irregularly scattered over the dull expanse of a Lithuanian plain, with unpaved streets that were ankle-deep in dust most of the summer, and knee-deep in mud and slush and snow most of the winter. The man was a woe-begone specimen of humanity, with hungry eyes gazing at you out of a careworn, furrowed countenance, the lower part of which was surrounded by a neglected-looking, reddish beard; clad in an aged suit of many colors—a man who was ready to do any and every work for a few kopecks, and who was rarely so fortunate as to see a whole rouble. He was not a bad sort of fellow at all, nor stupid. On the contrary, he had somewhat of a smattering of Hebrew education, and he endured with patience the unceasing chidings and naggings of his wife Shprinze, who, despite the auspicious significance of her name—a Yiddish corruption of the melodious Spanish appellation Esperanza—Hope—and thus also a far-off reminder of the sojourn of the children of Israel in the beautiful Iberian peninsula—did nothing to inspire the spouse of her bosom with courage or confidence, but was enough to break down the resolution of any man. He was never known to answer her revilings with a single harsh word. No doubt much of his patience was due to his knowledge of the fact that Shprinze had ample provocation, for, whatever might have been the reason, Yerachmiel simply could not earn a living. But, though Shprinze had provocation for her ill-temper, justification she had none. Yerachmiel did the very best he could, and it was not his fault but only the cruelty of unfeeling fate which prevented him from extracting even “bread of adversity and water of affliction” from the world. He tried to earn a little by being a porter or burden-bearer for one of the merchants of the town at very scanty wages, but just as he was about to get the place, along came a younger and stronger man and offered to do the work for even less. Needless to say, the latter was selected. He thought he could earn his livelihood by being a Mithassek, that is to say, one who watches at the bed of the dead and performs the funeral ablutions and rites; but it was provokingly healthy that season. No one died for a long time; and when at last the angel of death did claim one of the Hebrew residents of Novo-Kaidansk—a wealthy Baal Ha-Bayith he was, too, whose family always paid liberally for all services rendered to any of its members—it just happened that they had a poor relative, an aged man of greater learning and stricter piety than Yerachmiel; and so, of course, he was preferred, and Yerachmiel was not considered at all. At one time he dealt in fruit, purchasing a small stock with a sum of money which a pitying philanthropist had given him in order to set him up in business; but the demand for fruit was very slack just then, and in a short time Yerachmiel decided to retire from that line of commerce with the capital which he had originally possessed, that is to say, nothing. He made a dozen other attempts to coax the unwilling world into providing him with sustenance, but each attempt ended with the same result—failure, and caused him to sink appreciably lower in the estimation of Shprinze, whose temper grew bitterer and whose tongue sharper with every new proof of her husband’s Shlemihligkeit. In fact, the term Shlemihl no longer harmonized with her conception of her husband’s worthlessness; it was too mild, too utterly inadequate. She began to address him by no other term than Shlamazzalnik, that is, one doomed and predestined to perpetual misfortune; and soon the neighbors and the other townspeople, and even the children on the streets, took up the cry, and “Yerachmiel Shlamazzalnik” resounded from one end to the other of the dusty highways of Novo-Kaidansk whenever the poor fellow made his appearance. Poor Yerachmiel! He used to console himself by saying that he was the equal in some respects of the great Ibn Ezra, the renowned Hebrew exegete and poet of the Middle Ages, for the latter was also an incurable Shlemihl and Shlamazzalnik. Yerachmiel used to think he was reading of his own experiences when he read the complaint of Ibn Ezra:
“Were I to deal in candles,
The sun would shine alway;
And if ’twere shrouds I’d handle,
Then death would pass away.”