Water foams, water foams, one can hear afar. When father and mother die the orphan sheds tears.—The orphan goes, the orphan goes, the orphan does all in vain. People judge, people say that the orphan is good for nothing.—The orphan goes, the orphan goes, in pain and in sorrow. People judge, people say that the orphan is drunk with wine.—With my friends, with my friends there grows wheat and grain. With me, orphan, with me, orphan, there grow but grass and thorns.—Dear God, dear God, dear God of mine! Why have you not created me with the same luck as my friends have?
The tender feelings of love, replete with sorrows and despair, are left almost entirely to women; men are too busy to sing of love, or less romantic in their natures. But they are not entirely devoid of the poetic sentiment, and they join the weaker sex in rhythmic utterance, whenever they are stirred to it by unusual incidents that break in on their favorite attitude of contemplation and peaceful occupations. Such are military service, the pogroms, or mob violence, and riots periodically instituted against the Jewish population, expatriation, and the awful days of Atonement. On these occasions they rise to all the height of feeling that we have found in the other productions, and the expression of their attachment to their parents, wives, and children is just as tender and pathetic. The Russian Jew is naturally averse to the profession of war. He is not at all a coward, as was demonstrated in the Russo-Turkish War, in which he performed many a deed of bravery; but what can be his interest to fight for a country which hardly recognizes him as a citizen and in which he cannot rise above the lowest ranks in civil offices or in the army, although he is called to shed his blood on an equal footing with his Christian or Tartar fellow-soldier? Before the reign of Nicholas he was regarded beyond the pale of the country's attention and below contempt as a warrior; he was expected to pay toward the support of the country, but was not allowed to be its defender in times of war. He easily acquiesced in this state of affairs, and learned to regard the payment of taxes as a necessary evil and the exemption from enlistment as a privilege. Things all of a sudden changed with the ukase of Emperor Nicholas, by which not only military service was imposed on all the Jews of the realm, but the most atrocious regime was inaugurated to seize the persons who might elude the vigilance of the authorities. A whole regiment of Chapers, or catchers, were busy searching out the whereabouts of men of military age, tearing violently men from wives, fathers from infant children, minors from their parents. The terror was still increased by the order of 'cantonment,' by which young children of tender age were stolen from their mothers to be sent into distant provinces to be farmed out to peasants, where it was hoped they would forget their Hebrew origin and would be easily led into the folds of the Greek-Catholic Church.[42]
This sad state of affairs is described in a long poem, a kind of a rhymed chronicle of the event; it lies at the foundation of many later lyrical expressions dealing with the aversion to military service, even at a time when it was divested of the horrors of Nicholas' regime. Under the best conditions, the time spent in the service of the Czar might have been more profitably used for the study of the Bible and commentaries to the same, is the conclusion of several of such poems:
Ich gēh' arauf auf'n Gass'
Derlangt män a Geschrēi: "A Pass, a Pass!"
A Pass, a Pass hāb' ich gethān verlieren,
Thut män mir in Prijom areinführen.
Führt män mir arein in ersten Cheeder,
Thut män mir aus mein' Mutters Kleider.
Och un' wēh is' mir nischt geschehn,
Wās ich hāb' mir nit arumgesehn!
Führt män mir arein in andern Cheeder,
Thut män mir ān soldatske Klēider.
Och un' wēh is' mir nit geschehn, etc.
Führt män mir arein in Schul' schwören,
Giesst sich vun mir Teichen Trähren.
Och un' wēh is mir nit geschehn, etc.
Ēhder zu trāgen dem Kēissers Hütel,
Besser zu lernen dem Kapitel,
Och un' wēh is' mir nit geschehn, etc.
Ēhder zu essen dem Kēissers Kasche,
Besser zu lernen Chumesch mit Rasche.
Och un' wēh is mir nit geschehn,
Wās ich hāb' mir nit arumgesehn!
I walk in the street,—they cry: "A passport, a passport!" The passport, the passport I have lost. They take me to the enlisting office. They lead me into the first room. They take off the clothes my mother made me. Woe unto me that I have not bethought myself in time!—They lead me into the second room; they put on me a soldier's uniform. Woe unto me, etc.—They lead me into the synagogue to take my oath, and rivers of tears roll down my face. Woe unto me, etc.—Rather than wear the cap of the Czar—to study a chapter of religious lore. Woe unto me, etc.—Rather than eat the Czar's buckwheat mush—to study the Bible with its commentaries. Woe unto me that I have not bethought myself in time!