The lad looked steadily towards the waned stars and the clear moon. Much lay behind him, he knew. More lay in front of him. Beyond the bridge along the road, deep in his city, lay a little thing and a great, the first republic, School, whose citizenship he must yet earn. He had moved there hitherto with averted eyes, a stranger. Thence great affairs and greater expanded circle-wise, beyond race, beyond country, beyond even the gigantic world, out beyond the moon, the sun; even—he laughed aloud—even into the hazard of the very stars.
He rose from the grass and walked over to the water's edge. The air was warm with the new summer. The two horses moved about near him, like friends. He was young, young! Come, it would be morning soon! Was a sleepy bird already singing a first song?
He slipped off his clothes swiftly and dived into the water. When he rose again, the water-drops flung from his hair gleamed like gems. It was cold, harshly, superbly cold; but he shouted for joy as he struck for the bank in the first breath of the morning. The horses rubbed their noses together and communed.
GLOSSARY
(The following Yiddish words—mainly, of course, of Hebrew or German extraction—are spelt in such a fashion as rather to recall their actual pronunciation than to indicate what is often a dubious or mixed origin.)
Becher. Beaker.
Blintsie. A thin cake, usually of mashed potatoes, and fried in oil.
Bobbie. Grandmother.
Chayder. A Hebrew school.