“Are you suffering much, mother dearest?” she asked, tenderly, smoothing away the dark hair from the clammy forehead.
“Yes—I—I’m sinking fast, my child,” she replied in a faint, hoarse voice. “I shall leave you very soon, Mascha, and you will be alone, with no other protector except God, to whose mercy I confide you. Trust in Him in the hours of affliction or misfortune, and by His infinite power He will guide your footsteps and protect you from all harm.” She paused, and added, “Though you may be scoffed at and persecuted by Orthodox Russians, never forget that you are one of God’s chosen, and while resenting insult, always refrain from revenge.”
“I can’t bear to hear you talk like this,” cried my sister, bursting into tears. “You must not—you shall not die!” Springing suddenly to her feet, she stifled her sobs, and said, “You sha’n’t starve! I’ll save you, even if compelled to beg bread from the Gentiles. I shall not be long, and I will bring you food.”
With these words, she threw a cloak around her shoulders, and opening the door, disappeared; while her mother closed her wearied eyes and prayed earnestly for succour.
Through the old uncleanly Ghetto—the quarter in which Jews were suffered to reside—Mascha wandered aimlessly, wondering where she could discover a person generous enough to give her a morsel of bread. She knew it was useless to ask for food of the people of her own faith, for they were all in terrible distress. Owing to the failure of the harvest for two consecutive seasons food was so scarce in Western Russia, that in many places the peasants were subsisting on grass and roots, while hundreds were dying daily of sheer starvation. But worst of all, the feeling against the Jews had become greatly embittered, from the fact that the moujiks, in their ignorant fanaticism, had been taught to believe by the village popes that the Hebrews had brought the famine upon the land. Hence Jew-baiting had become rife. Unfortunate Israelites were cuffed and assaulted in the open streets, and were unable to obtain redress, and in dozens of towns in Little and Central Russia the Ghettos had been looted and afterwards burned.
In these anti-Semitic excesses Jews were treated worse than dogs, often ruthlessly murdered without a hand being stretched forth to save them, while women were outraged in sight of their children, and there were committed diabolical atrocities that had raised the indignation of every European nation. Murder and pillage ran riot through the Tzar’s domains, side by side with the grim spectre Famine, that had spread starvation and death through the great Empire from the White Sea to the Caucasus.
The Ghetto at Mstislavl was the oldest quarter of the little town, consisting of one dark, evil-smelling street, into which the sun never seemed to shine. The black wooden houses, with numerous poles projecting from the windows, further increased the darkness of the narrow lane. From end to end Mascha walked through it, but found no one who could render her assistance. The place seemed deserted, the houses were all closed; the usually noisy colony seemed hushed by death.
Leaving the Jews’ quarter, she made her way through the town and entered the market-place, where a little business was still being carried on. Groups of moujiks in their dirty sheepskins were standing about idly, their thin, pinched faces showing that they, too, were feeling the effect of the dearth of food. While wandering along, engrossed in her own sad thoughts, Mascha chanced to look up, and her eyes fell upon a buxom young woman, who held a large piece of bread in her hand, from which she was feeding a great black dog.
The thought flashed across her mind that she must get food by some means, and save her mother’s life. Without a moment’s reflection, she stifled her pride, and rushing wildly across to where the woman stood, begged for a portion of the bread.