"K-ke-kkerb-kkerb-lech!!" came from Feitel the Stammerer.

"Nienblech!" put in Yainkel Fonfatch, speaking through his small nose.

"No, more!" called out a couple of merry paupers.

"Kerblech, kerblech!" shouted the rest in concert.

And through their shouting and their speeches sounded such a note of anger and of triumph, it seemed as though they were pouring out all the bitterness of soul collected in the course of their sad and luckless lives.

They had always kept silence, had _had_ to keep silence, _had_ to swallow the insults offered them along with the farthings, and the dry bread, and the sc.r.a.ped bones, and this was the first time they had been able to retaliate, the first time they had known how it felt to be entreated by the fortunate in all things, and they were determined to use their opportunity of a.s.serting themselves to the full, to take their revenge. In the word kerblech lay the whole sting of their resentment.

And while we talked and reasoned with them, came a second messenger from Reb Yitzchok-Aizik, to say that the paupers were to come at once, and they would be given a ruble each.

There was a great noise and scrambling, the three wagons filled with almsgatherers, one crying out, "O my bad hand!" another, "O my foot!"

and a third, "O my poor bones!" The merry ones made antics, and sang in their places, while the horses were put in, and the procession started at a cheerful trot. The urchins gave a great hurrah, and threw little stones after it, with squeals and whistles.

The poor folks must have fancied they were being pelted with flowers and sent off with songs, they looked so happy in the consciousness of their victory.

For the first and perhaps the last time in their lives, they had spoken out, and got their own way.

After the "canopy" and the chicken soup, that is, at "supper," tables were spread for the friends of the family and separate ones for the almsgatherers.

Reb Yitzchok-Aizik and the members of his own household served the poor with their own hands, pressing them to eat and drink.

"Le-Chayyim to you, Reb Yitzchok-Aizik! May you have pleasure in your children, and be a great man, a great rich man!" desired the poor.

"Long life, long life to all of you, brethren! Drink in health, G.o.d help All-Israel, and you among them!" replied Reb Yitzchok-Aizik.

After supper the band played, and the almsgatherers, with Reb Yitzchok-Aizik, danced merrily in a ring round the bridegroom.

Then who was so happy as Reb Yitzchok-Aizik? He danced in the ring, the silk skirts of his long coat flapped and flew like eagles' wings, tears of joy fell from his shining eyes, and his spirits rose to the seventh heaven.

He laughed and cried like a child, and exchanged embraces with the almsgatherers.

"Brothers!" he exclaimed as he danced, "let us be merry, let us be Jews!

Musicians, give us something cheerful--something gayer, livelier, louder!"

"This is what you call a Jewish wedding!"

"This is how a Jew makes merry!"

So the guests and the almsgatherers clapped their hands in time to the music.

Yes, dear readers, it _was_ what I call a Jewish Wedding!

A GLOOMY WEDDING

They handed Gittel a letter that had come by post, she put on her spectacles, sat down by the window, and began to read.

She read, and her face began to shine, and the wrinkled skin took on a little color. It was plain that what she read delighted her beyond measure, she devoured the words, caught her breath, and wept aloud in the fulness of her joy.

"At last, at last! Blessed be His dear Name, whom I am not worthy to mention! I do not know, Gottinyu, how to thank Thee for the mercy Thou hast shown me. Beile! Where is Beile? Where is Yossel? Children! Come, make haste and wish me joy, a great joy has befallen us! Send for Avremele, tell him to come with Zlatke and all the children."

Thus Gittel, while she read the letter, never ceased calling every one into the room, never ceased reading and calling, calling and reading, and devouring the words as she read.

Every soul who happened to be at home came running.

"Good luck to you! Good luck to us all! Moishehle has become engaged in Warsaw, and invites us all to the wedding," Gittel explained. "There, read the letter, Lord of the World, may it be in a propitious hour, may we all have comfort in one another, may we hear nothing but good news of one another and of All-Israel! Read it, read it, children! He writes that he has a very beautiful bride, well-favored, with a large dowry.

Lord of the World, I am not worthy of the mercy Thou hast shown me!"

repeated Gittel over and over, as she paced the room with uplifted hands, while her daughter Beile took up the letter in her turn. The children and everyone in the house, including the maid from the kitchen, with rolled-up sleeves and wet hands, encircled Beile as she read aloud.

"Read louder, Beiletshke, so that I can hear, so that we can all hear,"

begged Gittel, and there were tears of happiness in her eyes.

The children jumped for joy to see Grandmother so happy. The word "wedding," which Beile read out of the letter, contained a promise of all delightful things: musicians, pancakes, new frocks and suits, and they could not keep themselves from dancing. The maid, too, was heartily pleased, she kept on singing out, "Oi, what a bride, beautiful as gold!"

and did not know what to be doing next--should she go and finish cooking the dinner, or should she pull down her sleeves and make holiday?

The hiss of a pot boiling over in the kitchen interrupted the letter-reading, and she was requested to go and attend to it forthwith.

"The bride sends us a separate greeting, long life to her, may she live when my bones are dust. Let us go to the provisor, he shall read it; it is written in French."

The provisor, the apothecary's foreman, who lived in the same house, said the bride's letter was not written in French, but in Polish, that she called Gittel her second mother, that she loved her son Moses as her life, that he was her world, that she held herself to be the most fortunate of girls, since G.o.d had given her Moses, that Gittel (once more!) was her second mother, and she felt like a dutiful daughter towards her, and hoped that Gittel would love her as her own child.

The bride declared further that she kissed her new sister, Beile, a thousand times, together with Zlatke and their husbands and children, and she signed herself "Your forever devoted and loving daughter Regina."

An hour later all Gittel's children were a.s.sembled round her, her eldest son Avremel with his wife, Zlatke and her little ones, Beile's husband, and her son-in-law Yossel. All read the letter with eager curiosity, brandy and spice-cakes were placed on the table, wine was sent for, they drank healths, wished each other joy, and began to talk of going to the wedding.

Gittel, very tired with all she had gone through this day, went to lie down for a while to rest her head, which was all in a whirl, but the others remained sitting at the table, and never stopped talking of Moisheh.

"I can imagine the sort of engagement Moisheh has made, begging his pardon," remarked the daughter-in-law, and wiped her pale lips.

"I should think so, a man who's been a bachelor up to thirty! It's easy to fancy the sort of bride, and the sort of family she has, if they accepted Moisheh as a suitor," agreed the daughter.

"G.o.d helping, this ought to make a man of him," sighed Moisheh's elder brother, "he's cost us trouble and worry enough."

"It's your fault," Yossel told him. "If I'd been his elder brother, he would have turned out differently! I should have directed him like a father, and taken him well in hand."

"You think so, but when G.o.d wishes to punish a man through his own child going astray, nothing is of any use; these are not the old times, when young people feared a Rebbe, and respected their elders. Nowadays the world is topsyturvy, and no sooner has a boy outgrown his childhood than he does what he pleases, and parents are nowhere. What have I left undone to make something out of him, so that he should be a credit to his family? Then, he was left an orphan very early; perhaps he would have obeyed his father (may he enter a lightsome paradise!), but for a brother and his mother, he paid them as much attention as last year's snow, and, if you said anything to him, he answered rudely, and neither coaxing nor scolding was any good. Now, please G.o.d, he'll make a fresh start, and give up his antics before it's too late. His poor mother!

She's had trouble enough on his account, as we all know."

Beile let fall a tear and said:

"If our father (may he be our kind advocate!) were alive, Moishehle would never have made an engagement like this. Who knows what sort of connections they will be! I can see them, begging his pardon, from here!

Is he likely to have asked anyone's advice? He always had a will of his own--did what he wanted to do, never asked his mother, or his sister, or his brother, beforehand. Now he's a bridegroom at thirty if he's a day, and we are all asked to the wedding, are we really? And we shall soon all be running to see the fine sight, such as never was seen before. We are no such fools! He thinks _himself_ the clever one now! So he wants us to be at the wedding? Only says it out of politeness."

"We must go, all the same," said Avremel.