JUVENILE STRUGGLES
My visit to my home was very pleasant; instead of the cold surroundings
I had been used to among strangers, I now met on all sides loving
glances from my brothers and sisters, and more especially from my
mother, who was proud of the son who had already earned eight bright
silver florins. She entertained the greatest hopes as to the result of
my future studies and saw me in imagination a country doctor sent for by
all the villagers for miles around, handsome fees pouring into his
pockets; in fact, in time a rich man. In one word, the learning
displayed by her first husband was always present to her mind, and she
eagerly sought in me all the qualities and talents he had possessed.
Had it depended upon my mother I should have started for St. Georghen at
once, so as to be able to begin my studies at the Latin school in
October as soon as the term commenced. But it was finally decided that I
was to stay at home till I had passed from childhood to youth, which
takes place in Jewish families at the age of thirteen and is celebrated
by the Feast of Bar Mitzva. So I stayed on, and by degrees got used to
the idea of having to leave home for good in a short time.
On the occasion of this Feast of Bar Mitzva the youth who is to enter
the ranks of the Orthodox Jews must hold a public discourse on some
religious subject, and is admitted to the reading of the Thora in the
synagogue, and this symbolical feast, which marks the period at which he
leaves childhood behind him and enters youth, is very beautiful. An
entertainment is given, to which all his friends of the same age are
invited; in the centre of the table is a large basket made of a kind of
baked dough; this is filled with rods made of pastry, which are
distributed at dessert amongst the boys and eaten by them as a sign that
they will not be needed for the future.
My mother shed tears of joy at this feast, and during my discourse she
imagined she heard my father speaking, and more than once sobbed out,
"He is sure to be happy, for his father is praying for him in Paradise."
Strange to say, the whole ceremony made little impression on me. My one
desire was to give my mother pleasure and win the admiration of my
hearers; but the religious part of the ceremony did not interest me
much, for the influence which the orthodox Jewish faith had on me as a
child had diminished through my having read German books. I was not yet
a sceptic, but the fear of overstepping the ritual laws had disappeared.
Pork and Christian food no longer seemed poison to me, and with the
gradual breaking away of the barriers the sanctuary of my faith was more
exposed to the outward attacks made upon it. The first attack shook it
without destroying it entirely; my peace of mind was hardly disturbed;
not, for instance, like Renan's, who, in his twentieth year, rushed into
the cell of his friend at midnight, exclaiming, "Oh, I have become a
doubter!"
There is only a short path from exaggerated fanaticism to scepticism. A
few days after the feast my knapsack was packed--a very small knapsack,
containing a few clothes and some books--and at dusk I left Duna
Szerdahely, my crutch under my arm and accompanied by my mother. We
hoped to be lucky enough to fall in with some carter taking corn to the
weekly market at Presburg who would give us a lift in return for a drink
or perhaps even from charity. And we were not mistaken, for we were soon
overtaken by some carts, but as they were heavily laden with sacks of
corn and the road was bad, we were given seats in two different carts.
Although my mother placed me as comfortably as possible among the sacks
and begged the man walking beside the cart to look after me, I heard her
call to me several times during the night to hold on tightly so as not
to fall out. Thus I arrived one fresh autumn morning at the toll-gate
of Presburg, and spent a few days in the town, during which time I did
not cease to admire the one-storied houses with their many windows.
We continued our journey to St. Georghen in a cart drawn by four oxen,
which we happened to meet on the way. This unostentatious entry into the
pretty little town at the foot of one of the spurs of the Carpathians
was a fitting beginning for the poverty-stricken existence I was
destined to lead there.
Our first visit was to a certain Hirsh-Tirnau, a man noted for his piety
and a school friend of my father, who, for the sake of his dead friend,
agreed to give me a lodging gratis, though not as willingly as he might
have done, for he would much rather have had me study the Talmud than
devote myself to Christian studies. As for my lodging, I had permission
to spread my mattress of straw in some part of the house at night, and a
pillow and blanket were given me by charitable people. But, after all,
it was something to have a place to sleep in and a roof over my head,
and as soon as my mother was satisfied on this score she went with me to
the Director of the Piarists' (Friars) College and entered my name in
the list of those who were to study in the first Latin class, or the
Parva, as they called it.
Nearly half the money I had earned in Nyék had to be deposited here as
entrance fee; with the other half I had to buy the necessary
school-books, and thus I was left without a penny in my pocket, though
the question of my board had not yet been touched upon.
It was the business of the Jewish commune to arrange for the daily
midday meal for students of the Talmud, and this they did. Charitable,
but mostly poor people offered me one meal a week at their table, and on
Saturdays I was the official guest of the Jewish commune. The cashier
gave me an assignment (or Bolette) on one of the richer members. This I
had to present on Fridays to the lady of the house, and it was often an
unpleasant surprise to her. By this means I got a better meal, which,
however, I ate with the bitter feeling that I was an unwelcome guest.
It was a different thing in the case of the other meals; they were given
freely, were the result of human kindness, or bestowed in memory of my
dead father, and tasted better to me in consequence. This manner of
getting my meals had its comical side too, for it often happened that I
ate the same dish all the week according as it was the dish of the day
at the various houses I visited. But I had at least enough to eat, had
even a piece of bread given me sometimes for my supper, and as long as I
did not lose the favour of one or other of my patrons I was better off
even than at home as far as my board went.
The custom of "boarding," which was willingly carried out by even the
poorest Jews, speaks well for the charity of that community on the one
hand, and on the other for their desire to assist and encourage poor
students in their pursuit of knowledge. The poor, deserted, and
much-oppressed Jew was always glad to share his hardly-earned crust of
bread with those who thirsted for knowledge, and it certainly is a
splendid trait of real humanity and of a noble endeavour to help in the
intellectual struggle.
Being provided with board and lodging, I could now give my undivided
attention to my studies in the Parva. My mother, whom it had cost a
great effort to part from me, had given me much good advice as to my
behaviour when left alone among strangers. She gave me a few pence for
pocket-money and a bag of meal, from which I was to make my soup for
breakfast in the morning, and after embracing me warmly several times
she left me.
This second separation was not as hard as the first one; habit makes
everything easy in time, and when, having made friends with my comrades,
I even took delight in going to school, I was able to overcome and
forget the adversities of my daily life, and real childlike mirth and
gaiety caused the first year of my school life to pass very pleasantly.
There could be no question of over-exertion for me, who had already
learnt by heart and translated whole volumes of Hebrew. The elements of
Latin grammar, delivered, strange to say, in the Latin tongue, the
rudiments of history, geography, and a little arithmetic were the
branches of knowledge with which I was made familiar at the college
conducted by the Piarists at St. Georghen. The greatest stress was laid
upon the acquirement of the Latin tongue, in which we were obliged to
carry on our general conversation after two months' time, and any one
heard speaking his mother-tongue at school, whether Hungarian, German,
or Slav, was condemned to write out the auxiliary verb "_sum, es, est_,"
or some theme ten to twenty times, and to hand it in as a pensum. In
order to control this, there was a regular system of spying at school;
one of the scholars carried the so-called "_Liber asini_" (donkey's
book) hidden on his person, and as _agent provocateur_ began to speak in
his mother-tongue, and if any one answered him in the same he whipped
out the book, exclaiming: "_Inscribas, amice!_" ("Inscribe your name, my
friend"); he left the delinquent no peace until he had entered his name,
and a suitable punishment was meted out to him the following Saturday.
This practice was a remnant of the Middle Ages, and formed a part of the
severe _régime_ of monastic life in vogue at that time in the Hungarian
monasteries. A lively contrast to the spirit of national education which
crept in later, it seems strange to us to-day, when the Hungarian
language is rightly cultivated as the acknowledged language of the
State. Just as severely was Catholic ecclesiastical discipline kept up
in many respects. Lutherans, Calvinists and Jews were obliged to repeat
the "Veni Sancte Spiritus reple tuorum corda fidelium!" ("Come, Holy
Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful"), and also the "Our Father" and
the "Hail Mary"; we were not allowed to quit the room whilst the lesson
in catechism was going on, nor were we permitted to bring meat to school
on Fridays; in fact, there was a sort of silent pressure exercised on
the scholars in the hope of their embracing the Catholic religion--a
pressure exercised without result, it is true, but it had a strange
effect on me, who had been an Orthodox Jew, and would not for the world
have pronounced the word "cross."
My teacher, a Piarist of twenty, Father Siebenlist by name, a man of
prepossessing exterior and great kindness of heart, seemed to take a
fancy to me from the beginning. He often pinched my cheek in a friendly
way, sometimes gave me an apple, and when, in the depth of winter, I
appeared at school with insufficient clothing, he called me up to his
room, gave me a warm comforter, a waistcoat, and once even a pair of old
trousers; in fact, he did what he could for me in every respect, moved,
I am sure, by pure benevolence.
I certainly always did my duty at school as far as was in my power. I
was considered the second best scholar, but could not attain to the
position of primus, for the simple reason that I studied one subject
less than the others, namely, catechism.
At the examination at the end of the first term I succeeded in gaining
the approval of my teachers and of the visitors who were present; the
praise I earned was sweet to my youthful vanity, but while all my
companions were able to distinguish themselves in the presence of their
parents and relations, it was hard to have no one to share my pleasure.
But this bitter feeling of desertion had all the more effect on my
ambition, and when, in the second term, I was the only scholar who
received for his pensum (a translation from Hungarian into Latin) the
classification "sine," that is _without_ fault, I began to see what my
mother meant when she spoke of "the inheritance of my father," and it
was no wonder I took pleasure in forming hazy pictures of my future.
When I ask myself to-day why, in spite of my bodily misery, I felt the
spur of ambition, and studied with such diligence, I find that the real
reason is to be found, not so much in a disposition favoured by nature,
as in my poverty and forlornness. I had no hope of help or protection
from any side, the possibility of better times in the future depended
entirely on my industry and activity, and that is why I worked so hard.
Though fortune had smiled on me at the beginning of my student's life,
it was less kind to me later in the matter of daily existence, and it
seemed as though I were to be strengthened in my youth by means of hard
struggle for the even harder struggle I was to go through in the future.
On account of my worldly, or rather Christian, studies, I soon lost the
favour of my orthodox Jewish friend who had let me lodge in his house,
and I had to look for another lodging, without having a penny in my
pocket. It was the same with my meals, and for similar reasons I was
reduced to five meals a week, later even to four. Jewish charity was not
compatible with Christian education, and only amongst the more
enlightened of the Orthodox Jews--the mere idea of neologism was then
almost unknown--did real humanity and pity for the starving boy gain the
upper hand. It may, in some cases, have been the result of the altered
circumstances of my kind but mostly poor benefactors, since they needed
every mouthful of food they had for their own increasing families. In
any case, I soon began to suffer the pangs of hunger; the strict diet I
was obliged to keep to, only stimulated my already healthy appetite, and
my feelings as I sat in a corner of the courtyard, learning my lessons
while other boys of my age were dining at their parents' tables, are
indescribable. I feasted with my eyes, and felt as though I could have
disposed of the contents of a baker's shop. The hungry-looking eyes of a
healthy boy, full of life, speak the most eloquent language in the
world. Later on, in my adventurous life, I often came face to face with
the dreadful monster called "hunger." His horrible, grinning features
have impressed themselves indelibly in my memory, for hunger caused me
to suffer equal pangs in my miserable lodging in the large town, or
among the sand-hills of the steppes of Central Asia.
I found another lodging with a childless couple; the man was a
cap-maker, and as his wife wished to have some one to talk to in her
free hours, her choice fell upon me; for even then, in spite of all my
privations and struggles, I was known for my lively manner and untiring
loquacity.
As the lodging of this worthy couple consisted of one room only, I was
given a corner in the kitchen, where I was allowed to spread my straw
mattress every night; during the day I was either at school or in the
court, and in the middle of the day, when there was no school, I either
wandered about in the streets or sat in a corner of our court reading or
learning my lessons.
For a time false pride had gained the day over hunger, and the pieces of
bread I received from my schoolfellows in return for helping them with
their lessons replaced the mid-day meal; but when they noticed that the
colour was gradually leaving my cheeks, and that my liveliness
decreased, their hearts were touched, and I was invited to dinner,
sometimes by one, sometimes by another; so that, at the end of the term,
my position as _protégé_ of the school was assured, and as second in
the class I had gained the love of my schoolmates.
Two of them were specially kind to me in those days. One was a Herr von
Vaymár, later on a distinguished lawyer in Tirnau; the other a Herr
Hieronymi, later Hungarian Minister of Commerce, who recognised me
thirty-five years afterwards in the house of the Director of the
National Museum, Von Pulszky, and was agreeably surprised at the
metamorphosis that had taken place in his former _protégé_.
Now came the delightful holidays, and with them the time for my return
home. The son of a well-to-do peasant from the neighbourhood of
Szerdahely gave me a lift in his cart, and it is impossible to describe
the delightful feeling with which I crossed the threshold of my parent's
door, bearing my certificate, on which my name was written in large
golden letters, and showed this first triumphal result of my work to my
mother.
My heart understood the meaning of her warm maternal kisses and of the
hot tears she shed. Friendly neighbours had managed to explain to her
the meaning of the words "classification" and "eminent" in my
certificate; without being able to read them, she stared at my name,
written in large letters, and kept remarking, "Of course it is quite
natural, for my son Arminius has his dead father's brains, and I am
quite sure he will be a success."
These were the happiest moments of my youth. The delightful "Home,
Sweet Home," the comfortable feeling of being with friends, and the
knowledge that, for a time at least, I was free from the horrible
spectre of hunger, did me a great deal of good. Unfortunately these two
months fled like a midsummer night's dream, and when, at the beginning
of autumn, I started for St. Georghen, my well-mended clothes in my
knapsack, and a few pence in my pocket, the earnest side of life, with
all its struggles, was again before me. I bravely tore myself away from
my mother's embrace, and so, getting a lift now and then, and walking
the rest of the way, I arrived the second time at St. Georghen.
I was now to be in the second class, or Secunda, and rise a step in my
student's life. The worries and troubles as to board and lodging, and
the acquisition of the necessary books had recommenced, and caused me
more than once to blush with shame, and in spite of all my self-denial I
was unable to procure all I needed.
Unfortunately my new professor in the second class was not so kindly
disposed towards me as the dark-haired young priest in the first class
had been, and when I went to enter my name in the list, I was received
with the not very flattering remark, "Well, Moshele" (the name given to
the Jews in general), "why dost thou study? Would it not be better for
thee to become a 'kosher' butcher?" In spite of these remarks, which
were more malicious than witty, I found it desirable to show my last
year's certificate, and to beg him to be kind to me and protect me. This
he promised, smiling, but all the same, during the whole school-year, he
not only mocked and scoffed at me, but in spite of my diligence, always
kept me back in the class, and very often earnestly advised me not to
continue my studies. He was certainly a splendid specimen of a professor
whose business it was to guide the youthful mind through the halls of
knowledge, humanity, and enlightenment.
But unfortunately this was the prevailing tone among the priests who
were entrusted with the school teaching, and roughness and fanaticism
flourished undisturbed in the shadow of semi-education. Exceptions were
very rare, and from his earliest childhood the Jewish boy of that period
received the saddest impressions of the position he was to fill in the
future.
The real Magyars, the ruling element in the country, more chivalrously
inclined and of marked indifference to religious affairs, have always
shown themselves kinder and more tolerant to Jews; but all the more
disgraceful was the behaviour of the Slavs, and in spite of my
reputation as a good scholar, I was often exposed to the wanton
behaviour of passing Christians in the streets of St. Georghen, had
stones thrown at me, and was greeted with the insulting "Shide Makhele!
Hep! Hep! Hep!" and other similar titles.
The second year at St. Georghen was anything but agreeable, and was
full of privations of every kind. Only once or twice a week did I have
sufficient to eat, and oh, the bitterly cold nights in the kitchen of
the cap-maker, with only a miserable counterpane as covering! When my
misery was at its height I received, through the kindness of my last
year's teacher, the employment of "boots" in the monastery, where I had
to make my appearance early in the morning, in order to clean the boots
placed outside the doors of three professors, and sometimes to brush
their clothes. I performed this office in the corridor, by the light of
the fire blazing in the stove, which not only warmed me but gave me
sufficient light to learn my lessons by, and so I always managed to
appear at school with my lessons well prepared. And when I was able to
still my hunger with a piece of bread or some potatoes, I was the
liveliest amongst my comrades, and was even able at times to move my
surly professor to a smile.
My sojourn in St. Georghen gave me the first proof of how much youth can
bear. Hunger, cold, mockery, and insult, I experienced them all in turn;
but the greatest misery was not capable of darkening the serene sky of
youthful mirth for more than a few minutes, and even my healthy colour
returned after a short interval of bodily collapse.
Although I had only just completed my fourteenth year, I had made many
plans for the future, and built many castles in the air. While other
scholars spent their time in games and in sport, I had always indulged
in the delight of reading books about travel, heroic deeds, and
simply-written historical works, and a book was to me not only a friend
and comforter in trouble, but it even drove away hunger; for the fire of
my excited fancy nourished not only my mind but my body too, and
occupied my senses to such an extent that I often forgot both hunger and
sleep.
Extraordinary was the change that took place in me as far as religion
was concerned. There was, of course, not a trace of the excessive ardour
of Jewish orthodoxy left. Fringes and phylacteries had long been done
away with; the law as to ritual food seemed to me childish and
ridiculous, and I had been prevented touching pork only by my aversion
to the unaccustomed taste. The glimpse I had already had into the
various religions, the acquaintance gradually gained with the causes of
certain natural phenomena, which superstition had formerly interpreted
quite differently, and, lastly, the vast difference I found between
principle and action in my Catholic teachers, had nearly upset all my
beliefs; they trembled on their bases.
Of a complete want of religious feeling or of conversion to another
faith there could be no question, but in the ladder that was to lead me
to heaven many rungs were broken, some even missing entirely, and in
the midst of the hard struggle for life I had neither time nor
inclination to soar to the higher regions of metaphysical contemplation.
It was chiefly my experiences during the time I spent in service in the
monastery of the Piarists in St. Georghen which stimulated my
indifference in religious matters. The contrast between the way of
speaking and of acting of these ecclesiastics was often very marked.
They did not seem so very particular as to religious observances, and
when one morning the student who had been ordered to serve at the early
Mass did not appear on the scene, I had to put on the cassock and serve
as though I had been one of the regular acolytes. I knew the catechism
by heart, they said, and was quite like a Catholic: there was no need to
make any difficulty about it. I enjoyed the comedy very much, and this
and similar experiences were a good preparation for my future _rôle_ of
Mohammedan priest. It was towards the end of the second year that the
idea of leaving St. Georghen for the larger provincial town of Presburg,
in the same neighbourhood, took firmer root in my mind; I hoped to find
more opportunities for study there and better means of livelihood. When
I thought of the sufferings and deprivations I had gone through in St.
Georghen at the beginning of my stay there, it was not hard for me to
take up my staff and seek my fortune elsewhere. Only the thought that
my father's grave was in the churchyard of St. Georghen made me waver,
for many a time had I gone out there in moments of bitterness and wept
away my trouble on the grave. And now I was to leave it.
It was during one of these visits that I resolved to do away with the
crutch I had till then carried under my left arm, and which not only
gave rise to many satirical remarks among my schoolfellows, but also
wore out my coat-sleeve. In a fit of vanity I broke the crutch over my
father's gravestone, and with a heavy heart and slow, laborious steps I
returned to the town, hopping most of the way on one foot. At first it
was very hard to walk, but being now in my fifteenth year I was much
stronger, and, aided by my vanity, and with the help of a stick, I was
soon able to overcome all difficulties.
I limped more than I had done, but at least I was rid of my crutch, and
I soon left St. Georghen with my knapsack (no heavy burden) and my
certificate containing the classification "Eminent." By my mother's
advice I was not to spend the next holidays at home but with her
relatives in Moravia, in the town of Lundenburg. The place of my
destination seemed further off than did later the most distant parts of
inner Asia. I had arrived in Presburg, the famous old coronation town,
without a penny in my pocket. After having wandered about helplessly in
the streets, and gazed my fill at the high houses all around me, and
having had a good meal at the expense of an acquaintance from
Szerdahely, whom I met by chance in the town, my attention was attracted
by a cart which was just being laden preparatory to starting for Vienna.
I was told that the cart belonged to a hackney-coachman of the name of
Alexander, a rough but good-natured man, who would perhaps take me with
him to Vienna for nothing, if I could manage to gain his heart.
Trembling, I proffered my request, and having inspected me from head to
foot, he said there was no more room on the box, but if I could make
myself comfortable in the basket of hay strapped on to the back of the
conveyance, he had no objection to taking me with him. In a minute I had
climbed into the basket, and making myself comfortable in the soft hay,
I started for the imperial town of Vienna, undisturbed by the jerks of
the rumbling vehicle.
Arrived in Vienna, I had first to look up a relative, from whom I hoped
to receive the necessary sum to take me to Lundenburg, for in 1845 there
was already a railway between Vienna and that town.
Mr. G., a well-to-do calico manufacturer, received me very kindly, kept
me in his house for two days, and gave me money for a third-class
ticket, besides a few pence for travelling necessaries. Quite delighted,
I started for the Nordbahn. I was to travel by rail for the first time,
and intending to provide myself with plenty of food for the journey, I
bought a quantity of fruit and various dainties, especially my favourite
kind of confectionery, the so-called butter-cake.
But on arriving at the ticket-office I found, to my horror, that I had
spent too much; had, in fact, bought ten or fifteen butter-cakes more
than I should have done. As the Arabic proverb says, "The stomach is the
origin of all troubles," and here was I in a sorry plight! What was to
be done? With a disturbed countenance I told the clerk at the
ticket-office of the plight I was in. He laughed, and advised me to ask
in Latin for the missing sum from some gentlemen who were standing in a
corner of the hall. As it was nearly time to start, I picked up courage
and approached the group of gentlemen, saying in everyday Latin: "Domini
spectabiles, rogo humillime, dignemini mihi dare aliquantos cruciferos
qui iter ferrarium solvendi mihi carent" ("Honoured gentlemen, would you
give me a few pence, as I have not enough to pay for my railway
ticket?"). This Latin speech from a small, lame boy, such as I was, had
its effect, and they soon collected about two shillings for me. So I
took my ticket, and hopping gaily through the waiting-room, got into a
compartment of the train for Lundenburg.
Those who know anything of the bond which draws Jewish families
together, will not be astonished that my uncle, David Malavan, received
the son of his sister, who had emigrated to Hungary years before, with
open arms, and that my other relatives were kindness itself, and did all
they could to make my holidays pleasant for me. They gave me a new suit
of clothes and a few florins to take me home again, and I started just
before the term began, travelling by Vienna to Presburg.
It was not long before I discovered that it was to be my fate in the old
Hungarian coronation town to lead a life of martyrdom. I was never very
much attracted by large towns; the narrow horizon, enclosed between two
rows of high houses, and the hard pavement seemed to me to be in keeping
with the narrow-mindedness and hardness of heart of the inhabitants, and
the more I missed the blue sky the sadder I became inwardly. After many
useless wanderings I came to the conclusion that there could be no
question here of a free lodging, and was very glad when a certain Mr.
Lövy, whose son had failed in his examination in the second class,
offered me shelter in return for helping his son with his lessons. True
it was only half of a folding-bed, which by day was pushed behind a
bench, but I accepted it with delight.
As far as my board was concerned, I was destined by fate to go through
all the torments of Tantalus. Mr. Lövy had a cookshop, and soon after
midday the one room in our small lodging began to fill with poor
students and tailors' journeymen, to whom, for the modest sum of
threepence, a meal was served, consisting of soup, meat, and vegetables,
not in very large quantities, it is true, and showing very primitive
culinary skill, but all the same sufficient to satisfy the heroes of the
thimble and the doctors-to-be. Custom there was plenty, and there would
have been even more had not Mr. Lövy made a rule that any one failing to
pay three times was not to enter the house again. Strangers, the length
of whose purse was as yet unknown, could easily indulge in the luxury of
_one_ dinner, but my destitute state was well known to my landlord, and
so I had no credit even for a single meal. The state of my feelings as I
sat at dinner-time in a corner of the room, trying in vain to keep my
eyes fixed on my book, and feeling all the gnawing pains of hunger, may
well be imagined, and now and then I could not help stealing a glance at
the students and tailors as they sat at table enjoying their meal.
This eager, hungry look of a starving lad seemed sometimes to appeal to
them, for now and then one or other of them would make a sign to me to
finish the vegetables he had left, or some one pressed a piece of bread
into my hand; so that I generally managed to get a trifle to still the
worst pangs of hunger, and partly to satisfy the inner man, which had
already caused me so much trouble in my short life.
The reader will see from this that my position in Presburg was not of
the most brilliant. In school matters I was not much better off. I was
to study in the third class at the college of the Benedictine monks, and
when I went to Father Aloysius Pendl to enter my name in the list, his
fat reverence received me with the following words, "Well, Harshl, so
you want to be a doctor, do you?" The fact that I had formerly been
dubbed "Moshele," and now "Harshl," did not vex me in the least, but it
was unpleasant as proving what treatment I had to expect in the future;
and the three years I went to the college under the archway in Presburg
will never be forgotten by me, recalling as they do endless instances of
stupid priestly animosity and disgraceful intolerance.
Later on in life I again met that amiable director, Father _Pendl_, who
ought to have been used as a _pendulum_ on a village church spire,
rather than have been placed at the head of a college. Our second
meeting was under quite different circumstances. I was then an honoured
traveller in the Monastery of Martinsberg, and although he did not
remember me, I have never forgotten him. Unfortunately the personality
of the teacher is not without influence on the subjects he teaches, and
in the third class, and even more in the fourth, I found that my desire
for study was rapidly decreasing, and that my visits to school partook
more and more of the nature of forced labour, so that I was happiest
when I was able, after having learnt my lessons, to read or study for my
own pleasure, that is, when I could occupy my youthful mind in my own
way, without control from others.
The ease with which I made use of the Latin tongue for general
conversation, and also the fact that when I began my studies I knew four
languages--Hungarian, German, Slav, and Hebrew--was the reason I turned
my attention to the acquirement of other languages. I had heard that a
knowledge of French was necessary in order to be considered _bon ton_,
and that without it no one could pretend to any education worth speaking
of. So I decided to learn the language at once, and bought a small
grammar by a certain La Fosse, which possessed the advantage of giving
the pronunciation of the words in German transcription, thus making the
help of a teacher unnecessary. It was, of course, a miserable
pronunciation, but I worked my way through the book the best way I
could, and, as with the help of the Latin I knew, I was soon able to
understand books written in a simple style, I was, after a few weeks'
time, full of hope that I should soon be able to speak French.
When alone I used to make up sentences or carry on a conversation with
myself, or read the most trivial things, declaiming them with great
pathos; and in the space of a few months I had learnt so much that I had
(especially in the lower class I was in) acquired a reputation for a
much greater knowledge of French than I really had. Whether it was my
own deceptive self-consciousness supported by the ignorance of those
whom I associated with, or my natural talent for languages which was
then beginning to show itself, I do not know; certain it is that I
conversed in French without restraint, and by my volubility surprised
not only myself but all who heard me. It developed to such a mania with
me, that I addressed every one in French--peasants, tradespeople,
merchants, Slavs, Germans, and Hungarians, it was all the same to me,
and great was my delight if they stared at me and admired me for my
learning(?). Such juvenile tricks were the only amusement I had in my
otherwise very hard life. In every other respect I was excessively badly
off, and there is not a stone in the little town on the Danube that
could not tell pitiable tales of my extreme misery and suffering.
As long as I had half of the folding-bed at Mr. Lövy's I was at least
sure of a shelter, and had only to fight against hunger. But one evening
I had for a bedfellow a young man, just arrived from a foreign country,
and from him I caught an illness which showed itself after some days in
constant irritation of the skin, and in consequence of which I was
immediately sent away by Mr. Lövy. As I owed that good man a few pence
he retained all my personal effects as payment of the debt; so one dull
autumn evening I left the house with my school-books under my arm, and
wandered about in the streets, not daring to apply for shelter for fear
of being turned out again on account of my disease.
It was nine o'clock, when, quite exhausted by hunger and fatigue, I sank
down on a bench in the Promenade. My glance fell upon the windows of the
one-storied houses opposite; I saw children at table having supper,
while farther on there were others playing games and running and jumping
about. I heard a piano being played, thought of home and my mother, and,
seized with a feeling of unutterable loneliness, I began to cry
bitterly.
Having put my boots under my head for a pillow, I had just lain down on
the bench to try to sleep, when I heard the tramp of regular footsteps
approaching from a distance.
"That is the watchman," I thought, "going his nightly round."
Trembling with the fear of being discovered and taken up as a vagabond,
to spend the night in a cell, I crept under the bench and hid there
until the watchman, wrapped in his long cloak, had passed on. He did not
notice me, and thus I was saved from the shame of spending a night in
prison.
Of course there was no further possibility of sleep that night, and with
an anxious heart I peered out from under the bench. The lights in the
windows were extinguished one by one, the watchman passed several times,
but not very near to me, and I lay there, cowering under the bench the
whole of that cold autumn night, till the break of day. I went to
school that day, but gave notice that I was ill, and it was only after a
fortnight's sojourn in the hospital of the Friars of Mercy that, once
more in good health and much stronger, I was able to start again on my
thorny way.
After this sad interval my natural liveliness soon returned. I finished
the third and fourth classes in Presburg at the Benedictine College the
best way I could, but I took far more interest in the progress I was
making in my private studies than in satisfying my professors. This
certainly had no good result, for I had begun to study alone, without
first acquiring the solid foundation of a college education; but on the
other hand it spurred me on to greater industry and perseverance, as,
being free from all control, I was master and pupil in one person.
Like all autodidacts, I had greatly overrated the results of my work,
paying no attention whatever to the difference between reading a thing
superficially and learning it thoroughly. The consequence was I fell
into faults that I have never been able to eradicate. But I learned with
delight and diligence, and being hardened by constant struggles against
Fate, questions of material comfort ceased to trouble me much.
As my circle of acquaintances widened, it was easier for me to gain my
living by teaching. I found shelter with an old bachelor, a usurer,
whose lodging consisted of a single room and a tiny ante-room where I
slept, with the usurer's coat for my covering. This shameful old
Harpagon begrudged me even the crumbs he left, although I filled the
office of man-servant and watch-dog for him; but he was mistaken in
thinking me of much use in the latter capacity, for were I once asleep,
a thief, in fact a whole regiment of thieves, could have rushed over my
prostrate body without awakening me. Oh! golden hours of youth! With
what pleasure I dwell on them to-day, when in my soft, comfortable bed I
have difficulty in stealing a few hours of sleep from friend Morpheus!
In spite of every comfort and convenience I cannot to-day attain to what
I could when I went to bed hungry and slept on the hard, bare boards.
As far as boarding went I was better off just then, for my fame as a
teacher had spread in the lower classes of Jewish society, and it was
chiefly to cooks and housemaids I gave lessons in reading and writing.
In some cases where I had inspired great confidence I was employed to
write billets-doux, and in return for this service of love I received a
good meal, sometimes even dainties.
I always found that cooks were the persons who most indulged in
love-letters; each one seemed to have been crossed in love, and whether
its flame was fanned by proximity to the fire or by other unknown
reasons, certain it is that the ladies who practised the culinary art
were my best customers, and if I was able to commit to paper a sigh, a
longing look, a greeting sweet as sugar, or even a kiss, I was sure of a
rich reward, and could reckon on a good dinner or supper for days to
come.
From cooks and housemaids my reputation spread to the young ladies, or
rather to the lady of the house. One evening at the request of a cook
who was head over ears in love with her boot-maker, I sang the
well-known German song--
"Schöne Minka, ich muss scheiden,
Ach, du fühlest nicht die Leiden!"
("Lovely Minka, I must leave you,
Ah! you cannot guess my sorrow!")
to the accompaniment of a guitar. My sonorous voice (I had, of course,
no idea of singing) seems to have penetrated to the sitting-room, and
made a favourable impression, for the attention of the lady of the house
and her daughters was attracted; I was called into the room, made to
sing some songs, and when the lady smoothed my curls and praised my
voice and my hair, I became aware that I had stumbled upon a _gradus ad
Parnassum_, and that I was in for a good time.
I was not engaged in the house itself, for the aristocratic feelings of
plutocracy revolted against the idea of employing the cook's teacher.
But I was recommended to others, and was soon introduced into the Jewish
society of Presburg (the lines between which and Christian circles were
very distinctly defined in those days) as private teacher of Hungarian,
French, and Latin.
The sum received for these lessons was, of course, in proportion to the
age and position of the teacher, very modest, sometimes not exceeding
two florins a month, which worked out at about one penny an hour. But
when my teaching was attended with great success my salary was raised,
and thus I was enabled, by dint of devoting three hours a day to
teaching, to live pretty comfortably, for things were cheap in Presburg
in those days. I was at all events freed from my greatest care, the
question of daily bread, and was even able now and then to buy some
article of second-hand clothing; and oh! how proud I was when I bought
with my own hard-earned money a tolerably threadbare coat or pair of
trousers!
Unfortunately my success had its bad effects, for after spending eight
hours a day at school and three or four in teaching, there was little
time left for my private studies. Besides, even this small success awoke
in me a desire for the pleasures of life, such as a visit to the theatre
now and then, or a piece of cake; and I was in danger of losing my zeal
in the pursuit of higher aims.
In spite of all I had gone through I was childish and frivolous enough
to allow my head to be turned by the watery ray of sunshine that Fate
had sent me. The knowledge that I was now well fed and tolerably well
clothed would have made me presumptuous had not Divine Providence sent
me a timely warning and roused me from my lethargy.
This warning was conveyed by the War of Independence of 1848, which had
just broken out. At the first approach of the storm the schools were
closed and lectures discontinued. Commerce was stopped, and every one
was anxious as to the result of the storm that was breaking over their
heads. To make matters worse, the mob in Presburg began a regular
persecution of the Jews, plundering the ghetto, breaking into houses and
shops, and destroying hundreds of barrels of wine and spirits in the
cellars.
The maddened and drunken mob then stormed through the Judengasse, on to
the Wödritz, and round the Zuckermandl, and the cries and wailings of
the persecuted Jews rang in every one's ears for some time after. Thus
the busy little colony was cast into poverty and despair.
I was rudely waked from the enjoyment of my imaginary good fortune; but
my chief feeling was one of disgust at the horrible executions of
Hungarian patriots, stigmatised as rebels, which I, in my youthful
curiosity, attended on the so-called Eselsberg, behind the fortress. Two
of these bloody scenes especially took deep root in my memory. One was
the execution of Baron Mednyanszky, the commander of the little fortress
of Leopoldstadt, taken by the Austrians, and of his adjutant, by name
Gruber. Both were young, and, laughing and talking, they walked
arm-in-arm to the scaffold. When I saw how those constables of the
Camarilla treated the corpses of these martyrs for freedom, swinging
them by the feet as they hung on the gallows, I was overcome by a
strange feeling of revenge. I called the Slav soldiers several
opprobrious names, and it would have gone hard with me had I not hurried
away.
The second awful picture I have in my mind's eye is another execution I
witnessed on the same spot, namely, that of a Lutheran clergyman called
Razga, who was condemned to be hanged for preaching a sermon of
Hungarian national tendency. This noble man was accompanied from his
prison to the place of execution by his wife and children. Embracing and
comforting his dear ones, he walked to the gallows with a firm step, and
when the Profos had read the sentence and broken the staves, the heroic
churchman kissed each member of his family, and gave himself into the
hands of his executioners. Mother and children (I do not know how many
there were) knelt on the ground near to the scaffold, their sorrowful
gaze fixed on the condemned husband and father, and several of them
fainted, overcome by sorrow.
This scene brought tears to the eyes even of the soldiers, and the
reader may imagine what an impression it left on a sentimental youth
like me.
The present generation of Hungarians has, for political reasons, drawn
a veil over this and other dreadful scenes; but it can only partially
cover them, for those who were present will always remember them with a
shudder.
My further residence in Presburg had become impossible, and I began to
look about for an engagement in the country. I accepted the offer of a
poor Jew in the village of Marienthal, near Presburg, to spend some
months in his house in the capacity of family preceptor. There, in a
quiet valley of the Carpathians, I could once more devote myself to my
private studies, and when I returned to town with my modest earnings in
my pocket, I decided not to enter the sixth class at the Benedictine
college, but at the Protestant Lyceum, as the professors there were
known to be unprejudiced, humane, and intelligent men, and I was
heartily tired of the everlasting drudgery for the fanatic monks.
At the Lyceum the language spoken was mostly German, and the lectures
were better in every way, so that I might have got on very well there
had not my difficulties in procuring the necessaries of life
recommenced, and partly withdrawn my attention from my studies. At that
time I was eighteen years old, and weary of my eight years' struggle
with all the moods of Fate. My spirit was so broken that I decided to
pause in my studies for a year, and take an engagement as tutor in a
country family, and then, having earned the necessary means, return to
town and take up the thread of my studies again.
The Private Tutor