_The Story of the Tablet Placed Upon the Statue of Liberty in New
York Harbor._
This isn't a story at all, just a sort of "good-bye" word to the boys
and girls who have read these tales of Jewish men and women who tried
to do their part in the making of America. Do you remember away back
to the first one, the story of the Jews who from Columbus's flag ship
dreamed of the promised land, but never knew that the continent their
admiral discovered would some day be a place of refuge for their race?
Now, every year, thousands of men and women and children, a great many
of our own people among them, seek a refuge here. If you go to Ellis
Island, you may see them entering this New World where they hope to
find home and happiness. I have seen them with their baskets and their
bundles of household goods, their little children in their arms, (do
you remember how Reuben wandered through the storm carrying his little
son?), crossing the gang plank of the steamer which brings them to the
island, raising their tired eyes in mute gratitude to the American
flag which floats above them as they pass. And from where I stood I
could also see the great Statue of Liberty Enlightening the World, the
woman with the light in her hand to guide the weary wanderers across
the sea.
If you visit this statue, boys and girls, you will see at the base a
bronze tablet with a short poem engraved upon it. The poem was written
by a Jewish woman, Emma Lazarus, our first and greatest Jewish
American poet. As a girl she had cared little for the history and
traditions of her people; her verses were about the gods of Greece and
Rome and the legends of the Middle Ages. Then, when the dreadful
persecution of our people in Russia in 1881 drove many of them to our
shores, she was called upon to assist in caring for some of the
homeless wanderers and, like a loving mother, she gathered them to her
heart.
Something new and beautiful awoke in her soul and she gave her
strength and energy in caring for these exiles of her own blood. When
she wrote now it was of her people. She read our long and wonderful
history and immortalized the heroism of our martyrs in such poems as
her tragedy, "The Dance to Death." She wrote shorter verses, too, and
there are few Jewish boys and girls who have not recited or at least
heard her stirring Chanukkah recitations, "The Feast of Lights," and
"The Banner of the Jew." Her poems had always been very beautiful,
winning the praises of such a high critic as Ralph Waldo Emerson, but
now they glowed with a new beauty, her love and new found kinship with
her race.
It was her passionate love for America and her knowledge of all that
our country means to the Jew, both the native-born and the persecuted
wanderer from other lands, that made her see in the Statue of Liberty
more than a mere mass of sculptured stone. Instead she saw a gracious,
loving woman guarding the gates of the New World, not like the ancient
giant figure striding the harbor at Rhodes, a haughty menace to the
nations, but a symbol of welcome and freedom and justice to all
mankind. So she wrote her verses, to be inscribed later at the
statue's base, telling as only a great poet could what America means
to her children.
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land,
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome: her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
* * * * *
+-----------------------------------------------------------+
| Typographical errors corrected in text: |
| |
| Page 29: her's replaced with hers |
| Page 31: her's replaced with hers |
| Page 58: earings replaced with earrings |
| Page 63: Pharoah replaced with Pharaoh |
| Page 71: 'For if your are discovered' replaced with |
| 'For if you are discovered' |
| Page 76: 'Your are to grow weaker' replaced with |
| 'You are to grow weaker' |
| Page 77: 'wrists and angles' replaced with |
| 'wrists and ankles' |
| Page 78: abuot replaced with about |
| Page 89: Hussiel replaced with Hushiel (twice) |
| Page 91: Hussiel replaced with Hushiel |
| Page 92: hosts's replaced with hosts' |
| Page 93: persade replaced with persuade |
| Page 102: Hushel replaced with Hushiel |
| Page 119: earings replaced with earrings |
| Page 123: pears replaced with pearls |
| Page 144: wainted replaced with waited |
| Page 151: 'love like your's' replaced with |
| 'love like yours' |
| Page 152: 'Irving's eyes met her's' replaced with |
| 'Irving's eyes met hers' |
| Page 154: befor replaced with before |
| Page 159: her's replaced with hers |
| |
| |
| Note that the printers' error on page 32, which starts |
| with "Samuel's eyes sought the governor's face, half- he |
| told her, gently." has been left as is. Every copy of |
| the story consulted has the same error. |
| |
+-----------------------------------------------------------+