^
 

THE TALMUD  MAN  FROM WILNA

THERE was a wide margin of difference
between the leaving and the coming of
Meyer Rabinovitz. It could not have been
otherwise. In Wilna, although the business had
been lost, although the son had died just when
great things were expected of him, and the wife had
soon followed, wearied and worried into death by
constant misfortune and persecution, he had still
been the rabbi, and a shred of venerable respect had
always been his share. And when it all became im¬
possible, and when nothing except America, the
promised land of the oppressed, seemed to hold out
a future, even then they showed him honour until
the very last moment, and escorted him to the train
which was to carry him and Rebecca to their haven
of new hopes.

At Ellis Island it was all different. There was a
multitude of people, noise, pulling, and shouting;
but in all that hubbub there was no one to bid him
welcome. On the night before their release from
the detention pen Meyer stood looking across the
craft-stirred waves and felt that in the gigantic city,

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