Читать книгу Against the Current: Simple Chapters from a Complex Life - Edward Alfred Steiner - Страница 9

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IT was a bitter winter in the valley of the Waag. Motionless in its crooked bed lay that swift river, whose roar and rush neither the drought of summer nor the cold of winter had silenced within the memory of a generation. Only the roofs of the peasants’ cottages were visible above the all-conquering, drifted snow, as for days, men, women and children battled with it in the attempt to release one another from its embrace.

No one asked: “Is this a Jew’s house or a Magyar’s isba?” “Is it the home of a Roman Catholic or a Protestant, to which we are making a path?” The common danger broke down ancient barriers, even as the snow filled the valleys, and the frozen river united isolated shores. As the older people became one in their common danger, so the children became one in the pleasurable excitement which these changes brought into the routine of their lives.

There was no school, no church and no synagogue service, and as we coasted down great mountains of snow, piled high by the patient toilers, we forgot the antagonisms to which so early in life we had fallen heir. I shared freely the sleds of the Gentile boys whose fathers were skillful in making them, and they shared as freely my luncheon, which the more provident Jewish home provided.

While sandwiched on a sled between two Gentile boys, one of them, my brother by vaccination, called my attention to the fact that Christmas was at hand, and that as chief choir boy, it was his prerogative to train the three wise men who go about on Christmas Eve from house to house, singing carols and gathering such gifts as may be bestowed upon the celebrants.

The boy on the back of the sled was to be one of them, and as the third boy was snow-bound in an isolated farmhouse, and not likely to be liberated before Christmas Eve, it was proposed that I should take his place. I accepted.

In a very vague way I knew the meaning of Christmas; it came in the dreariness of our winter, unrelieved by Jewish holidays, and the Christmas trees, the candles, and the happy children had long ago aroused my childish envy. Realizing that all this was not for me, I was content to see the twinkling lights, and hear the merry laughter of the children from afar, never even asking why I could not have a share in those things. Consequently it came about that when the sled reached the bottom of the roadway and I was released from my close fellowship with the Gentile boys, I was initiated into the duties of a wise man and duly accepted the post with all its obligations. Being a Jew, the financial responsibilities of the affair were thrust upon me. These consisted of purchasing paste, pins and several sheets of gilt paper for crowns and a huge star. My room was made the studio in which the various symbols were to be designed and manufactured.

It is safe to say that I was fairly unselfish in the matter, inasmuch as I could not hope to share in the returns from this enterprise, which would be largely in food which I did not need and could not have eaten had I needed it. Of course, being a wise man and wearing a crown were in themselves compensations worthy the sacrifice I was making, which at first consisted merely in diverting a few pennies from my small allowance, but which grew beyond my calculations, the more I entered into the experiences of a wise man.

While I provided the material things, as behooved my station in life, the acolyte provided things spiritual, and in a snow cave dug by our united efforts, he taught me my part in the dramatic performance of the “Three Wise Men.” Incidentally I learned how to sing a Christian hymn and had my first lesson in Latin; and of both there were more, later in life and under less trying circumstances.

I spent the day before Christmas in feverish excitement, mumbling my part in all sorts of out-of-the-way places, as it was not safe for me to be heard by my family, reciting: “Christo nostro infantia”; three words of the hymn which I have never forgotten. When evening came, I had the difficult task of smuggling the Gentile boys into my room and then converting those ragamuffins into kings from Eastern lands. Their ill-smelling sheepskin coats were hidden in my bed, and the red garments of the acolytes, readorned by gilt paper, were thrown over the scanty clothing which remained. Then with gilt star, sceptre and crowns, we started out into the bitter cold to seek the Child in the Manger. I carried the star, and being cast for the part of the wise man from the land of the Moors, my face was blackened with stove-polish, generously applied by my brother by vaccination.

We made straightway for the home of the Pany, at the edge of the town. It seemed a fairy palace to our unspoiled eyes. As in a dream I climbed the broad stairway leading to the upper chambers, although I was very conscious of the unusual garments I wore and in whose folds my ungainly feet were entangled.

Our welcome was not such as royal guests might expect, and very reluctantly we were led into the drawing-room where, nearly touching the high ceiling, stood the lighted Christmas tree from which hung glittering things that fairly dazzled us.

I had been told that in Catholic homes we would be greeted, according to custom, in the following manner: “You royal sirs, our visitors, what is the cause that brings you thus?”

Instead of that, the rough, jeering voice of the Pany said: “Get done with your mummery, you lousy brats!” The two Gentile boys, born to obey such commands, fell upon their knees and recited: