Tevye the Dairyman & Motl the Cantor's Son

by Sholem Aleichem

  Where Canada is we do not know. They say it’s even farther away than America. My brother Elyahu and his friend Pinni now have something to argue over. Elyahu asks him, “Pinni! Where is this Canada? You’re supposed to know all about geography.” Pinni tells him that Canada is in Canada—that is, not in America. He means to say that Canada is really the same as America but not exactly America. Elyahu asks him, “How can that be?” Pinni answers, “Well, that’s the way it is!”

  Meanwhile we have to go to the ship to say goodbye to our good friends Pessi and her husband Moishe the bookbinder and their whole gang of kids.

  Oh my, what is going on at the ship! So many men, women, and children, with bundles, satchels, pillows, and mountains of bedding, all running, shouting, crying, sweating, eating, and cursing. Suddenly the cry of a wild beast, a buffalo, is heard: Hoo-oo-ooh!

  That’s the ship’s horn warning passengers to say goodbye and board the ship. More running, kissing, and crying—it’s a living theater! Everyone is saying goodbye. We’re saying goodbye too. Everyone is kissing. We’re kissing too. We’re kissing the whole gang. My mother is kissing her neighbor Pessi, who consoles my mother and begs her not to worry—they will, God willing, soon see one another in America. My mother waves her hand sadly and swallows her tears. Lately she’s crying much less. She’s taking some medicine to help her cry less. All the passengers have boarded the ship. We’re standing on the dock. Oh, how we envy them! Oh, how I envy Vashti! Once he envied me—today I envy him!

  Vashti stands with a tattered cap on the deck of the ship. He holds his hands behind his back and sticks out his tongue at me to let me know that he’s going and I’m not. This really hurts my feelings, but I thumb my nose at him: “That’s for you!” meaning, Vashti! May your face break out in boils! I will soon be in America too! And I will get rich there!

  Oh! Don’t you worry. I’ll be in America very soon!

  XX

  THE GANG DISPERSES

  A.

  Day by day the gang of emigrants grows smaller and smaller, and Antwerp empties. On Shabbes another large group of emigrants sails away on a ship, all to America. Among them is my friend Big Motl, the one who taught me ventriloquism and other tricks. I don’t know what made my brother Elyahu dislike him. I think it began with my sister-in-law Bruche. Bruche has a habit of eavesdropping on people who are talking and laughing. Is it her business why we laugh? Maybe we’re laughing at our friend Pinni, at the way he fishes bits of honey cake and candy from his pockets and eats them. Maybe we’re laughing at the way Beaver is always bragging.

  But I tell you, this time Bruche is right. We make up a skit about her mother Rivele the baker’s wife, with her fur cape. Rivele can’t stop talking about that fur cape she was robbed of at the border.

  Imagine, even my mother can’t take it any longer! She says to Rivele, “Oy, my dear in-law! If I talked about the bedding and pillows that I was robbed of at the border as much as you carry on about your fur cape . . . !”

  Rivele the baker’s wife responds in her mannish voice, “At least realize there’s no comparison!”

  My mother retorts, “Weren’t my pillows stolen goods too?”

  “Were they stolen? I wasn’t there to see it.”

  My mother is puzzled. “What are you implying, my dear in-law?” Rivele says, “Let’s leave it at that.”

  “My dear in-law, how have I offended you?”

  “Who says you have offended me?”

  “Why then are you saying there is no comparison between my bedding and your fur cape?” my mother asks.

  “It’s obvious! I’m speaking of my fur cape, and you start in with your bedding and your pillows!” Rivele replies.

  “Aren’t my pillows stolen goods?”

  “Stolen goods or not, I wasn’t there to see it.”

  And around and around it goes!

  Tell me, do we need theater?

  B .

  The situation with my mother’s eyes is not good at all. They say they won’t allow her on the ship for any amount of money, not even a million. We must flee Antwerp. In Antwerp the doctors are fiends! They examine your eyes, and if they see trachoma, they turn into devils. They have no respect, no pity! We’ll have to go to America by a different route but which route we don’t yet know. There are plenty of routes if we only had the means. Most probably the money in my brother Elyahu’s pocket is dwindling. We spent the proceeds from the sale of our house on doctors and barber-surgeons, all on account of my mother’s eyes. I overheard my brother Elyahu saying to his friend Pinni, “I just hope we can manage to get to London!” Of course I’d rather go straight to America than by way of London. Our friend Pessi and her whole gang have long been in America by now. They’re already making a living. Vashti must be strolling at his ease with his hands in his pockets cracking nuts.

  Our in-laws and their family couldn’t wait for my mother’s eyes to heal and left for America without us. Oh! What went on that day in Antwerp! We didn’t let my mother go to the ship to say goodbye to her in-laws, because we knew she would cry and ruin whatever was left of her eyes. What good did it do? She cried even harder. She lamented that we were taking away her only pleasure—crying her sorrows out, soothing her heart! But who listens to her now?

  C .

  Do you know who is happy that our in-laws have left? You’ll never guess—Goldele! The very same Goldele whose parents are now in America for over a year and she is still in Antwerp on account of her sick eyes. When she heard our in-laws were leaving, she wanted to dance. What’s going on? She doesn’t like Alteh, my so-called future bride. She doesn’t like her because she is haughty. Goldele doesn’t like a person who is full of herself.

  “I can’t stand your bride with the red braids. She’s a snob!” Goldele once said to me, and her cheeks were flushed.

  “Where did Alteh get red braids when her hair is black?” I said.

  Goldele got angrier, cried, and said, “Red! Red! Red!”

  When Goldele is angry, you have to leave her be till she is over it. After that she’s as good as ever. She’s like a sister with me. She tells me everything. She works hard at the inn, sweeps the rooms, takes care of the chickens, and puts the children to sleep. For a long time the innkeeper’s wife didn’t have any children, but now God has blessed her with twins. Goldele goes to the doctor every day to cure her eyes, and the doctor smears them with the same bluestone salve he uses for all the other patients.

  “Oh, if only God would grant me a different salve, maybe someday I’d be able to see my mother and father,” she says with tears in her sick eyes.

  It makes my heart ache. I can’t bear to hear her talk about her mother and father. I can’t bear to see her crying. I say to her, “Do you know what, Goldele? Soon I’ll be going to America. When I start making a living, I’ll send you a different salve.”

  “You aren’t joking? Swear a holy oath on that,” says Goldele, and I swear a holy oath that I won’t forget her. If God will help me, as soon as I start to make a living in America, I’ll send her a different salve right away.

  D .

  I know for sure that on Saturday morning we are leaving for London. We’re already preparing for the journey. My mother, Bruche, and Teibl go from one inn to the next saying goodbye to the emigrants—not only saying goodbye but pouring their hearts out to one another.

  We realize we are kings compared to other emigrants. Among the emigrant shlimazels are some who actually envy us. Their woes are not to be described. At home they were prosperous businesspeople and lived well. Their children married well. They always had room at their table for poor people. Now they would be happy to have what they once gave away. Today they are all paupers! What strange people!

  I am fed up with their stories. At one time when they talked about pogroms, I was all ears. Now when I hear the word pogrom, I take off. I prefer happier stories, but no one tells anything happy. The barber-surgeon Beaver was happy. He was a liar. But he too is in America now.<
br />
  “He’s probably filling people’s ears with plenty of lies!” says our friend Pinni.

  “They won’t let him fill their ears for long. Don’t worry, in America they hate people like that. In America a liar is worse than a bastard!” says my brother Elyahu, and Bruche asks him how he knows that. A quarrel follows. I and Pinni side with Elyahu, Teibl sides with Bruche. Whatever one says, the other one says the opposite.

  WE, THE MEN: America is a country of pure truth.

  THEY, THE WOMEN: America is a country of liars.

  WE, THE MEN: America is built on truth, justice, and compassion. THEY, THE WOMEN: On theft, murder, and immorality!

  Luckily my mother interrupts. “Children, why do you have to fight over America when we’re still in Antwerp?”

  She’s right. We’re still in Antwerp. But not for long—soon, soon we will be leaving for London. Everyone is leaving, all the emigrants, the whole gang of them.

  What will become of Antwerp?

  XXI

  GOODBYE, ANTWERP!

  A .

  When we depart Antwerp, I have feelings of regret that I’ve had for no other city. But more than Antwerp and its people, I’ll miss the emigrants, and even more I’ll miss my friends. Many left earlier—Vashti, Alteh, and Big Motl are now in America making a living. The ones remaining are Mendl the bar mitzvah boy (Bruche gave him the nickname Colt) and Goldele, the girl with the bad eyes. No one else stayed on.

  What will the Ezra, who helps the emigrants, do? Whom will they help now? I feel sorry for Antwerp. I’ll miss it, a fine city with fine people. They all deal in diamonds. People in Antwerp carry precious stones in their pockets, ready for business. They all know the trade: cutting, grinding, and polishing stones. Whomever you meet is either a diamond cutter, grinder, or polisher. Some of the boys from our gang remained on here and became diamond cutters.

  If we weren’t so eager to get to America, my family would have apprenticed me to a diamond cutter. My brother Elyahu likes the trade, and so does our friend Pinni. They say if they were a little younger, they would become diamond polishers. Bruche laughs and says that precious stones are better to wear than to polish. Pinni’s wife agrees with her. She also likes to wear precious stones. Every day they go looking in the display windows and can’t get enough of the stones. Diamonds and other jewels are everywhere to be seen, enough to make your head spin and dazzle your eyes. The women go out of their minds. Pinni laughs and says all these stones are ridiculous, and anyone impressed with them is mad. Don’t you think he wrote a song about it? This is how it goes:

  Antwerp is a city

  Made of precious stones.

  The poor get no pity,

  The rich have great big homes.

  Diamonds are a dime a dozen,

  Sold by an uncle or a cousin.

  Jewels bulge in every pocket,

  Rings, necklaces, a fancy locket.

  But one thing strikes me as very funny:

  Nobody carries any ordinary money!

  And that’s all I remember.

  B .

  To remember all of Pinni’s songs, you’d have to have the mind of a government minister. My brother Elyahu is always battling with him over his songs. He says that if the Ezra finds out that Pinni is writing songs about Antwerp, they’ll drive us out. And we need the Ezra to help us leave. We go there every day. We’re like old friends. Fräulein Zaichik knows who we are by name. She loves me as if I were her own child. My mother is like a sister to her. Even Bruche says Fräulein Zaichik is the reincarnation of a Jewish girl with a Jewish soul. The entire gang of emigrants has fallen in love with her, especially since she speaks to us in Yiddish, not in German.

  Everybody else speaks German in Antwerp, there’s nothing for it! Pinni says the country doesn’t even belong to the Germans, and the Jews could very well speak Yiddish—it wouldn’t do them any harm. All the Jews on this side of the border dislike Yiddish and like German. Even the beggars speak German. They’ll die of hunger so long as their last words are in German! This is what Bruche says, and she urges us to go to London. She’s sick and tired of Antwerp and its language. Wherever you go, all you hear about is jewels and diamonds!

  “If only a little tiny diamond would attach itself to us! If only someone was willing to lose a few diamonds and I would find them!” Bruche’s eyes glow with hope. I don’t know why she’s so excited by diamonds and jewels. I’d give away all the precious stones in the world for one box of paints and a paintbrush. Not long ago I drew a ship with a pencil on paper, a ship with a gang of emigrants, crowded one on top of the other. I gave the drawing to Goldele, who showed it to Fräulein Zaichik, who showed it to everyone at the Ezra.

  My brother Elyahu also saw it. I heard from him, “Figures! Will you ever stop drawing figures?” He beat me harder than ever. I told Goldele about it, and she told Fräulein Zaichik, who asked my brother Elyahu why he beat me. She showed him the drawing and argued with him for a long time. He heard her out, and when he came home, I really got it from him. My brother says he has to beat the crazy desire for drawing figures out of me.

  C .

  Today is our last time to go to the Ezra. I don’t know why we go. My brother Elyahu is complaining about something. Pinni is waving his arms around. Bruche is constantly interrupting. My mother is crying. The people of the Ezra are talking to us, as usual, in German. Three of them sit there competing to see who can speak better German. Don’t ask me what they say. My mind is now on the ship sailing the sea, or in London, or in America.

  Suddenly Goldele comes running over and says in one breath, “Are you really going?”

  “I’m going.”

  “When?”

  “Tomorrow.”

  “Where to?”

  “To London.”

  “And from there?”

  “To America.”

  “And I have to stay here with my sick eyes! Who knows when I will see my mother and father?” Goldele cries her heart out.

  My heart aches for her. I want to console her but I don’t have the words. I look at her and think, God in heaven, what do you have against this girl? What has she done to you?

  I take her by the hand and pat it. “Don’t cry, Goldele. You’ll see, I’ll go to America and will make a living, and the first thing I’ll do is send you a different salve to smear on your eyes. Then I’ll send you a steamship ticket, half price because you’re not ten years old yet. You’ll come to America, and at the Castle Garden your mother and father will be waiting for you. I’ll also be there. When you arrive in America, you should look for me in the Castle Garden. I’ll be holding this pencil in my hand—do you see? When you see a boy holding this pencil, you’ll know it’s me—Motl Peysi’s. Later, when you leave the ship, you’ll hug and kiss your mother and father. You won’t go straight home with them. You’ll just give them your things, and you’ll go with me. I’ll show you all of America because by then I’ll know it all by heart. Then I’ll take you home to your parents, and you’ll eat supper—a hot, fresh soup.”

  Goldele does not want to hear any more. She throws her arms around my neck and kisses me. I kiss her too.

  D .

  Bruche has a habit of showing up when you don’t want her. Exactly at the very minute I’m saying goodbye to Goldele, she has to turn up! She doesn’t say anything to me, but just utters, in her mannish voice, the drawn-out word “So-o-o-o?!”

  Then she draws her lips together in a strange way and screws up her nose while letting out a little cough—“Ahem!”—and goes off straight to my brother Elyahu. What she tells him I do not know. I only know that when I leave the Ezra, Elyahu gives me a smart slap that sets my ears ringing.

  “What for?” my mother asks him. “Why?”

  “He knows what for,” my brother Elyahu replies, and we all return to the inn, where we find things in turmoil. Everyone is packing. We too must pack. I love to see how people pack. When it comes to packing, my brother Elyahu is a master. He takes off his c
oat and starts giving orders: “Don’t put the dirty laundry there! . . . Mama, the teakettle . . . the cap, Bruche, the hat, hurry! . . . the galoshes, Pinni, you blind bat, you scarecrow, can’t you see? The galoshes are right under your nose! . . . Motl, why are you standing around like an idiot? Lend a hand! All he knows is drawing figures! Figures!”

  He means me. I jump up and help carry things and toss around whatever they put in my hands. My brother Elyahu gets angry because I’m throwing things every which way. He’s about to hit me, but my mother defends me: “What do you want of the child?” My mother calling me a child doesn’t sit right with Bruche, who gets into a spat with my mother, who reminds her I am an orphan and is about to start crying. My brother Elyahu says, “Cry, cry! Cry out the rest of your eyes!”

  Soon we will be leaving Antwerp.

  Goodbye, Antwerp!

  XXII

  LONDON, WHY DON’T YOU BURN DOWN?

  A .

  As long as I’ve lived, I’ve never seen a city that’s more like one big fair than London. Oh, the clattering, the clanging, the whistling, the whooping! And the people are as thick as flies! Where do all these people come from, and why are they always running? They must be hungry or have to get somewhere, elbowing one another aside, knocking people down and stepping on them!

  Our friend Pinni, as you remember, is nearsighted. He walks with his head in the clouds, completely distracted, while his feet get tangled up. One day we just stepped out of the train. Pinni has one trouser leg rolled up, one sock rolled down, and his necktie to the side, as always. I’ve never seen him so excited—he’s burning as if with a fever. He spouts strange words, as is his habit: “London! England! Disraeli! Buckle! History of Civilization!” It’s impossible to calm him down. Then an accident happens. Within two minutes he’s stretched out on the ground, and people are stepping over him as if he’s a chunk of wood. His wife Teibl screams, “Pinni, where are you?” My brother Elyahu rushes to him and pulls him up, rumpled and crumpled like an old cap.