d; my first meal at a Gentile--yes, a
Christian--board. Would I know how to behave properly? I do not know
whether I betrayed my anxiety; I am certain only that I was all eyes
and ears, that nothing should escape me which might serve to guide
me. This, after all, was a normal state for me to be in, so I suppose
I looked natural, no matter how much I stared. I had been accustomed
to consider my table manners irreproachable, but America was not
Polotzk, as my father was ever saying; so I proceeded very cautiously
with my spoons and forks. I was cunning enough to try to conceal my
uncertainty; by being just a little bit slow, I did not get to any
given spoon until the others at table had shown me which it was.

All went well, until a platter was passed with a kind of meat that was
strange to me. Some mischievous instinct told me that it was
ham--forbidden food; and I, the liberal, the free, was afraid to touch
it! I had a terrible moment of surprise, mortification, self-contempt;
but I helped myself to a slice of ham, nevertheless, and hung my head
over my plate to hide my confusion. I was furious with myself for my
weakness. I to be afraid of a pink piece of pig's flesh, who had
defied at least two religions in defence of free thought! And I began
to reduce my ham to indivisible atoms, determined to eat more of it
than anybody at the table.

Alas! I learned that to eat in defence of principles was not so easy
as to talk. I ate, but only a newly abnegated Jew can understand with
what squirming, what protesting of the inner man, what exquisite
abhorrence of myself. That Spartan boy who allowed the stolen fox
hidden in his bosom to consume his vitals rather than be detected in
the theft, showed no such miracle of self-control as did I, sitting
there at my friend's tea-table, eating unjewish meat.

And to think that so ridiculous a thing as a scrap of meat should be
the symbol and test of things so august! To think that in the mental
life of a half-grown child should be reflected the struggles and
triumphs of ages! Over and over and over again I discover that I am a
wonderful thing, being human; that I am the image of the universe,
being myself; that I am the repository of all the wisdom in the world,
being alive and sane at the beginning of this twentieth century. The
heir of the ages am I, and all that has been is in me, and shall
continue to be in my immortal self.

CHAPTER XIII

A CHILD'S PARADISE

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