plot. The characters are all poor; fishmongers,
children of the Ghetto, a Jewish farmer, two mothers, an old married
couple. A few typical plots follow.

"Ein Eilbotte" is really a prose poem describing a sunrise, a storm,
and the reappearing sun--more properly perhaps a series of paintings,
of symphonic word canvases. Let me translate the opening passages:

"Behind the town ruin which stands on a small hill
like a national monument, flaming and fiery rises the
red of the morning and floods with its glow the gray
clouds that hang in the horizon. It brings a son of
the sun into the world. The day tears itself from the
lap of the mother Night.

"In the little town life is beginning to stir. Here
and there one sees a peasant wagon on which the dew
drops of the night are still hanging. Here and there a
Jew, eyes heavy with sleep. The show windows and house
doors are for the most part locked. For many of the
inhabitants the day has not yet begun. . . . This day
shall be like yesterday, like to-morrow."

A storm rushes over the woods. The storm comes like a
mighty giant that wishes to swallow the world or it
seems as though God himself were spreading out His
black mantle: "The end of the world! Neither heaven
nor earth, neither beginning nor end! Black, ominous,
dull, empty. . . . Suddenly Heaven opens for a
second. . . . A blinding light has torn the clouds.
Stabbed by a flaming dagger the giant dies--a confused
moaning fills the air. It rains." But the storm passes.
"The Heaven is clear and blue as if nothing had happened.
The air is clearer and purer, the earth washed clean
by the water."

* * * * *

"DIE Mutter." It is in a little Hebrew school in a small town in
Russia. The rabbi has gone to say the evening prayer, leaving the
small boys to study. Instead they begin to talk of various subjects.
Mothers are discussed and each boy praised his most highly. One pale
little chap with large eyes says, "My mother also . . ." and then stops.
One of the boys laughs uncontrolledly and then there is an
embarrassing silence. The teacher returns. The little Josek, however,
cannot keep his attention on the book:

"The 'crazy Trajna' stands life-like before him. Out
there at the well