One night we were all awakened by the neighing and tramping of horses near our house. We ran to the windows and saw about a dozen mounted gendarmes and police riding into our yard.

“What can this mean?” asked my father, with a tremble in his voice.

I immediately ran to the back of the stove and snatched a bundle of pamphlets from under it. These were forbidden works given to me by Hannah for safe keeping. I pressed them to my bosom. I was sure that the gendarmes had come to take the pamphlets away from me, and was ready to defend them with all my strength.

“What have you there in that bundle?” my father asked me.

“Books.”

“Give them to me. I will hide them.”

Father put the pamphlets in his coat-pocket and looked again out of the window.

“They have gone,” he said, “but their horses are tied in our yard.”

In about an hour the gendarmes returned, mounted their horses and galloped away without going into our house. When they had gone, father took my bundle of pamphlets out in the field, back of our kitchen-garden, and buried them deep in the ground.

On the following morning we learned that the gendarmes had arrested the son of the synagogue president, who shortly before had come from Vilna, for his connection with a secret organization. This event kept our village in a state of turmoil and excitement for several months. My mother, who repeatedly told my father that I would become a “nihilist,” that I was keeping company with “nihilists,” now felt perfectly convinced that she was right. She began to watch all my movements. The persecution to which I was subjected for my reading and my frequent excursions to town became still more severe.

One day when father and I remained alone he said to me:

“Maria, you must be a good girl. I know that you will not do anything wrong. But you had better give those books back to the people from whom you got them. They must not be kept in the house.”

“Papa, dear Papa,” I began excitedly, “let me go to a large city. I want to study and become—” Here I stopped, as I did not know myself what I wanted to become. Father looked at me with his kind, bright eyes, and stroked my head. “I cannot bear to see our poverty any longer,” I continued. “I will go and learn how we might live better. You will see what a learned girl I shall return. Then we shall not be poor any more.”

Father paced up and down the room, listening to me in thoughtful silence.

“You have an uncle at Odessa. He is a good and learned man. I shall write to him about you and, if he agrees, then I will send you to Odessa. He is my favorite brother,” father added, “and to him I will trust my child. But you must be a good girl and obey him.”

The news that Mordecai’s daughter Maria was going to Odessa spread like wild-fire; our house was constantly filled with women. My mother showed them the long brown dress—my first long dress—which was being made for the occasion, and also three pillows. Three pillows and a feather-bed were the traditional part of a girl’s dowry.

“Although she is yet very young,” mother remarked to every new-comer, “who can tell? Maybe she will not want to return home so soon, and will grow up there, and find her happiness there: the city is a large one.”

* * * * *

The train was leaving at four o’clock in the afternoon, but I was ready early in the morning. I put on my new brown dress, and tied a red ribbon in my hair. The three pillows, a few coarse towels—the work of my mother—and a piece of homespun linen were packed in a large valise, and my preparations for the journey ended.

With a heavy heart I walked about the field and forest, bidding good-by to every nook, to every little shrub along the paths. “Will I ever see you again?” I thought, looking at the green meadows.

All went to the railroad station at Smorgon to see me off: My parents, my brothers and sisters, our neighbors, and even strangers. Hannah, too, came and brought me a letter to one of her friends at Odessa.

PETER LAVROVICH LAVROFF

Scientist and philosopher. Born 1823, sentenced in 1867 to exile in Siberia, escaped, lived in Europe, died 1900 ]

When father was bidding me good-by, he said:

“I believe, Maria, that you will be happy.”

My mother wept, and kissed me a long time. My elder brother Noah, who was home on leave of absence,—he was serving in the army—gave me his last fifty kopecks.

At last the third bell rang, and the train slowly pulled out. Soon everything disappeared in a cloud of smoke. Seeing nothing but strange faces around me, I sat down in a corner and cried bitterly.

On the third day I arrived in Odessa. When I went out of the station and saw the long line of _izvoshchiks_[4] with their shining top hats, my heart filled with gladness. “Everybody dresses so nicely here,” I thought.

I approached one of them and said:

“Please take me to my uncle, Mr. Sukloff.”

“Sure, Miss,” he replied, with a twinkle in his eye. “Got his address?”

I was rather surprised that he did not know where my uncle lived. I took out of my dress pocket a slip of paper and handed it to him.

“All right, Miss,” he said, and with a motion of the hand invited me to climb into his carriage. When we started, he asked me where I came from. I told him why I had come to Odessa and he, turning sideways in his seat and listening to me, nodded his head approvingly.

After a long ride we stopped in front of an old four-story brick building.

“This is where your uncle lives,” the izvoshchik said.

Disappointed, I stared at the dirty, weather-beaten structure. As I learned later, my uncle lived in the poorest section of the city, called Moldavanka.

I climbed three dark and filthy flights of stairs, followed by the izvoshchik carrying my valise. On the fourth floor I saw a card on one of the doors. It read: “Samuel Sukloff, Tutor.” I rang the bell. A man of above middle height, thin, with a long beard and sparkling eyes, opened the door. For a moment I thought it was my father, so greatly did this man resemble him. It was my uncle. He greeted me very warmly and, having paid the izvoshchik forty-five kopecks, led me into his apartment. My aunt and cousins surrounded me and regarded me with evident curiosity. Noticing that I was bareheaded, my aunt remarked:

“We must buy a hat for you.”

My uncle was a teacher of Russian at a Hebrew school. He earned sixty rubles a month. But notwithstanding this small salary, he managed to give his children—six sons and a daughter—a good education. One of his sons was a civil engineer, the others were attending the gymnasium. Of course, the children paid their own way through school, otherwise it would have been absolutely impossible. But their earnings were not regular, and often the whole family lived on those sixty rubles.