Reminiscences of Zionism in England
THIRD PAPER
VIII
IN my last paper (Dec., 1901) I recalled the Zionist situation in England up to the publication by the Jewish Chronicle of Dr. Herzl's state scheme in April, 1896.
When that article first appeared, with its laudation by a journal that had never given us the slightest encouragement, we were one and all mystified. It was to our thinking, with our empty pockets, a most mysterious event. The name of Herzl was unknown to us, even after it had been ascertained that the hero of the new era was both journalist and man of letters. I caught a glance of him at the dinner Mr. Zangwill gave, or rather caused the Maccabæans to give to him, on his first visit to England. At once the personality struck me, I was baffled; for here was not one of the men that I had learned to associate with Jewish ideals of a national character. When the glad news spread, although the Chovevi Zion did practically nothing to support us, there was everywhere a slight stirring of the smoldering ashes. The majority of us read "The Jewish State." I remember reading it out to a circle with something like surprise. It was more definite than "Auto-Emancipation," unlike Hess and lacking the idealism of "Regeneration." It hesitated with its "over there" instead of Palestine; and when I was intrusted with the task of writing a criticism on it, I remember urging the author to accept the Palestinian ideal and expressing doubts as to whether the Powers of Europe would not act against the large accumulations of funds which the scheme premeditated. But, at any rate, there was something to go upon, and the only objection that I heard in Zionist circles was Colonel Goldsmith's demurrer to the socialistic proposals, such as the seven-hour labor day. The ordinary Zionist would have swallowed that and a good deal more in order to obtain the goal, and, in fact, we were the ultra-Democrats of the Democracy in English Jewry.
Nothing of importance happened until the middle of that year, 1896. Then, one Sunday morning, The Observer, a West End Sunday paper, the proprietor of which is a Jew of the forgot-his-ancestry type, came out with a great article telling how this Herzl had been to Constantinople, how Palestine was to be regained and how a committee of Lucien Wolf, Zangwill, Israel Abrahams and all the hosts of the Maccabæans were to form a new Council of State.
At least one section of London was wild with excitement, which was not allayed by an interview in the Daily Graphic with the new Moses, the announcement that Dr. Herzl was about to tell the Maccabæans all that he had done; and Dr. Adler's unforgettable description of the new Zionism as an "egregious blunder."