(This sketch of Baer Meisels was originally written in German some thirty-five years ago, soon after the death of the Polish preacher. In view of the situation of the Jews in Russia to-day, and the peculiar position they occupy in the Polish promise, the incidental description here given of the relation of the Jews to the Christian Poles is not without present-day interest and value.)
What a dreary day! The cold rain beaten by the wind splashes noisily against my study window. But recently recovered from an illness, I am not yet able to become interested in my books, and I am therefore al the more absorbed in my own sinister thoughts. I am reading in the book of my own experiences, and on its dark and on its bright pages a brilliantly colored portrait catches my eye —the portrait of my comrade in action and in suffering, my paternal friend, Baer Meisels, the Polish patriot and Jew, the strictly orthodox Rabbi and liberal man of the world.
He has passed away—that remarkableman, with his soulful eyes, his calm beautiful countenance, mild features, andstrong character. On February 16, 1870,his mortal remains were accompanied totheir last resting-place by a cortege offifty thousand people, representatives of allfaiths and all stations in life. Ah! thesepeople, these living attendants, they aremore lifeless—if I may be permitted theexpression—than the dead whom theysilently weep for. They must perforce bedead and rigid! They may not bemoan
their dead in public. The Russian mercenaries might suspect contraband feelings and thoughts, and to fall under suspicion is not a very comfortable situation in Russian Poland. Siberia is a cold place. The mourners dare not honor themselves by writing in praise of the departed. The Russian Government is fond of everybody but the beloved of the people, and the censor has long shears to clip thoughts, and his ink is black and indelible for every bright mind. The eulogists may not be just to the departed, for fear of appearing unjust to the imperial officers. They must seem dead, they must stifle their feelings. But Meisels is free! the only freedom Russia cannot suppress, its name is Death!
It is my intention to record only personal reminiscences of Meisels. I shall let others tell of his career as a banker in Cracow; how he filled the difficult position of Rabbi without renumeration; how, in consequence of the dissolution of the Free State of Cracow and the political disturbances in Galicia, he saw his business wrecked, and how, meeting all his obligations without consideration for himself, he emerged from the ruin with nothing but the unsullied honor of his name; how, having tested the joys of independence from the time of his early marriage, he now reluctantly accepted an emolument for his holy office; how his wife, reared in the lap of luxury, now bravely and resignedly contented herself with his meagre income; and how the marriage of his daughters and their removal to Warsaw induced him to accept a call as chief Rabbi of that community. Let all this be recorded by others better acquainted with the facts. Such intimate chronicles, we may be sure, wil not be lacking in admirable incidents.