A JEW'S VISIT TO THE HOLY LAND. * THE book we
are about to notice is one on which we have already said a few words, intimating a wish that some explanation should be given of its ambiguous title. None having been offered, we must again express our regret that a work, otherwise of apparent value, has been laid before English readers in a manner which renders its authenticity more or less problematical. Who is the real author of this book ? Is it the Austrian Jew whose travels it narrates, or is it the Christian Chaplain of her Majesty's Forces, who has made himself responsible for it in the first degree ? If The Jews in the East is simply a translation, the title-page pro- claims what is not true. If it is more or less than a translation, it may to a certain extent be a new work, and Mr. Beaton may so fat: have a right to call himself its author • but we want ex- plicit information on this point, and are left without any, for the book comes before us without a scrap of preface to elucidate its doubtful genesis. Where all is conjectural, we may, if we like, assume that the title is deceptive, and that the text is tolerably free from adulteration. It is upon this hypothesis, arbitrary though it be, that we proceed to consider the contents of the book.
It is lively, entertaining, and full of matter. Dr. Frankl is a learned and liberal-minded jew, a physician, and probably a wise one, for he makes no fuss about his professional knowledge, a poet, and in all likelihood a bad one, for he loses no opportunity of glorifying himself in that capacity. His readers would freely
- • The Jews in the East. By the Reverend P. Beaton, M.A., Chaplain to the Forces. (From the German of Dr. Frankl.) In two volumes. Published by Hurst and }Hackett. dispense with some of this self-laudation, but no doubt it had its use in the East, where modesty is little esteemed and every man is bound in good policy to encompass himself with all the prestige he can. Dr. Frankl was deputed by a munificent Jewish lady of Vienna to found a school in Jerusalem, where none he.dprevioualy existed for the children of her race, and this mission gave him facilities for minutely investigating the condition and cirouin- stances of his brethren in every place he visited. In the abund- ance of novel and exact information thus obtained consists the distinguishing merit of Dr. Frankl's report of his travels ; but in addition to this he gives us glimpses of a multitude of things worth noting, for he had access everywhere and made the most of his opportunities. For instance, touching at Rhodes he had but two hours allowed him to see the town but that snort time enabled him to pen what will probably continue to be the last account ever given from actual inspection of the beautiful church of St. John, and the noble Strada dei Cavalieri, composed on both sides of massive stone dwellings built like fort. roses. Beautiful gates opened into strongly arched halls, and heavy stone staircases led through dark passages to balconies and terraces. On some of these palaces were carved in stone the arms of their former possessors, whom family names still survive in Europe. The knights are dust and their man- sions are no more. Soon after our traveller's departure, in May 1856, occurred that dreadful fire in which an immense powder magazine exploded, and left nothing of the Strada dei Cavalieri and the greater part of the town but a heap of ruins.
In Greece, to which Dr. Frankl devotes three chapters, there were two things he never saw—a permanently blue sky, and a beautiful woman. The Athenians themselves admitted the first fact; they had put on their summer clothes in February, and complained very much of the return of bad weather ; and with regard to the second, they affirmed that the real national face and figure are now only to be found among the islands and moun- tains. But it was not in Greece alone that he looked in vain for female beauty ; he found it neither among the Turks nor among the maids or matrons of Judah, with one signal exception, seen in the midst of a miserable rabble, shrieking for alms on the ruins of the Palace of Belisarius which the poorest Jewish families in Constantinople have converted into a rookery.
"Among the women, there was one singularly, . strikingly beautiful. When the rest were clinging to our Clothes and shrieking for alms, there stood a young woman at the door of our cell who did not 'beg ; her lofty figure was dressed in a light blue tattered robe, secured at the waist by a parti-coloured girdle ; her bust, which might have been cut out of marble, was imperfectly covered by a yellow silk chemise ; a piece of yellow cloth, a small stripe of embroidered woollen, was worn over one of her shoulders. Her brownish hair was covered by a white veil, worn like a turban, with the ends, which were spangled in imitation of gold, hanging loosely on each side of the head. Her head belonged to that style of beauty whisk is marked by sublime repose. She looked as if a statue of this once noble palace had been overlooked, and still stood forth in all its original beauty, with only its drapery slightly injured by the lapse of time. She was the only bean- tiful woman that I saw in the East. She leaned against the door-post, and looked at the unfortunate beggars in stern silence; she herself a queen in tatters l" Apropos of physiognomy, the doctor says that among eightY boys he saw in a school at Zante, there were only a few whose features indicated their Jewish descent, while nearly all exhibited the expression and form of body distinctive of the South. For. an explanation of this fact, as well as of the remarkable frequency of fair hair and blue eyes among Jewish children in German schools, he refers to "the conduct of the patriarch Jacob, grounded on physiological principles, when he wished to prodttce speckled sheep "; and also to the doctrine of Winckelmann who believed that the beautiful shape of the Italian head and body is due in a great measure to continual familiarity with the sight of fine forms in painting and sculpture. Full of hope and generous ardour was Dr. Frankl when he set out on his journey to visit his brethren in the East; he returned disgusted and disheartened by the deep debasement which every- where characterizes the race, but most of all at Jerusalem, where all the efforts made for their improvement by their coreligionists of Europe have ended in utter failure. It is true they no longer labour under any special disabilities civil or social, but fully enjoy the equality before the law conferred by the Hat Humay- oum on all the subjects of the Sultan—a fact of which the doctor had a startling proof, when, to his great alarm, his Jewish guide thrashed an insolent Turk, in spite of his green turban and his descent from the Prophet, and this too before the mosque in Hebron, one of the most fanatical of Turkish towns. But this proof of courage and energy was exceptional, and the race remains after its political emancipation as hopelessly demoralized as ever. There are a few men of enormous wealth amongst them4 and in Damascus many of them thrive by lending money at twenty-four per cent interest on tolerably good security, but their communities are everywhere poor and heavily indebted, and a vast majority of their members grovel in sloth and extreme penury. This miserable condition is perpetuated by the practice which prevails universally amongst them, of marrying their child- ren of both sexes long before the age of puberty. Physical and moral degeneracy and ever increasing pauperism are the in- evitable results of this detestable usage. In Jerusalem the general corruption appears in its most frightful aspect. Abstract a few physicians and some scores of honest handi- craftsmen, and all the rest of the Jewish population, number- ing 5700 souls are knaves and beggars subsistin, on aloe- from Europe, the largest share of which is appropir of the ted bythoei
rabbis, who keep the collection and administratio
funds in their own hands. Profoundly ignorant, fanatical and unscrupulous, their whole care is to enrich themselves, and keep their poorer brethren languishing in deep misery, in spiritual op- pression in hunger and despondency, lest any improvement in their condition should diminish the flow of contributions from Europe. With the exception of the Rothschild. hospital, every benevolent institution founded in Jerusalem by Jewish bene- factors had been ruined by the rabbis before Dr. Frankl's arrival, and the school he established, with a world, of trouble, will no doubt have the same fate. Sir Moses Montefiore, a very Hebrew of the Hebrews in orthodoxy, has lavished his kindness and his gold in profusion on Jerusalem. On his third visit, when he had no more money to throw away for the benefit of the rabbis they ex- eommunicated him, on the impudent pretext that he had entered the Mosque of Omar which is built on the site the Holy of Holies. One institution there is in the Holy City which appears, upon the unwilling testimony of Dr. Frankl, to be exercising an et& tient influence over a portion of the Jewish community for the improvement of their condition in this world, if not in the next. It is the Protestant Mission. The doctor of course ex- presses a strong repugnance to its proselytizing efforts, says that its pretended converts are actuated by mercenary motives, that whereas the Latins only begin to support those who become Ca- tholics after their conversion the Protestants give earnest money, and demoralize families, and that half their converts in Jerusa- lem belong to the most disreputable sect in Jewry ; nevertheless., with the admirable candour which is conspicuous in his pages, he admits that the Protestant Mission is doing more for the moral regeneration of a degraded race than all their wealthy brethren in Europe put together. "If we could only close our eyes to the object which the mission has in view—but we cannot close our eyes to that which is immoral and bad—we should readily admit that it has conferred many: material advantages on the Jews, and done much to promote civilization in the highest sense of the term. The minion has a well-managed hospital, with thirty-six beds, pre- pared for the poor of every creed; a sewing-school, which affords employ- ment to from eighty to one hundred women ; a house of industry with six pupils, Polish boys, who are taught to be joiners and turners ; and an agri- cultural establishment, which employs one hundred men. I often met these men in the evening returning from their labour in a field, which the Mis- sionary Society had bought. Many who are shy of receiving alms directly from the mission are employed here, chiefly to afford them a certain advant- age, and thus attach them to the Society from gratitude. At all events, they are obliged to listen to a missionary sermon every evening. The sum received for a day's labour beneath the glare of the Syrian sun is only four piastres, and yet there are crowds who are anxious to earn it. I regard this fact as an sidditional proof that the mechanics and labourers, though very much oppressed, are by far the most respectable part of the Jewish population of Jerusalem, and that they are willing to use their hands even at the most painful kinds of labour. "The success of the mission is partly owing to the Jews themselves. While the conversion of a Jew to Christianity causes a painful sensation, and excites surprise in a German or Austrian community, the same event is regarded with considerable indifference by the Jews at Jerusalem. It may be that they have grown indifferent owing to the frequency of the event, or that they are quite willing to make a present of the proselytes, who are usually not remarkable for their high moral principle to the Society. The family of a convert,. though grieved at first, are soon reconciled to the change, and the family ties are not dissolved ; he visits them, he eats with them, he is still called Reb,' and addressed by his Jewish name. The family knows that, in most cases, his inward convictions have remained un- changed, and I have heard them say, He will soon come back, after he has
helped himself.' Then there is great joy." •
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