e water became too black, some young boys threw it out
of doors, and the women waited for the tubs to be filled again, their
red parboiled hands resting on their hips, in the way of washerwomen the
world over.

We crossed the mud before the wash-house, on planks, and went into a
house across the courtyard.

"This is the tailoring establishment," Mme. C---- continued. "The
tailors among them mend and cut over old clothes which we collect for
them, so that every Jew may start on the next stage of his journey in
perfectly clean and whole clothes. My husband and son complain that they
will have to stay in bed, soon, I have taken so many of their suits of
clothes.--And here are the shoemakers."

We looked into the adjoining room, where the cobblers sat cross-legged,
sewing and patching and pegging shoes.

"It's very hard to find the leather. But it is so important. If you
could see how they come here--their feet bleeding and swollen and their
shoes in tatters. And many of them were rich bankers and professors in
Galicia and Poland, used to their own automobiles like the rest of us. I
think I would steal leather for them."

The workers were different from the waiting Jews in the courtyard.
Perhaps it was work that gave them importance in their own eyes, and
took away that dreadful degrading subserviency--degrading to us as much
as to themselves. The whirring noise of the sewing-machines, the click
of shears, the bent backs of the workers, and the big capable hands,
formed by the accustomed work! The trade of every man could have been
known by his hands! My heart was warm toward them.

"It's splendid, I think," I said to Mme. C----.

As though she guessed my thoughts, she replied, "They are grateful for
being allowed to work."

"For being allowed to work." Those words damn much in the world. What
hindrances we erect in the way of life!

And I looked out into the courtyard again, at the apathetic faces of
the waiting Jews. Waiting for what? The white, dead faces, with the
curved noses and hard, bright eyes, all turned toward us. Were they
submissive or expectant, or simply hating us? They say the Galician Jews
turn traitors and act as spies for the Austrians. But surely not these.
What could these broken creatures do? How near death they seemed!

The courtyard burned like a furnace. The shade was shrinking from moment
to moment. The heat rose in blinding waves. I was sickened. The
courtyard smelled of dirt and waste