is no field
in their street, no garden, no tree, no grass--nothing--nothing. There
are big buildings in their street, grey walls and high chimneys that
belch out smoke. Each building has a lot of windows, thousands and
thousands of windows, and machines that go without hands. And in the
streets there are cars that go without horses. And beyond these,
nothing--nothing.

Even a little bird is seldom seen here. Sometimes an odd sparrow strays
in--grey as the grey walls. He picks, picks at the stones. He spreads
out his wings and flies away. Fowls? The children sometimes see the
quarter of one with a long, pale leg. How many legs has a fowl? "Four,
just like a horse," explains Abramtzig. And surely he knows everything.
Sometimes their mother brings home from the market a little head with
glassy eyes that are covered with a white film. "It's dead," says
Abramtzig, and all three children look at each other out of great black
eyes; and they sigh.

Born and brought up in the big city, in the huge building, in the
congestion, loneliness and poverty, not one of the three children ever
saw a living creature, neither a fowl, nor a cow, nor any other animal,
excepting the cat. They have a cat of their own--a big, live cat, as
grey as the high damp grey wall. The cat is their only play-toy. They
play with it for hours on end. They put a shawl on her, call her "the
wedding guest," and laugh and laugh without an end. When their mother
sees them, she presents them--one with a smack, a second with a dig in
the ribs, and the third with a twist of the ear. The children go off to
their hiding-place behind the stove. The eldest, Abramtzig, tells a
story, and the other two, Moshetzig and Dvairke, listen to him. He says
their mother is right. They ought not to play with the cat, because a
cat is a wicked animal. Abramtzig knows everything. There is nothing in
the world that he does not know.

* * *

Abramtzig knows everything. He knows there is a land far away called
America. In America they have a lot of relatives and friends. In that
same America the Jews are well-off and happy--may no evil eye rest on
them! Next year, if God wills it, they will go off to America--when they
get tickets. Without tickets no one can go to America, because there is
a sea. And on the sea there is a storm that shakes one to the very soul.
Abramtzig knows everything.

He even knows what goes on in the other world. For instance, he knows
that in the other wo