The Ghetto School.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIIC, Issue 13679, 22 August 1908, Page 1 (Supplement)

The Ghetto School.

WHERE BOYS ABE TRAINED TO 3B I .WRANGLERS, j (By Harold Spender.) I It is a class-room, in a bchool off ths Mile-end-road'—-one of those lofty, "clean, well-lighted rooms i)i\>vided by jmhlio authority for the children of the, people in almost, every part of' London to-day. The sunlight falls upon rows of little dark-haired heads ben't over their books. At the fitiit question the heads arp lifted, bright eyes flash at you—kcea ; ey<:« shining from littlo faces, lit with i; eager inteUigencc. "They are learners of tli« world," says the teacher. " They ' leAm because they want to learn." ' And when you ask them n few. questions and you find that the children in that room conie from every part" tf t'hs world—from Geimany, Austria, It&lr, France, lloumania, Eufsia—yes, above all, lliissia. ■■ - . TItANSFOIIMATION. ! .They are the children of the race that lias no country. They eoru6 from all the world—driven, hunted, > persecuted, "tortured. Like scattered leaves before a, hupricane they fly to these shores, and here at last they find some real. For theyfirisb lime ia,their lives they have a clianoe. And now the worfd knows how they .tl&B that chance. The Mile-end Senior Wranglership is dramatic enough. But it. ha* coma us no surprise to those who know these children. For in these schools oi» sees miracles of humau change . A lUllo child' will come into the 6thool, \brought from some Ghetto-slum by tfee sweep of t;ur great educational broorhf-V half-ragged, half-washed child, with tangled hair, large.i.Rad eyes, and a,'loqk as of one who has known no frieijd bjit Death.. S]»eak to her in Englisli, and'bh* will answer no word—utter a word, of 1 iddish, and her Wngue will be unlocked. She will etammer out her story. Th> very name of the Russian town will 'ttll you all. Let us say it is KisliiniffT " Your father?" "My f a :thcr was killed.V ''Brother?" "We Itst, our '."brother"? "jMother?" "Mother is out You get a glimpse as 'into a fiety furnace —a gb'mpse of bell, hate and inaasacr«, from which this little child has been eared. as by fire. t ~" Return .to .that school a fefr njphthis later. You will ssee in the place-wiei& sab tha-t ■ tongue-tied, terrorised little mg, still smirched; with the filth'of : th« Je\yish Pale, a; b'tight, tileari, eag<fii; • py-faced chdd, wha already talks -th> : Erig; hsh tongue. , You will, perha'pSy riot «£ cognise her. .But the teacher w'iljl' tell j-ou.. 4 " 0, yes, that: is .Anna Kftzow'sky; . we had to send her home several times;, but.now her mother sends- her clean, and we think she'll be one; of the brightest girls in the class.'' . The trampled • bud has been- watered with human kindness; and it is already smiling.back. In,a years, she will blossom out into t, fulj flower, a new "London Pride," for ouf English garden. So truly did Mm Bron-ning say, ~.,■• ? God's possible is taught by His-world'a loving. - ..,,... .-: SECRETS OF SUCCESS. >'••' How is it that so many of, these Jewisl*. children climb the ladder so quicblv, audi capturing the scholarships for which All compete, so often pass .by the Christum children in the race. Ah! you, will find the answer t.o thai if you pastj thioug-h,.th* Jewish streets .and go into; the Jewish homes. It is because,, follovping; tradition which has brought' their, .raw undiminished through the .long; cenii.urijSg of exile, they look after their children %» Svell. Watch the playgrounds' of tne schools' at the hour of. depaituri 'lb, is the Jewish mothers who 'come fliist; H t<i fetch their children. Go through. mhy class. It is the Jewish children that (bear the marks of most-careful home •bending?;. Inqiure—aa we inquired' last; spring, in four of the into'the question of .feeding. You ■•will scarcely ever. I* had almost' said '•" never,'' discover, a Jewish child nnfedJ -!RatherV the danger is that !thb poor . and ■ liungiy. 'Over- - feed their children. . The teachers' get to fear the large, heavy luncliis—wrapped up so carefully . and hugged so cloßelyr-ij which the little children bring to «sat 'at IT o'clock in the, morning.; . i . \ .•' < Stay—we once discovered an underfed, child, in a 6chobl of a thousand,; drawn from Central Stepney—a child of a.father, long out of work and a, mother who,.'was sick. But scarcely was the word, mentioned when, there arose, as from, the ground, charity after charity, all fed- front Jewish pockets, to" look' after, that .child —Penny Dinner Funds, Breakfast. Iftmds, and, always, behind' all "the others,' that best of London Poor-law '.' Boards, the Jewish of Guardians.. The Jewish Board of Guardians does not draw a pemiy from the rate of. London. Bub 'there''ss. not'a sick or distressed Jew or Jeweys that it does not befriend—befriendi' and not degrade. ' -.-.'•' ' - ■-. i> . "How is it," you ask, "that those poor East-end Jems look after their children'so well?" Well, there are eereral but three aboA-e ail.. The first \»> beoaus* tlie paroiits are sober. The public-housts .of East Loudon get, little or nothing -frohi the Jewis. The second is because, however badly organised . and' overworked'—andl there is much' to be said on that point—they are amazingly, : miraculously....inddstrious. ; And- the third' is because-they have a religion they really ■ behetei'in'. Let thosei three reasons bo enough for tie • present. ••■■.■■•■ ~ . •... ... GRATEFUL PRIDE. .. But it ie ript; only the children - (hut ...are ready, willing iearners. ' I woiild-Tike; to take your readers to some of our .Ghetto evening-schools, the. schools where , the adult Russian and German Jew, artificially thrust back into .darkness by European Governniontb-, clutches at his last- '.hopp of knowledge.- They,come to this country liko little children, Ignorant of" tile Eugh'sh language, very ; often unajblo ~to read, write or'add up. .-They are.sit? w-ork all day—perhaps in scnia factory or workshop, but very often doubled up atitiiloring in some littlo.sweating 'don. "In tlio evening they rush from their"-work;- with ■scarcely a bite- of food, straight to evening claeises.v And there, thpy sib -for hours patiently .ploddiugjvthrougli some infant reading-book . or painfully:' summing up, ivith slow, stiff fingers, the.multiplication .'table. -And in a! few mouths they will learn to write or read .our English tongue alhiost as ' well as the Christain workman, who has half-forgotten what lie lcarnb a't school.' ' .• '.'. I; never feel prouder: of • England.'than when standing in these-schools and watching! this work.!! For hero as .the England we knew wlien' we 'were the hospitable, the. free,'the humane..- jSTc're are the'.fugitives' from all laijtls, the fugitives froni" tlie" Consack's knoiit,' the Germans sword, the' Roumanian's torch; The human.wealth that' igitdrance"andi*raelty have w'asted.;is'licre" bearing fold, eixty-fold,' a"hundred-fold./ i\nd.*e have our reward.' : For 'in return ,for this work • we ! win' "the ; gratitud©;' that >i»' the best basis;-for citizenship. •' • .'- -■- • Nothing is more pathetic . than the./'desiro of these people to be English, s to-Work for' England, to-fight for England. 'England -is the.'only Western Europcan' r ni,t'ion that has been wholly .just' and • gencrouß to;thoJew: And in return' England v.is -the; only ■■country >vhero tho.' Jew: is gs proud of Tik nation as: of his race.-'- >■*