The Lord of the Sea Part 44

Now Temple and Synagogue were crowded: rabbi and p.a.w.nbroker and _maggid,_ clothes-man and _takif,_ were infected; and there spread the cry (for the most part meaningless): "To Zion!"

It may be that the Jewish electorate were now too agitated with the near probability of s.h.i.+loh to interest themselves in any mundane question: at all events, it was during that rage that the Government-whips announced the certainty that the Jewish members would vote against the Land Bill.

Hogarth first heard it pretty late at night from the Prime Minister; and "Ha!-the Jews", he went: "so they have dared, these men? I never thought that they would! May G.o.d deliver me from His ill-chosen people--!"

"And ill-choosing, it seems, my Lord King".

"Quite so! But, Sir Robert Wortley, is it supportable this thing?"--a brand now on his brow--"an alien race in Britain opposing thus daringly not _my_ will only, but the plain will of the people? And have I the air of one who will support it? Rather, I a.s.sure you, would I govern without a Parliament! But stop--perhaps I shall be found capable of dealing with these mischievous children of Israel. Give me a night: and to-morrow at noon come, and hear. Of course, this second-reading business must be postponed ".

And deep and wide, in lonely vigil, wrought the Regent's thought that night, till morning: of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, of tendencies, histories, soils, ports, railways, possibilities, race-genius, a.n.a.logies, destinies; of Rothschild and I Solomon; of Hirsch and Y'hudah Hana.s.si; of the Jewish Board of Guardians, Rab Asa, and the Targum on the Babylonish Talmud; of the Barbary Jews, the Samaritans, and Y'hudah Halevi; of the Colonial Bank, and the Karaite Jews....

When at dawn he threw himself dressed into bed, he had resolved upon a very great thing: their expulsion from England, Pole and Hungarian, Baron and coster, and the little child at the breast, ten millions.

His eyes had closed toward sleep when, with a start, he remembered a prophecy uttered one evening in the _Boodah_ Throne-room, and these words: "Richard, deal gently with my people...."

Two nights later, with a retinue, he hurriedly left England-for Constantinople.

XLVI

THE ORDER IN COUNCIL

Three days before that setting-out, O'Hara's appeal for pardon had come under the Regent's notice: and as he had read, his eyes--once more--had softened, as he had thought: "It would be a great crime to forgive him the long list; but never mind--we will see"....

And he had meant to reply, but suddenly the Jews had swept O'Hara quite out of his mind.

He was away hardly two weeks: and when he returned, Palestine and western Armenia were his, all his acts of this period bearing resemblance in largeness and rage to the incredible forced-marches of Napoleon.

If one spreads apart the first two fingers, he sees exactly the country ordained by Hogarth for modern Israel: the first finger Palestine, looking upon the Mediterranean; between the fingers, the Syrian Desert; the second (longer) finger that Mesopotamia, "the cradle of our race"

between the Euphrates and the Tigris, this opening upon the Persian Gulf, and the trade of the East.

The then population of this area was only 300,000 (Arabs, Turks, Jews, Greeks) in the Palestine finger, omitting Russian pilgrims to Jerusalem; while in the Mesopotamia finger--all that Hinterland of Palestine called "Turkish Armenia"--not 320,000 Armenians had been left by Khurdish rapine and Turkish atrocity: we may therefore say that the whole was an uninhabited land waiting for inhabitants.

The only things needed (according to modern notions) to make it immediately colonizable were roads and railways, and the Regent had not returned to Dover when both were making in Palestine, the Sultan, left thunderstruck with a chronic eye of scare by that visit, "lending his co-operation", consoled meanwhile by a Conversion Loan of thirteen millions out of Sea-revenue; to which add a grant-in-aid of fifteen millions to the emigrants, and the remark of Hogarth's Chancellor about this time becomes intelligible: "Your Lords.h.i.+p's Majesty's expenditure is exceeding revenue by 50 per cent"; so that Beech's was soon realizing considerably in bonds over Europe, and Hogarth temporarily poor--had stubbornly refused any Parliament-grant for the Regent's personal establishment.

And suddenly from the blue fell his bolt: at that same table of the Regent's oath-of-office a.s.sembled eighty-seven Jewish lords and gentlemen at noon of the 24th March, the first day of the month Nisan in the Jewish year 5699, ordered, each by himself, to the Royal presence; and the Regent, with the gravest eyes, both palms pressed on the table, in an embarra.s.sment of compunction, rose and spoke with them--Rothschild and merchant-prince, Chief Rabbi, Manchester Chief Minister, Heads of the Alliance Israelite, Anglo-Jewish a.s.sociation, Jewish Board, Jewish philanthropists, writers; and they could not believe themselves awake.

He began by speaking of himself, the fact of his power, with such graciousness, that all were affected, not by the power, but by the gentleness which wielded it: Providence had given him the disposal of the earth, and it was for him to do his poor best--a lonesome, sorrowful post; so that talking could never alter in anything the main point; but it could modify details: and he had called them to invoke their great administrative gift and expert counsel; he told of the exodus which he designed, the home which he had prepared them; recommended a Sanhedrim of Chief Jews to form the Provisional Government of the new State, with the Chief Rabbi as its head under the t.i.tle of Shophet (Judge); would offer a contribution of 15,000,000 from his Exchequer toward an emigration and colonizing fund, and doubtless emigration bureaus would be at once established at princ.i.p.al centres; he would also hand over a Deed of Gift of this larger Judaea as between the Sea and the Jewish people to the Central Authority as soon as established; also, duplicates of the text of the Treaty as between the Sea and the Ottoman Empire.

What he gave he gave, he a.s.sured them, with a free heart, without condition; except, of course, one: that no inch of the new land should ever "belong" to any particular Jew: for he gave, as Nature gave the earth, not to a hundred, but to all, living and to be born, occupiers to pay rent, not to any adventurer calling himself landlord, but to the Central Authority, representing all. This done, he would invoke with confidence upon their able race the blessing of Almighty G.o.d.

In tones so mellow did he utter himself, that for many minutes stillness reigned, every face pale.

Until a baron stood up with ashen under-lip, to say that such a scheme, it seemed to him, must remain for ever abortive, unless enforced by Act of Parliament--

But Hogarth checked him quick.

"No, my lord, not by Act of Parliament: the how your lords.h.i.+p may leave to me. I dare say you will see it in this evening's papers".

It was by an Order in Council!

"DECLARATION of the Court of Great Britain respecting the Order in Council.

"At the Court at Buckingham Palace, the 24th day of March, his Lords.h.i.+p's Majesty, the Lord Regent, in Council.

"WHEREAS His Lords.h.i.+p's Majesty was pleased to declare in the name and on behalf of His Majesty the King on the 23rd day of March: THAT if at any time, after the expiration of the three months following, any of the hereinafter mentioned trades, occupations, pursuits, or acts, shall be carried on or done within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland by any person being a person coming within the sense of the term "Jew" as hereinafter defined, THEN and thereafter such person shall be liable to the pains and penalties hereinafter specified".

No Jew might own or work land, or teach in any Cheder or school, or be entered at any Public School or University, or sign any stamped doc.u.ment, or carry on certain trades, or vote, or officiate at any public service, and so on: parentage, not religion, const.i.tuting a "Jew". Through Britain this piece of Russian despotism sent a wave of quiet gladness, and an epidemic of jest broke out, in club, factory, "Lane", and drawing-room: "You hurry up--to Jericho!" became the workman's answer to a Jew; it was remarked that the chimney of train and steams.h.i.+p would furnish a new pillar of cloud by day, and pillar of fire by night, to go before the modern Exodus; they were little to be pitied, for even Heaven was their mortgagor in land, with promise to pay--the Promised Land; a syndicate would be formed to "pool" milk and honey, and either Sharon or Salem would become the new Get-O at any price; being a rather Peculiar People, they would call the new Temple "the 'Ouse" (of Prey-ers), and make contango-day coincide with Pa.s.sover....But let him laugh that is of a merry heart: as for Israel, with weary breast and hunted stare he sandalled his foot for the final Exodus: yet not as them without hope. Already--some days before the Order in Council--the disappearance of Estrella's body, her daring prophecies, had led to the embarkation of 700 Jews for Palestine; and when the Regent's Edict gave startling confirmation of her prediction of "the Return", in many a million hearts thrilled the certainty: "the Day of the Lord is nigh!"

And with that their stoicism and organizing strength, they mutely turned to follow the finger of Destiny: their _takifs_ (rich men), hard upon the unchosen, were, as usual, liberal to their own, the fund swelled, and a Committee left England for the acc.u.mulation of stores and implements; at the same time two Parliament Bills were pa.s.sed in two sittings, empowering the purchase by Government of land "owned" by Jews on Land Bill terms, and quickening the machinery for the collection of debts due to Jews.

Whereupon, "You see", said the Chief Rabbi, "he drives us out: but he makes us ap.r.o.ns--if only of fig-leaves--to cover us. Let us bow to his rod, and thank him, and go: he is G.o.d's Minister".

So they went: the world's mercantile marine having been summoned, sea-ports were turned into caravansaries of gabardine and ear-lock: the Exodus began.

In the midst of which it came to the knowledge of the Regent that the house of Frankl was making ready for departure.

And now Hogarth rebelled against Heaven: self-forgetfully he did his best, and it returned and struck him dead: for what good, he thought, would his life do him, she always in Asia, he in Europe?

He wrote to her, a pa.s.sionate hotch-potch of command and grovelling supplication: if she went, he would curse her; would go mad; would blaspheme G.o.d; would throw up everything; would die.

He had promised to go down to Oxford to receive a degree, and as up to the time of his departure she had not replied, he went half-unconscious of himself and those about him.

Now, upon Adair Street the Expulsion had brought despair, the second-reading now a.s.sured, the Jews' vote over, and new writs issued; the second-reading debate was actually in progress at that date of the Oxford visit; and though the four yachts, copies of the _Mahomet II_, were being rapidly put together, the Bill, if at all pressed, must get through before they could be ready; nor could the House of Lords long delay its pa.s.sage.

There remained Harris, so far ineffectual, but not therefore hopeless: so he, spurred, went down to Oxford.

But what Harris could not do was to get near to Hogarth: his task was, as it were, to pluck Venus from the firmament; but he mused, he mused upon her, with musing astrologic eye, with grand patience, fascinated by her very splendours, not without hope. When at 8 P.M. a banquet was served to 250 guests in the Radcliffe Library, the upper gallery being open to a crawling public to see the lions feed, Harris, watching thence the unattainable under the blue of the canopy--blue always in honour of the Sea--thought within himself: "Ah, Mr. 76, you've got it all, ain't you?--for the time being. But 'ow'd you feel if I had a pistol now?

Gawd! I can just see him nicely curl and kick. Worse luck, I can't shoot a bloomin' 'ouse".

But the opportunity was so exquisite, that he resolved to try--the exit reached, would run, get a pistol, and return; but at the door itself a hand touched his shoulder, and, with a twist of guilty scare, he saw--O'Hara.

"Good Gawd!" he whispered, "what you want to startle anybody like that for? Don't you know that the wicked flea pursueth every man, but the righteous shall escape his filthy snare?"

"What are you doing here, boy?" asked O'Hara.

"Thick-head! ain't I down 'ere after this precious Mr. 76?"--for Hogarth, if Monarch of the Sun, would have remained for Harris only a glorified 76, Colmoor being for him the reality of the universe, all else mirage, such stuff as dreams are made of.

"Well", said O'Hara, "come with me: want to talk to you"--he just come from the _Mahomet_ through Spain and France, drawn to Hogarth as moths to a candle, his pet.i.tion for pardon not yet answered; and he a.s.sumed that Hogarth's wrath still blazed, though, in fact, answer was only delayed by compet.i.tion of greater interests, Hogarth having forgotten O'Hara; at any rate, O'Hara, with shrinking qualms, had come to Oxford, thinking: "I will try and get at him for one more talk--I am not afraid of your eyes, my son: tut! I've seen the great brow in a prison-cap. And the haughty beast still loves old Pat at bottom, I do declare. Be bold, be bold, but not _too_ bold....Well, I will! And, if I perish, I perish, and he perishes, too, so help me, G.o.d"....

And to Harris, walking by the towing-path, he said: "No, boy, don't you.

Not now. Tut!--those lords: they are only making you their tool. Don't you understand? Hogarth is robbing from them the land which they have robbed from the British people, and they naturally wish to murder him: but what have _you_, or I, to do with that? Let the thieves fight it out between them, while we enjoy ourselves, if we can. Weren't we happy in the _Mahomet_, boy--we two? Didn't you roll whole weeks drunk? That was better than Colmoor, eh, Alfie? And didn't I have my incense, my grapes, my little Circa.s.sian, and ten thousand pounds in yellow gold a year? Wasn't that all right? Well, we may have it again!--not in the _Mahomet_, perhaps, but somewhere. Do nothing--not yet: till I give the word. If you _must_ kill, get a dog, or a horse, or an obscure old man, not the Regent of England--"