I flung my arms around my brother and he seized Bessie by the curls, and we danced about the room crazy with joy. “Beggars!” laughed my mother, “why are you so happy with yourselves? How will you go to America without a shirt on your back--without shoes on your feet?” But we ran out into the road, shouting and singing: “We’ll sell everything we got--we’ll go to America.” “White bread and meat we’ll eat every day--in America! In America!” That very evening we fetched Berel Zalman, the usurer, and showed him all our treasures, piled up in the middle of the hut. “Look, all these fine feather beds, Berel Zalman,” urged my mother; “this grand fur coat came from Nijny itself. My grandfather bought it at the fair.” I held up my red quilted petticoat, the supreme sacrifice of my ten-year-old life. Even my father shyly pushed forward the samovar. “It can hold enough tea for the whole village.” “Only a hundred rubles for them all,” pleaded my mother; “only enough to lift us to America. Only one hundred little rubles.” “A hundred rubles? Pfui!” sniffed the pawnbroker. “Forty is overpaid. Not even thirty is it worth.” But coaxing and cajoling my mother got a hundred rubles out of him. * * * * * Steerage--dirty bundles--foul odors--seasick humanity--but I saw and heard nothing of the foulness and ugliness around me. I floated in showers of sunshine; visions upon visions of the new world opened before me. From lips to lips flowed the golden legend of the golden country: “In America you can say what you feel--you can voice your thoughts in the open streets without fear of a Cossack.” “In America is a home for everybody. The land is your land. Not like in Russia where you feel yourself a stranger in the village where you were born and raised--the village in which your father and grandfather lie buried.” “Everybody is with everybody alike, in America. Christians and Jews are brothers together.” “An end to the worry for bread. An end to the fear of the bosses over you. Everybody can do what he wants with his life in America.” “There are no high or low in America. Even the President holds hands with Gedalyeh Mindel.” “Plenty for all. Learning flows free like milk and honey.” * * * * * “Learning flows free.” The words painted pictures in my mind. I saw before me free schools, free colleges, free libraries, where I could learn and learn and keep on learning. In our village was a school, but only for Christian children. In the schools of America I’d lift up my head and laugh and dance--a child with other children. Like a bird in the air, from sky to sky, from star to star, I’d soar and soar. “Land! Land!” came the joyous shout. “America! We’re in America!” cried my mother, almost smothering us in her rapture.