It is no wonder, then, that the Jew takes a gloomy view of life, and that whenever he rises to any generalizations, he gives utterance to the blackest pessimism. One such poem depicts the vanities of human life, into which one is born as into a prison, from which one is freed at best at the Biblical age of three score and ten, to leave all the gold and silver to the surviving orphans. There is but one consolation in life, and that is, that _Tōre_, 'learning,' will do one as much good in the other world as it does in this. And yet, under all these distressing circumstances, the Jew finds pleasure in whole-hearted laughter. His comical ditties may be divided into two classes,--those in which he laughs at his own weaknesses, and those in which he ridicules the weaknesses of the Khassidim, the fanatical sect, among whom the Rabbis are worshipped as saints and are supposed to work miracles. This sect is very numerous in Poland and South Russia, is very ignorant, and has opposed progress longer than the Misnagdim, to which sect the other German Jews in Russia belong. As an example of the first class may serve a poem in which poverty is made light of: Ferd' hāb' ich vun Paris: Drei ohn' Köpp', zwēi ohn' Füss'. Ladrizem bam, ladrizem bam. A Rock hāb' ich vun guten Tuch, Ich hāb' vun ihm kein Bröckel Duch. Ladrizem, etc. Stiewel hāb' ich vun guten Leder, Ich hāb' vun see kein Bröckel Feder. Ladrizem, etc. Kinder hāb' ich a drei Tuz', Ich hāb' vun see kein Bröckel Nutz. Ladrizem, etc. Jetzt hāb' ich sich arumgetracht Un' hāb' vun see a Barg Asch' gemacht. Ladrizem bam, ladrizem bam. Horses I have from Paris, three without heads, and two without feet,--ladrizem bam, etc.--A coat I have of good cloth,--I have not a trace left of it.--Boots I have of good leather, not a feather's weight have I left of them.--Children I have some three dozen,--I get no good out of them.--So I fell a-thinking and made a heap of ashes of them. The sensuality, intemperance, and profound ignorance and superstition of the _Rebe_, or Rabbi, of the Khassidim, and the credulity and lightheartedness of his followers, form, perhaps, the subject of the most poems in the Judeo-German language, as they also form the main subject of attack in the written literature of the last forty years. V. PRINTED POPULAR POETRY