Page:Five Russian plays and one Ukrainian.pdf/186

164 : Rightly says the boy. He answered for me better than I could know. Ye all heard. While in Israel they speak thus, Eleazar will not share bread with Levites and cripples. He that has bread, let him give to the child; I will take stones from the captives. He that has fish, let him feed the children, and give me a viper that drinks blood from the heart. I shall take it and bear it with me into the courts; it will give sting to my words and its hissing they will hear in Babylon.


 * Much wilt thou earn for such songs in Babylon! Surely less than thou hast earned for the hymns of Zion.


 * Unwisely, boy, hast spoken. I sang them not hymns of Zion. The hymn of Zion, of all songs the ornament, was as a bride in Jerusalem, as a wife in the holy city; here it were as a concubine, for who taketh a captive as a lawful wife? (The people sigh. Eleazar holds his peace and bows his head.)


 * Why didst not sing the songs of captivity? Why hast not poured the bitter tears of slavery? The cold drop pierces the stone,