The Melting-Pot

What of that?

[He throws down his quill and jumps up.] But just fancy it, uncle. The Stars and Stripes unfurled, and a thousand childish voices, piping and foreign, fresh from the lands of oppression, hailing its fluttering folds. I cried like a baby.

MENDEL

I'm afraid you are one.

DAVID

Ah, but if you had heard them-'Flag of our Great Republic'-the words have gone singing at my heart ever since-

[He turns to the flag over the door.] 'Flag of our Great Republic, guardian of our homes, whose stars and stripes stand for Bravery, Purity, Truth, and Union, we salute thee. We, the natives of distant lands, who find

[Half-sobbing] rest under thy folds, do pledge our hearts, our lives, our sacred honour to love and protect thee, our Country, and the liberty of the American people for ever.'

[He ends almost hysterically.]

MENDEL [Soothingly]

Quite right. But you needn't get so excited over it.

DAVID

Not when one hears the roaring of the fires of God? Not when one sees the souls melting in the Crucible? Uncle, all those little Jews will grow up Americans!

MENDEL [Putting a pacifying hand on his shoulder and forcing him into a

chair] Sit down. I want to talk to you about your affairs.

DAVID [Sitting]

My affairs! But I've been talking about them all the time!

MENDEL

Nonsense, David.

[He sits beside him.] Don't you think it's time you got into a wider world?

DAVID

Eh? This planet's wide enough for me.

MENDEL

Do be serious. You don't want to live all your life in this room.

DAVID [Looks round]

What's the matter with this room? It's princely.

MENDEL [Raising his hands in horror]

Princely!

DAVID

Imperial. Remember when I first saw it-after pigging a week in the rocking steerage, swinging in a berth as wide as my fiddle-case, hung near the cooking-engines; imagine the hot rancid smell of the food, the oil of the machinery, the odours of all that close-packed, sea-sick--

MENDEL [Putting his hand over DAVID'S mouth]

Don't! You make me ill! How could you ever bear it?

DAVID [Smiling]

I was quite happy-I only had to fancy I'd been shipwrecked, and that after clinging to a plank five days without food or water on the great lonely Atlantic, my frozen, sodden form had been picked up by this great safe steamer and given this delightful dry berth, regular meals, and the spectacle of all these friendly faces.... Do you know who was on board that boat? Quincy Davenport.

MENDEL

The lord of corn and oil?

DAVID [Smiling]

Yes, even we wretches in the steerage felt safe to think the lord was up above, we believed the company would never dare drown him. But could even Quincy Davenport command a cabin like this?

[Waving his arm round the room.] Why, uncle, we have a cabin worth a thousand dollars-a thousand dollars a week-and what's more, it doesn't wobble!

[He plants his feet voluptuously upon the floor.]

MENDEL

Come, come, David, I asked you to be serious. Surely, some day you'd like your music produced?

DAVID [Jumps up]

Wouldn't it be glorious? To hear it all actually coming out of violins and 'cellos, drums and trumpets.

MENDEL

And you'd like it to go all over the world?

DAVID

All over the world and all down the ages.

MENDEL

But don't you see that unless you go and study seriously in Germany--?

[Enter KATHLEEN from kitchen, carrying a furnished tea-tray with

ear-shaped cakes, bread and butter, etc., and wearing a grotesque

false nose. MENDEL cries out in amaze.] Kathleen!

DAVID [Roaring with boyish laughter]

Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!

KATHLEEN [Standing still with her tray]

Sure, what's the matter?

DAVID

Look in the glass!

KATHLEEN [Going to the mantel]

Houly Moses!

[She drops the tray, which MENDEL catches, and snatches off the

nose.] Och, I forgot to take it off-'twas the misthress gave it me-I put it on to cheer her up.

DAVID

Is she so miserable, then?

KATHLEEN

Terrible low, Mr. David, to-day being Purim.

MENDEL

Purim! Is to-day Purim?

[Gives her the tea-tray back. KATHLEEN, to take it, drops her

nose and forgets to pick it up.]

DAVID

But Purim is a merry time, Kathleen, like your Carnival. Haven't you read the book of Esther-how the Jews of Persia escaped massacre?

KATHLEEN

That's what the misthress is so miserable about. Ye don't keep the Carnival. There's noses for both of ye in the kitchen-didn't I go with her to Hester Street to buy 'em?-but ye don't be axin' for 'em. And to see your noses layin' around so solemn and neglected, faith, it nearly makes me chry meself.

MENDEL [Bitterly to himself]

Who can remember about Purim in America?

DAVID [Half-smiling]

Poor granny, tell her to come in and I'll play her Purim jig.