The Jews at K'ae-fung-foo; Fac-similes of the Hebrew Manuscripts [pp. 240-250]

The Jews at Krae-fung-foo.
15, 1850, and pursuing a route, the particulars and incidents of
which are detailed in their journals, they arrived at K'aefung-foo, December 9, having travelled a distance of about
seven hundred miles in a northwest direction. They entered
the east gate of the city; and pursuing their course along the
Great East-gate Street, in accordance with the information
which they had acquired on the journey, they soon turned to
the northward, and at no great distance arrived at the site of
the Jewish synagogue, facing to the eastward. Here, in the
midst of a surrounding population, two-thirds of whom were
Mohammedans, and close adjoining to a heathen temple dedicated to the god of fire, a few Jewish families sunk in the lowest poverty and destitution, their religion scarcely more than a
name, and yet sufficient to separate them from the multitude
around, exposed to trial, reproach, and the pain of long-deferred hope, remained the unconscious depositaries of the oracles
of God, and survived as the solitary witnesses of departed
glory. Not a single individual could read the Hebrew books;
they had been without a Rabbi for fifty years. The expectation of a Messiah seems to have been entirely lost. The
rite of circumcision, which appears to have been observed at
the period of their discovery by the Jesuits two centuries ago,
had been totally discontinued. The worshippers within the
synagogue faced towards the west; but whether in the directioa of Jerusalem or towards the suspended tablets of the
emperors, no clear information was obtained. The synagogue
itself was tottering in ruins; some of the ground had been
alienated to pagan rites, and a portion of the fallen materials
sold to the neighbouring heathen. Sometime previously they
had petitioned the Chinese emperor to have pity on their
poverty, and to rebuild their temple. No reply had been
received from Peking, but to this feeble hope they still clung.
Out of seventy family names or clans, only seven now remained,
numbering about two hundred individuals in all, dispersed over
the neighbourhood. A few of them were shop-keepers in the
city; others were agriculturists at some little distance from the
suburbs; while a few families also lived in the temple precincts,
almost destitute of raiment and shelter. According to present
appearances, in the judgment of the native messengers, after a
1852.]
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