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No. 3 Vienna, 19 January 1900. Fourth Year

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Rothschild's Colonies.

II. A negotiation which has now been carried on for a considerable time has at last been brought to a conclusion: Baron Edmund Rothschild has handed over his Palestinian colonies to the Jewish Colonization Association for administration.

This event is interesting enough to prompt us to a few reflections. Herr Edmund von Rothschild, as is known, took up the work of colonisation with much enthusiasm and, unlike many another rich Jew, did not intervene in the lot of the poor with the customary heartless charity, but strove to lay out a larger work and to prepare a lasting remedy. Now, a weary and sick man, he has entrusted the continuation of his work to that corporation which stands as the legal successor to Baron Hirsch's good intentions, and which is called, by a name formed of the initial letters of its style, the "Jca."

The appearance of these two Jewish colonisation barons, Hirsch and Edmund Rothschild, was a remarkable and gratifying phenomenon of our time. An ideal strain in the labours of both men was unmistakable. We, who have laid not the slightest restraint upon ourselves in criticising the methods followed in these colonisations, and who have censured without indulgence the grave errors committed; we, who have often enough given expression to the unshakable view that a great national cause can be solved only from great national points of view: we may surely at this moment praise without embarrassment what deserves praise. No one will confound us with the courtiers and lackeys of rich people. And so now, when Edmund Rothschild withdraws from his well-meant activity, the good that we think of his insufficient undertaking shall not be passed over in silence either. Seldom has a great work of relief for the unfortunate been undertaken in a more modest, a more noiseless manner than Edmund Rothschild's Palestinian labour. He did not at all desire to be known as its author. For long years he kept himself in the dark, and when the quietly working person was spoken of at all, one might speak only of the "Benefactor." Therein is expressed both the merit and the infirmity of his endeavours. It is foolish to believe that one can help millions of men by way of so-called charity, though one were a Rothschild. It is the error of a kind-hearted but not very far-seeing man. Still, he has done good — perhaps more to his own House than to the poor Jews. For this House of Rothschild, which by the mere fact of its wealth stirs up so much hatred against the whole body of Jewry, here showed itself, in at least one of its members, concerned also for the sufferings of the community.

To be sure, what has Herr Edmund von Rothschild been able to accomplish with all his excellent will and the expenditure of many millions? A figure communicated last week at the meeting of the "Anglo Jewish Association" gives the answer. Edmund Rothschild has succeeded in settling 470 families — four hundred and seventy Jewish families, neither more nor less — in Palestine! The mountains are in labour, and they bring forth a mouse. 470 families! In a single lane in Cracow or Vienna or Bucharest or Warsaw, or in the East End of London or New York, there dwell more families in need of help, pining away in the Jewish distress. And not even these 470 hothouse families, planted out by Edmund Rothschild, was he in a position to help. For the help would have been accomplished only when these colonists had attained independence. And what do we now learn? That is to say, we knew it already. But officially we learn it only now: that the baronial colonies are still dependent upon the Baron's further assistance. They lie heavy in his pocket, and he means to set a limit to his sacrifices as well, by handing over the administration to the "Ica." He has indeed pledged himself to a subsidiary participation for some years yet, but the colonists are to know that they