There was a song her mother used to sing.

It was taken from a _Purim-Spiel_, itself based upon a Midrash, one of the endless legends with which the People of One Book have broidered it, amplifying every minute detail with all the exuberance of oriental imagination and justifying their fancies with all the ingenuity of a race of lawyers.

After his brethren sold Joseph to the Midianite merchants, the lad escaped from the caravan and wandered foot-sore and hungry to Bethlehem, to the grave of his mother, Rachel.

And he threw himself upon the ground and wept aloud and sang to a heart-breaking melody in Yiddish.
Und hei weh ist mir, Wie schlecht ist doch mir, Ich bin vertrieben geworen Junger held voon dir.
Whereof the English runs: Alas! woe is me! How wretched to be Driven away and banished, Yet so young, from thee.
Thereupon the voice of his beloved mother Rachel was heard from the grave, comforting him and bidding him be of good cheer, for that his future should be great and glorious.
Esther could not sing this without the tears trickling down her cheeks.
Was it that she thought of her own dead mother and applied the lines to herself?
Isaac's ill-humor scarcely ever survived the anodyne of these mournful cadences.

There was another melodious wail which Alte Belcovitch had brought from Poland.