Where would the doom strike next?
The Jews who lived illegally without the Pale turned their possessions into cash and slept in their clothes, ready for immediate flight.

Those who lived in the comparative security of the Pale trembled for their brothers and sisters without, and opened wide their doors to afford the fugitives refuge.

And hundreds of fugitives, preceded by a wail of distress, flocked into the open district, bringing their trouble where trouble was never absent, mingling their tears with the tears that never dried.
The open cities becoming thus suddenly crowded, every man's chance of making a living was diminished in proportion to the number of additional competitors.

Hardship, acute distress, ruin for many: thus spread the disaster, ring beyond ring, from the stone thrown by a despotic official into the ever-full river of Jewish persecution.
Passover was celebrated in tears that year.

In the story of the Exodus we would have read a chapter of current history, only for us there was no deliverer and no promised land.
But what said some of us at the end of the long service?
Not "May we be next year in Jerusalem," but "Next year--in America!" So there was our promised land, and many faces were turned towards the West.