Dr Simon was among those at the railway station who saw Lidia off for New York. As she shook hands with them in the Pullman car, he later recalled, she urged them to continue to work for the spread of Esperanto throughout the world, and to be faithful to the ideals of the Esperanto movement.
Now, Lidia's thoughts were on returning to Europe, and she faced the prospect with determination but with the knowledge that the conflagration was not far off. In fact, war was already raging in the world: fascists were fighting republicans in Spain, the Japanese army was attacking China, and Italy had occupied Ethiopia. 'The tiger of war has broken out of its cage', Lidia wrote in an article. And like a tiger, once released, the beast of war could not be expected to respect the laws of civilized society. Lidia offered the scenario: a neutral ship, bombarded by a plane from one of the warring sides; the aviator ignores its identifying markings. 'The offended power energetically protests. The other side makes excuses for itself: fog, a regrettable error, the guilty ones will be punished . . .
'Abyssinia, Spain, China. . . here and elsewhere the victims cry out and bloody fountains spurt. A tiger that breaks out of its cage knows no restraints. The tiger of war also knows no restraints. For it, international laws do not exist, neutrality does not exist. Respect for civilian populations, for the Red Cross, for schools, for temples, does not exist.' Those who thought otherwise, she asserted were 'naive'. 'The tiger of war has no ears to listen, no brain to understand, no heart to feel compassion.' While the diplomats vainly tried to 'teach the tiger good conduct', Lidia urged women to build in their hearts, and the hearts of their children, 'the fortifications of Peace. Fortifications that will not be penetrated by the poison gases of interracial hatred and suspicion, that will not be demolished by the bombs of chauvinist fanaticism . . .'
Events soon showed that Lidia was right; the diplomats could not 'teach the tiger good conduct'. Just as Lidia was leaving Cleveland, news came that a massive pogrom had been unleashed against thejews of Germany. In 'revenge' for the assassination of a German diplomat by a distraught seventeen-year-old Polish Jew, whose parents were among those whose Polish citizenship was cancelled and who had been expelled from Germany, a wave of'spontaneous' violence swept over Germany and Austria. Led by Storm Troops at the direction of Josef Goebbels and Reinhard Heydrich, mobs burned Jewish homes, shops and synagogues. In the violence of that Kristallnacht or 'Night of Glass', which actually continued for a week, five million marks' worth of plate glass was shattered, seventy-five hundred Jewish businesses were destroyed, and nearly a hundred Jews were murdered. Some thirty thousand Jews were arrested and sent to concentration camps.
This was the Europe to which Lidia was returning.
Roan wanted to travel from Boston to New York to see Lidia off, but Lidia wrote her not to come. 'I must not encourage you to that expenditure of money, time and effort, however glad I too would be to see you again', she told her friend. Apparently Roan was also hesitant about going, but for reasons of humility. After receiving Roan's next letter, Lidia wrote: 'Now, I'm grumbling!!! You really have crazy motives for not coming to New York, if it is "because you are not worthy to shine my shoes" or something like that!!! (Parenthetically speaking, I shine them myself.) But watch out, Roan, because finally 1*11 really say: "she is crazy".
'But although I don't agree about the motives, I think that it is better for you not to come, as much for the expense of time and money, as for the fact that - and in this I have great experience - the personal separation is much harder than if you stay in Boston. You will not be happy when you see the ship pull away from the shore. I know those matters well. So, it is better for you to stay in Boston, but please remember that the reasons you gave completely differ from mine!'
As the day for her departure drew near, Lidia wrote farewell letters to her friends in America. Surely some of the most painful letters she had to write in those last dark days were letters like this one:
Dear Baha'f Friend, I received your kind letter a few days ago and am very grateful indeed for the kind invitation that the friends of Augusta [Georgia] are extending to me. I would be extremely happy to be able to accept it. Unfortunately, it is otherwise. I am compelled to leave America and am sailing for Poland in a week, on November 29th.
We never know what are God's plans for us. Maybe I shall come back one day - if it be His Will. Then, I hope, Mrs Quinlan would inform you and perhaps I could visit Augusta then. Meantime thank you again for your kind letter. May the Blessing of Baha'u'llah be always upon the friends of Augusta.
With truest Baha'i love, yours, Lidia Zamenhof.
Lidia's last days in New York were hectic and filled with meetings. Even before asking Lidia's approval, Della had arranged for her to give a Baha'f talk in Brooklyn.'Yes, you are right that I certainly would not refuse to speak,' Lidia had answered. 'That indeed will be the last service, I believe, which I will be able to render in America.' It was, Della wrote Roan, 'a fine meeting. Most of the people there were Esperantists. They were greatly attracted. I need not tell you how she spoke. A man said to me last Thursday night that over and over again he was saying to himself while she was speaking, "eloquent, eloquent". And don't we know it!'
The day before Lidia was to leave America was Thanksgiving. She had been invited to spend the holiday with Mr and Mrs Edward Kinney, and she stayed at their home until eleven that night at a meeting attended by both Esperantists and Baha'fs. 'That night', Lidia wrote later, 'remained unforgettable in my memory. The whole atmosphere was profoundly penetrating and spiritual. I can still see the gray head of Mr Kinney behind the piano.' Mrs Kinney had mentioned that she knew of someone who might be able to help Lidia stay in America. 'But I thanked her,' Lidia told Roan. 'Shoghi Effendi approved my going to Poland, and I feel that I must do that.'
Lidia had made many partirigs in her life, but this was one of the hardest. Her letters revealed the sadness and melancholy she felt at having to say farewell to her American friends. 'I beg you', she wrote Roan, 'conquer your imagination and don't allow it to look at the departure of the ship if that must weigh on your heart. I absolutely do not want your heart to be depressed. Always be cheerful, always be happy!' Lidia admitted that she still owed Roan a few cents for some transaction or other. She joked in a letter: 'Ha, Roan, I really ought to send you the check for fourteen-and-a-half cents . . . But I am afraid that if I do that, I will no longer be able to pay for my ship passage. So I am running offto Europe without paying the debt (people in Europe who don't want to pay their debts run off to America). If you wish, send the police after me.'
She wrote her farewell to the National Spiritual Assembly the day before leaving. 'I feel sad to leave America where I have found so many friends, so many wonderful souls, deeply inspired with this Spirit which is the Destiny of the New Day. I consider it a great privilege to have come to this country and am hoping that what I have learned here will help me to become a little bit better instrument for the Cause of Baha'u'llah.'
On November 29 the PUsudski sailed from the Sixth Street Pier in Hoboken, NewJersey. Helene and Martin Leonard were the only ones there to say good-bye to Lidia, Mrs Leonard recalled. Helene Leonard, who was Polish, had been a student in Lidia's first class in New York. Long afterward, she remembered that the day before the ship was to sail, Lidia called to tell her that she was leaving. Mrs Leonard telephoned many Esperantists to try to get a farewell committee together to see her off, but she was unsuccessful. She hoped that some people, at least, would come to the ship, but no one else did. 'So I stayed to the last minute,' she reminisced. 'Needless to say it was a tearful farewell.'