THE CRY OF A MISERABLE WOMAN

I implore the honourable readers to pity me, a lonely and despondent woman, because my husband has left me and our three healthy children during Passover, just five years after our marriage. As he was making his way to Pinsk to earn our bread, he sent for me and I followed him until Sukkot. Now he has vanished without a trace, and I was told that he was seen in a hotel in Minsk, and later he was spotted in a railway carriage bound for Kiev, whereas I am left with nothing, dispirited and beleaguered, stripped of my possessions, penniless, with no-one to come to my aid. Therefore, honourable readers, I ask if perhaps one of you knows of my husband’s whereabouts? Have mercy upon me and at least obtain from him a duly signed writ of divorce. I am prepared to give money, up to one hundred and fifty roubles, to whoever releases me from my husband’s yoke. These are his details: his name is Meir-Yankel Hirsch of the town of Drahichyn, he is now twenty-four years of age, of average height, with brown, curly hair, fair beard, green eyes, and has a mother and a brother in the town of Uzlyany. I, the complainant, am Esther Hirsch, daughter of Shlomo Weisel-fisch, righteous man of blessed memory.