Note (return) — Chapter III

Those from the country—writes a Russo-Jewish eye-witness of the scenes following the enforcement of this inhuman law—move first to the neighboring cities, and increase the existing poverty, rendering the difficulty of finding profitable employment still greater. God only knows how it will end when the congestion increases still further.... I must also inform you—he proceeds—that these past four months several imperial commissioners have visited the frontier towns on the Lithuanian border, from which the Jews are to be banished, in order that the value of the real estate may be estimated. But how is the valuation calculated? Even one who is acquainted with the venality and unscrupulousness of Russian officers cannot form a correct idea of how this business is conducted. If a man has no connection with those in authority, or cannot obtain powerful intercession, or is unable to give heavy bribes, his property is valued at perhaps five per cent, or is set at so low a figure as to make the appraisal differ little from downright robbery. We, however, are used to such measures, for when they banished us some time past from certain districts of the city of Brest-Litovsk, where for centuries celebrated scholars of our people dwelt, nothing better was done by the crown to compensate us for our houses.42 The same occurred at the expulsion from St. Petersburg, Moscow, Kiev, Nikolayev, Alexandrov, Sebastopol, etc., but as it did not affect so large a mass, nor injure us to so great an extent, we bore the injury silently. Alas, this is not the case at present. We should gladly quit the country, gladly should we emigrate to America, Texas, and especially to Palestine under English protection, if, on the one hand, we had the means and, on the other, the Government would permit us.43