THE BOUNDARIES STRETCH The long chapter of troubles which led to my father's emigration to America began with his own illness.

The doctors sent him to Courland to consult expensive specialists, who prescribed tedious courses of treatment.

He was far from cured when my mother also fell ill, and my father had to return to Polotzk to look after the business.
Trouble begets trouble.

After my mother took to her bed everything continued to go wrong.

The business gradually declined, as too much money was withdrawn to pay the doctors' and apothecaries' bills; and my father, himself in poor health, and worried about my mother, was not successful in coping with the growing difficulties.