It was a great disaster, therefore, to have a lamp upset on my writing-table, when I was near the end, soaking the thick pile of letter sheets in kerosene.

I was obliged to make a fair copy for my uncle, and my father kept the oily, smelly original.

After a couple of years' teasing, he induced me to translate the letter into English, for the benefit of a friend who did not know Yiddish; for the benefit of the present narrative, which was not thought of thirteen years ago.

I can hardly refrain from moralizing as I turn to the leaves of my childish manuscript, grateful at last for the calamity of the overturned lamp.
Our route lay over the German border, with Hamburg for our port.

On the way to the frontier we stopped for a farewell visit in Vilna, where my mother had a brother.