Translations of a Letter Addressed by Sir Moses Montefiore…to the Jewish Congregations in the Holy Land, on the Promotion of Agriculture and Other Industrial Pursuits in that Country, and of the Replies Received Thereto

The correspondence between the Jewish inhabitants of Eretz Israel and Sir Moses is quite insightful. One letter to the great man, signed “Thirteen Gayrey Tsedek,” was composed by families of converts to Judaism, settled in the Holy Land (pp.22-3). Another letter advocates the purchase from the Authorities, land near Jericho, which on account of its great fecundity was referred to in ancient times as “Dooshna of Jericho” (p. 15). A Hungarian Jew familiarizes Sir Moses with a pamplet “by the great and learned Rabbi Akiba Joseph Schlesinger,” a collection of notions how best to settle the Land (p. 27)