were at least partially the cause for the long delay in her bringing the second volume to completion. Over the course of her life Markel-Mosessohn corresponded with three prominent maskilim – her male colleagues in the Hebrew revival – Abraham Mapu, Judah Leib Gordon, and Moses Lilienblum. Mapu was the first fellow Hebrew writer with whom she initiated a correspondence, in 1861, writing to him in Hebrew and enclosing an original piece of writing. He responded appreciatively, complimenting the lucidity of her style and dubbing her a "maskelet", or enlightened woman. They exchanged a handful of letters over the next year or two, and also met briefly in person on two occasions, in 1861, and again in 1866 or 1867, both times at Mapu's home in Kovno. Markel-Mosessohn wrote to Judah Leib Gordon for the first time in 1868, after she had completed a draft of the first part of Ha-Yehudim be-Angliya, her translation of Francolm's work. Gordon responded enthusiastically to the translation; he assisted her in finding a publisher, and contributed a laudatory preface to the published volume. Their correspondence spanned 20 years, and reflected a mutually supportive friendship, although they never met in person. In 1875 Gordon dedicated to her his poem "Kotzo shel yud" (The tip of the [letter] yud), which evokes empathy for a modern-day woman trapped by oppressive strictures of Jewish law. Two years later she acknowledged the honor, while writing to him for moral support, at a time when her husband had been imprisoned in connection with questionable financial dealings. During the 1870s Markel-Mosessohn became more involved than before in her husband's business affairs, and moved several times, at one point staying three years in Danzig (Gdańsk, Poland), and finally settling in Vienna in 1881. She renewed her correspondence with Gordon in 1887, when she had completed the second volume of her Hebrew translation of Francolm's Die Juden und die Kreuzfahrer unter Richard Löwenherz; she requested he write a few lines for the preface of her book, and he readily complied, as pleased with the second as he had been with the first volume. In the spring of 1887, upon Gordon's urging, Markel-Mosessohn hesitantly agreed to become the Viennese correspondent for the Hebrew newspaper Ha-Melitz (The advocate), of which he was then editor. Between May and July 1887 she published four progressively more developed articles, the last two being, respectively, a report detailing the