Young women who had been secluded in their chambers rushed out with their mothers, sprinkled their hair with dust, and filled the streets with groans and lamentations.

But among the Jews there was indescribable mourning, lamentation, and tearful cries and groans; everywhere their hearts were burning, and they groaned because of the unexpected destruction that had suddenly been decreed for them.

And young women who had just entered the bridal chamber to share married life exchanged joy for wailing, their myrrh-perfumed hair sprinkled with ashes, and were carried away unveiled, all together raising a lament instead of a wedding song, as they were torn by the harsh treatment of foreign nations.

Their husbands, in the prime of youth, their necks encircled with ropes instead of garlands, spent the remaining days of their marriage festival in lamentations instead of feasting and youthful revelry, seeing Hades already lying at their feet.

And when this had happened, the king, hearing that the Jews’ compatriots from the city frequently went out in secret to lament bitterly the ignoble misfortune of their kindred,

they thought that this was their last moment of life, the end of their most miserable suspense, and giving way to lamentation and groans they kissed each other, embracing relatives and falling into one another’s arms—parents and children, mothers and daughters, and others with babies at their breasts who were drawing their last milk.

Accordingly, those disgracefully treated and near to Hades, or rather, who stood at its gates, arranged for a banquet of deliverance instead of a bitter and lamentable death, and full of joy they apportioned to groups of revelers the place that had been prepared for their destruction and burial.