In 1828 J. B. Levinsohn wrote his Hebrew work, 'Teudo Beisroel,' by which the Haskala took a firm footing in Russia. About the same time there circulated manuscript copies of a Judeo-German essay by the same author, in which a sad picture of Jewish communal affairs was painted in vigorous and idiomatic words. This essay, called 'The World Turned Topsy-Turvy,'[76] is given in the form of a conversation by three persons, of whom one is a stranger from a better country where the affairs of the Jews are administered honestly. The other two in turn lay before him an array of facts which it is painful to regard as having existed in reality. It is interesting to note that the stranger, who is Levinsohn himself, advocates the formation of agricultural colonies for the Jews, by which he hoped to better their wretched condition and to gain for them respect among those who accused them of being averse to work. The most original and most prolific Judeo-German writer of this early period was Israel Aksenfeld.[77] He was born in the last quarter of the eighteenth century, and had passed the early days of his life in the neighborhood of the Rabbi of Braslow, a noted Khassid, being himself a follower of that sect. Later in life, in the fifties, he is remembered as a notary public in Odessa. He was a man of great culture. Those who knew him then speak in the highest terms of the kindly old man that he was. They also like to dwell on the remarkable qualities of his cultured wife, from whom he is supposed to have received much inspiration.[78] That is all that is known of his life. Gottlober mentions also in his 'Recollections' that he had written twenty-six books, and that according to Aksenfeld's own statements they had been written in the twenties or thereabout. Of these only five were printed in the sixties; the rest are said to be stored away in a loft in Odessa, where they are held as security for a debt incurred by the trustee of his estate. Although this fact is known to some of the Jews of that city, no one has taken any steps to redeem the valuable manuscripts. This is to be greatly regretted, as his books throw light on a period of history for which there is no other documentary evidence except that given by the writings of men who lived at that time.