How does the city sit solitary, that was full of people! She has become as a widow, who was great among the nations! She who was a princess among the provinces is become tributary!
"How doth the city sit solitary"  (Lamentations 1:1).  "The word `How' is the characteristic introduction to an elegy, or a dirge."[2]  The Hebrew text used the word as the title of the book; and it carries the sense, "Behold, how great a tragedy!"