If the personal estate of such convict be insufficient for the discharge of his debts, or if such estate, or the residue thereof after payment of the debts, and the rents and profits of the real estate, be insufficient for the maintenance of the wife and family of such convict, when it is proper to make provision for such maintenance, his committee may proceed, as provided in article one, chapter thirty-seven, of this code, to obtain authority to mortgage, lease or sell so much of the real estate of such convict as may be necessary for the purposes aforesaid, or any of them, setting forth in the bill or petition the particulars and the amount of the estate, real and personal, the application which may have been made of any personal estate, and an account of the debts and demands existing against the estate.