Note: dated 1 VI 1901

44.
1/VI 01 [Munich].

Dear P. B.!

We have just received your letter with the enclosures and letters from Debogory-Mokrievich.*) 1) Thank you very much; we shall have to examine the materials carefully.

Regarding Debogory-Mokrievich's proposal, we of course agree to provide him with 500 offprints and hope that his reservations will present no obstacle whatsoever to the publication of his memoirs in our journal. The deadline for No. 2 of *Zarya* is one month, that is, until the first of July. The maximum length is 2 sheets, maximum 2½. We hope that he will divide his 4–5 sheets principally so that they fit into Nos. 2 and 3 of *Zarya*.

We know nothing yet about the conference. Please persuade Koltsov [Ginzburg] and someone else from *Sotsial Democrat* to agree. After all, this commits us to nothing, and it removes from us the *odium*2) of unwillingness to end the quarrels. We are truly not inclined to make any essential concessions either to *Borba* or to *Rabochee Delo* (how weak its No. 7 of the *Listok*3) is! We have already surpassed it even in the technical aspect: the speed of our information4)).

No. 5 of *Iskra* is being printed: The leading article there is "On Senseless Dreams" (Starover [Potresov]). A feuilleton by G. V. [Plekhanov]—"New Wine in Old Wineskins." About the manifesto of the socialist-revolutionaries and their turn toward social democracy. Then one (or even 2) articles about the massacre of May 4–7 in St. Petersburg (on the Vyborg Side and at the Obukhov Factory). We also have material for the "General Chronicle" section and for the workers' movement, as well as for the section "May First in Russia"—for example, a vivid letter from a St. Petersburg working woman about the murder—on 4/V of her relative, a worker, in the crowd that was heading toward the Nevsky5). A letter from our close friend—a worker6) from Ivanovo-Voznesensk about the mood there, about attempts to celebrate 1/V, about the success of *Iskra*.

Only the finances are weak, but everything else is going well and gives us hope for the future.

How is your health? Is your *Erwerbsarbeit*7) easier now? Are you getting enough rest? How do you think of spending the summer?

I clasp your hand firmly and send greetings to all yours.

Your Petrov.

*) His letter we shall of course preserve.
V. I. LENIN—P. B. AKSELROD.

___

*) This concerns the publication of Debogory-Mokrievich's memoirs in *Zarya*.
2) *Odium*—hatred aroused by a given action.
3) The seventh issue of the *Listok* of *Rabochee Delo*. Published in summer 1901. Devoted to the student movement.
4) At the same time Martov wrote to Akselrod—on 30/V (see "Letters of P. B. Akselrod and Yu. O. Martov," letter 8, pp. 35–36):
..."All these days we have been up to our necks in business with Ryazanov, who has positively worn us all out. We parted from him, it is true, as 'friends,' but the sort who hold a stone in their bosom. He treated our 'league' with sufficient hostility, and apparently their group will not go beyond the Federation, which will have the right to independent publishing"...
..."The Allies apparently insist that the conference take place in Brussels. We agreed, as a last resort, on Basel, hoping that for the Gr[oup of] Lib[eration of] Labor this will be the lesser evil. We have not yet received an official answer about the Union's agreement"...
..."P. S. The letter was written when your letter of 28/V arrived. It is a pity that Ginzburg [Koltsov] (he also sent us a letter today) is so uncompromising in his attitude toward the idea of a conference. We replied to him with the advice to collect the votes of the members of *S.-D.* nonetheless and to keep in mind that a conference, committing us to nothing, will allow us to clarify the situation and immediately after its failure (if the Union does not accept our conditions) declare our own unification. At the same time one must remember that essentially only a Federation is in question."
5) Vladimir Ilyich speaks here of events in Petersburg in May 1901 on the Vyborg Side and beyond the Nevskaya Gate, of the so-called Obukhov Defense. On the Vyborg Side, striking workers on May 4th moved in a demonstration toward the city. On the Sampsoniевsky Bridge they were met by police; a scuffle ensued, in which many workers were wounded.
6) The "close worker"—probably Babushkin. In No. 5 of *Iskra* of June 1901, in the section "May First in Russia," the corresponding correspondence appears: "Ivanovo-Voznesensk."
Regarding Ivan Vasilievich Babushkin, Vladimir Ilyich wrote (*Rabochaya Gazeta* No. 2, 18 (31) December 1910):
"The name of Ivan Vasilievich is dear and close to more than one social-democrat. All who knew him loved and respected him for his energy, absence of phrase-mongering, deep and steadfast revolutionariness and ardent devotion to the cause. A Petersburg worker, in 1895, with a group of other conscious comrades, he energetically carries on work beyond the Nevskaya Gate among workers of the Semyannikov, Alexandrov, and Glass factories, forming circles, organizing libraries, and himself constantly and passionately studying."
..."When the 'Union of Struggle for the Liberation of the Working Class' is formed in Petersburg, Ivan Vasilievich becomes one of its most active members and works in it until his arrest."
..."Look through the first 20 issues of *Iskra*, all these correspondences from Shuya, Ivanovo-Voznesensk, Orekkhovo-Zuevo and other places in central Russia: almost all of them passed through the hands of Ivan Vasilievich, who strove to establish the closest connection between *Iskra* and the workers. Ivan Vasilievich was the most diligent correspondent of *Iskra* and its ardent supporter. From the central district Babushkin moves to the South, to Ekaterinoslav, where he is arrested and thrown into prison in Aleksandrovsk. From Aleksandrovsk he escapes together with another comrade, having filed through the window grate. Knowing not a single foreign language, he makes his way to London, where the editorial office of *Iskra* was at that time. Much was discussed there, many questions were debated together. But Ivan Vasilievich was not fated to be at the Second Congress of the Party... prison and exile took him out of action for a long time." (See Lenin. Collected Works, vol. XI, part 2, pp. 130–133.)
7) *Erwerbsarbeit*—work for the acquisition of means of livelihood.