V. I.

Lenin

25

To:   HIS MOTHER AND HIS SISTER ANNA

May 25, 1897

The day before yesterday I received your letter of May 5,
Mother dearest, and am answering by the first post. I, too,
am now wondering how it could have happened that I did not write for a long time at the end of April; I must have
missed a day or two because of the fuss and bustle at that
time, but after that I wrote very frequently, both before
my departure from Krasnoyarsk and on the way here. From
here I have also been writing frequently—every week.
There really is nothing to write more frequently about;
by the way, I answer all letters immediately, so I may sometimes have written twice in one week.

I have no information about the health of E.E. now—she must be better because no one at Tesinskoye writes anything
about it. She was pretty badly exhausted by the journey,
especially the road journey, and was anxious to reach the
village and rest. I really do not remember your letter to
her, addressed to me, I may have passed it on and forgotten
it.

I simply roared with laughter when I read in your letter
that Mitya, “the queer fish”, is not coming here! I wrote
that as a joke! [1]

What sense would there be in his trekking a distance of 4,500 versts and losing a month (there and
back) on the journey for the sake of the joys of Shu-shu-shu!
I am sorry that you are so long in making up your, mind what to do in summer because of me and are missing the
best time and the best accommodation, etc.

It is a pity that the books were sent so late (if they have
been sent—you write that you will be sending them “in a day or two”). I thought they were already on the way.
I shall now have to find out when they will arrive in
Krasnoyarsk. Probably not before the end of summer!

Life here is not bad, I go shooting quite a lot; I have
got to know the local sportsmen and go shooting with them. [7] I have begun bathing; up to now I have had to go
quite a long way, about two and a half versts, but soon I
shall be able to go to a place about a verst and a half away.
Such distances mean nothing to me because, apart from shooting and bathing, I spend a lot of time walking. I am
longing for newspapers; I hope I shall soon be receiving
them now that you have sent them.

I have had a letter from Basil in Tesinskoye. He says it is an awful place, quite bare, neither forest nor river near
(there is one two versts away—too far for him!), no shooting and no fishing. And so, if anyone moves at all, they
will have to come here, since there is no point in my going
there. A.M. visited them for one day (May 14) from Krasnoyarsk; she came with a resettlement party, and then
went back to Krasnoyarsk; she intends to go to Tesinskoye
soon to live there.

Regards to all, Yours,

V. U.

May 25, 1897

Anyuta,

I am very sorry to hear that your trip abroad is hanging
fire because of me. I am fixed up here so well (certainly
better than any of the other comrades) that there is no
need at all for Mother to worry about me, and as far as a
summer holiday is concerned I think that she can get a better rest abroad than in this place, since she would have
to travel thousands of versts on all kinds of transport. By
the way, I expect all this is superfluous now—meaning the “now” when you will be reading this letter.

At first I couldn’t understand why you wrote in your letter, “ I repeat that I do not show him,
etc.” [8] —but then
I remembered that I had spoken to you about it, in Moscow
or even, I think, in St. Petersburg. I had completely forgotten it—there was so much confusion there—otherwise
I, would not have spoken about it a second time. I imagine
that the editor is up to his ears in work and for that reason
does not give any but purely business information. [2]

In
view of this my request for books in payment of fees was
probably out of place; how would he find time to bother
about such a relatively troublesome business? If you have
not yet written to him about this, please don’t write. The
fee I received for the first article will last me about a year,
when added to my allowance [9] —and the remainder for the next two
articles [10] I am thinking of using for journals and books. (I do not know bow much you have already
sent me; 30 or 40 rubles would be enough and the rest can
go for journals.)

As regards journals, I have already written [3] (in any case
I am repeating it, although I think that some of them, at
least, have been sent here) that you should subscribe to
(1) Russkoye Bogatstvo , (2) Russkiye Vedomosti , [4] (3) Vestnik Finansov (from the beginning of the year), (4) Soziale Praxis , (5) Archiv für soziale Gesetzgebung und Statistik (herausgegeben von Braun ). I think I have also written partly
about books, especially about Ukazatel fabrik i zavodov ,third edition, St. Petersburg, 1894 (I think it costs 5
rubles) and the book by Chuprov and Posnikov on grain prices. [5]

If they have not been sent with the other books (which would be a pity because in that case they will be
travelling about three months), then please send them by
post as printed matter. These are the books (and also the

Yezhegodnik if you managed to find it) that I need more
than any others for my work. Please send me direct any particularly interesting new books, so that I shall get them
quicker and shall not lag too far behind. By the way, if
a report of the Free Economic Society’s discussions on grain
prices (in connection with the book by Chuprov and
Posnikov) has been published, send it to me [11] .

I am still thinking about the possibility of using a Moscow
library; have you managed to do anything about it, i.e., have
you managed to join some public library? If it is possible
to take out books for two months (as you can in St.
Petersburg at the library of the Free Economic Society) it
would not cost very much to send them by post as printed matter (16 kopeks a pound, and you can send 4 pounds for
64 kopeks, and 7 kopeks to register them), so it would probably be more profitable for me to spend money on postage and
have a lot of books than to spend much more money on buying a few books. I imagine that it would be much more
convenient for me; the only problem is whether you can get books
for such a long period (leaving a deposit, of course) from
some good library—the
University, [6] or the library of the
Moscow Bar Association (you must get information from there, get their catalogue and find out the terms for the
acceptance of new members, etc.), or some other. There are
probably a number of good libraries in Moscow. You can even find out about private libraries. If any of you are
staying on in Moscow they can probably find out about all
this.

If you go abroad, write to me and I will send you details
of books from there. Send me more catalogues of all kinds
of second-hand books, etc. (libraries, bookshops).

Yours,

V. U.

As far as news from St. Petersburg is concerned I have almost lost all hope; there is nobody to expect a letter from,
I’ve already given up hope of the director.

When you write to the Bulochkins send them my regards.
They should send me their photographs in exchange for mine. How are their affairs going on?