V. I.

Lenin

85

To:   HIS MOTHER AND HIS SISTER ANNA

April 4, 1899

I have received your letter and Mitya’s, Mother dearest.
There is no need for you to worry about a place to stay
in Shusha, there is plenty of room here. We had four visitors staying with us at Shrovetide. If your health
permits we should be very, very glad to see you, so as not to
have to wait until my term is up (sometimes the term is
extended—although I hope mine will not be). Nadya is writing in greater
detail, [1] but as regards the season I must make a correction to her letter; at the beginning of May
the water is still low—the steamer put us ashore half way.
It is no good travelling an extra hundred versts by road.
The best thing is to reach Krasnoyarsk at the end of May,
when you can easily go by boat as far as Minusinsk, and
from there it is only 55 versts. As a summer resort Shusha
is not much worse than any other, I think (if worse it is). It
is only a question of the journey.

There is no need for you to be worried about the gun.
I am used to it and am very careful. [2]

Shooting is the only form of amusement here, and some sort of
“loosening up exercise” is necessary because of my sedentary life.

Thank Mitya for the trouble he took over the gun (which
I have not yet received).

I read in Russkiye Vedomosti that Mark beat Chigorin!
So that’s what he’s like! I’ll have to cross swords with
him one day!

Many kisses for you and regards to all.

Yours,

V. U.

By the way, I almost forgot—some books will be sent to you C.O.D. from Vyatka. They are for me; please ask Mitya
to make a list of them and send it to me.

April 4, 1899

Anyuta,

I have received Prakticheskaya Zhizn and Heyse’s German Grammar . Many thanks for the latter, it is an excellent
book. I wrote you last time that I had received
Tsion. [5]

By the last post I sent a telegram to Petersburg in answer
to the following, which I received on March 26. “Proposed
price of book two rubles, author’s royalties about 1,500
rubles, wire consent Kalmykova’s warehouse.” [3]

I gave my consent—because I cannot, after all, haggle by
telegraph—and on the eve of publication! How can I hold it
up for that! Actually I am not much in favour of that “consent”. I was rather surprised that they (who? I do not know,
there is no signature) should have done things in a roundabout way and, instead of asking you as the person in
charge of the whole business, applied directly to me. I
now regret that I did not answer “Apply to Yelizarova in
Moscow, she is in charge of the affair.” That is how I should have answered! Because 1,500 is very little for three
years’ work, it works out at 50 rubles a printer’s signature.
Furthermore, since the Studies are selling exceedingly well
there need be no worry about the “markets”. If that is the
case there is no reason for making the booksellers a present
of 30 per cent. One could, if the publisher were a more
practical man or woman, offer the booksellers half that
percentage and also sell the book through the Nachalo office, which, it is to be hoped, would not refuse. By the way, it is probably a waste of time writing all this now,
since the deed seems to have been done. Of course, we shall
have to make concessions on the fees because of the cheapness of the book. Since it is not we, but other people, who
are publishing the book there is no sense in making special
claims. And so, all the preceding is merely platonic contemplation and not “business” propositions.

I believe it most probable that even the list of misprints
in signatures 11 to 16 (I received them from you the day
before yesterday) will be too late, so I am sending it only
in case, and without making a fair copy. [4]

I have at last received issue No. 1–2 of Nachalo from comrades. (Please subscribe to it for us, if you have not
done so. I did a very foolish thing in again relying on the
écrivain . I hope I shall not be so silly in the future.) In
general, I liked it very much, but B. Avilov is rather weak,
more scathing than sound. [6] Bulgakov simply made me mad; such nonsense, such utter nonsense, and such eternal
professorial pretentiousness—what the devil is this?! [7] No
wonder Syn Otechestva has already praised him! We’ll see
how he finishes up. I am thinking of writing “about
Kautsky’s book and Bulgakov’s article”. [8] I have given up
the plan to write about Kablukov, he is not worth a second
article. The écrivain , as usual, is silent, and we do not
expect any information on journal affairs from him although
we feel a considerable need for such information.

All the best,

V. U.

---
Notes:
[1]
See Krupskaya’s Letter No. 15.— Ed .
— Lenin

[2]
A centre-fire gun is much safer than an ordinary one.— Lenin

[3]
The telegram has been lost.— Ed .

[4]
This list has been lost.— Ed .

[5]
Lenin apparently made use of the journal Prakticheskaya Zhizn
and I. Tsion’s book Nigilisty i nigilizm to send letters in
invisible ink.

[6]
The article referred to is B. Avilov’s “Novy opyt ’ekonomicheskoi
garmonii’ (N. Kablukov, Ob usloviyakh razvitiya krestyanskogo khozyaistva v Rossii . M., 1899)”, published in Nachalo No. 1-2 for
1899.

[7]
Bulgakov’s article was “ K voprosu o kapitalisticheskoi evolyutsii zemledeliya ”, published in Nachalo Nos. 1-2 and 3 for 1899.

[8]
Lenin made a critical analysis of the views of S. N. Bulgakov,
the “legal Marxist”, in two articles under the common title of
“Capitalism in Agriculture (Kautsky’s Book and Mr. Bulgakov’s
Article)”. They were intended for publication in Nachalo but
since that journal was banned they appeared in Nos. 1 and 2 of