CERTIFICATE FOR I. P. POKROVSKY
[August 26, 1910. Copenhagen.]
I hereby certify that Comrade Pokrovsky has been designated by the Social-Democratic Parliamentary Group of the Third Duma as a delegate to the Socialist International Bureau.
N. Lenin.
[Translation.]
I hereby certify that Comrade Pokrovsky has been elected by the Social-Democratic Parliamentary Group of the Third Duma as a delegate to the International Socialist Bureau.
II. Lenin.
* To Mr. Kobetsky. Ed.
** Printed from a draft manuscript, written in pencil on the reverse side of a printed page from “Syndikalisten” for August 1910, which contained an address (in four languages: English, French, German, and Danish) to the delegates of the International Socialist Congress. Ed.

1. I. P. Pokrovsky, a member of the Social-Democratic faction of the Third State Duma, served as a member of the Russian Social-Democratic delegation to the Copenhagen Congress with a consultative vote. The session of the International Socialist Bureau took place on the afternoon of August 26. Lenin was present at the meeting; he had apparently arrived in Copenhagen in the morning of August 26, as he had anticipated (see Lenin’s letter to M. K. Kobetsky, dated between August 8 and August 26, 1910, published in “Len. sb.”, vol. XIII, p. 183). Most likely, this very same day saw the issuance of the present certificate for Pokrovsky.
EXCERPT FROM A CONVERSATION WITH V. K. NURNATOVSKY * TO
[Autumn 1910. Paris.]
The account of these events so captivated me that I was unable to fully grasp the author’s perspective. It seemed that the author was a Menshevik—struggling, often through mere rhetoric, to break free from Menshevism **2.
Was the author Braïlovski?
And when did he write it? Was he already in Petrograd?
Yes, the facts are so compelling that it is a pity they are not more fully documented.
And was he involved throughout?
Nadia asks that I leave her the book for [a week! several] days, if possible.
And how is your health? You look better!
In Chita itself, during October and November 1905, were there no factions or internal divisions? Perhaps ***…
1. The nature of the document suggests that these are responses and questions exchanged in a conversation with a sick man who suffered from such severe deafness that he could only communicate through written notes. Most likely, Lenin’s interlocutor in this instance was V. K. Kurnatovski, who had arrived in Paris in the autumn of 1910, quite ill (with an ear infection) after emigrating from Australia. At that time, Lenin visited him in a Parisian hospital (see N. K. Krupskaya, “Memoirs of Lenin,” Parts 1 and 2, Partizdat, Moscow, 1932, p. 178). The present document contains the record of a conversation between Lenin and Kurnatovski during one of these visits. This is further corroborated by certain passages in the text: the conversation revolves around the revolutionary events in Chita in 1905, in which Kurnatovski played a leading role.
* The note was written in pencil on a small scrap of paper. Ed.
** Further down, in the blank space between the lines, the manuscript bears a faintly erased, barely legible pencil mark that resembles “IX–X. 10.” It is possible that this represents an approximate date for the actual conversation with V. K. Kurnatovski. Ed.
*** The text of the record ends abruptly here. Ed.

VARIA
2 It appears that we are speaking of an article or pamphlet written about the events in Chita in 1905 by one of the participants—and previously passed on to Kurnatovski, who then shares his impressions upon reading it.