Dear friend! I have just received your postcard. I sent you a short postcard to Bern, poste restante, containing only a request to respond, as your silence was beginning to worry me somewhat.

I am now very engrossed in the idea of publishing leaflets on Swiss affairs.

Here, something like a circle of leftists has been established. However, this expression is not quite accurate: so far, there have only been a series of meetings (prompted by my theses). Participants include Nobs, Platten, Münzenberg, and several other young people. We are discussing

* Refers to the fee for the works: "Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism" and "New Data on the Laws of Development of Capitalism in Agriculture." Ed.

** A. M. Gorky. Ed.

*** - poste restante. Ed.

the military resolution in connection with the tasks of the left. These discussions have made it especially clear to me: 1) how devilishly weak (in every respect) the Swiss leftists are; 2) how poor the "system" of influence of Vronsky and Radek, who have written and continue to write articles about the left in other countries! The crux of the matter is that everyone is eager to be leftists when it comes to foreign countries: it's cheap!! But when it comes to Switzerland... disaster!

Abramovich has undertaken to distribute 1500 copies of pamphlets and leaflets (will you take on the task of translating? systematically and regularly? Please reply!), and Münzenberg, with whom I spoke yesterday, the head of an organization of 4,000!! German members, has undertaken to distribute a maximum of 1500!!

Guilbeaux, to whom I sent the theses 408, writes that he is very pleased with them and will take them as the basis for the newly founded Committee of Internationalists. We shall see!

I read Humbert-Droz's "Plaidoirie"!! 409 Good Lord, what a muddle in his head! And this in 1916!

The Tolstoyan - I fear, hopeless.

Grigory writes to me that in No. 25 of "Arbeiterpolitik" there is a note about "The Three Editors of 'The Communist'" 410 and that "Radek is conducting the same policy with E. B. + Bukharin as Tyska with the Left"... Finally, Grigory is beginning to understand this, although he still insists that "despite this, it is not advisable to break with Radek." Ha-ha!

How are you settled? Is the apartment at Maison Vincent cold? Do you go skiing? I strongly advise you to do so: it is extremely beneficial. Go hiking in the mountains on skis near Rocher de Naye.

Best regards!

Lenin

P.S. What kind of person is Usievich's wife? Seems energetic, doesn't she? Will he make a Bolshevik out of her, or will she make him neither one thing nor the other?