London. 15 Dec. 1868. After midnight. Dear Fred, I request you – despite its fadaise – to study the enclosed document seriously, to write your marginal notes to me in French and then to return the thing itself to me by next Saturday at the latest! Herr Bakunine – in the background of this story – is condescending enough to want to take the workers’ movement under Russian leadership. This shit has existed for 2 months. Only this evening did old Becker communicate it by letter to the General Council. This time Schapper is right. The society is supposed, as old Becker writes, to make up for the lack of ‘idealism’ in our society. L’idéalisme Russe! There was great fury, particularly among the French, over this document this evening in our Conseil Général. I had known this shit for a long time. I regarded it as stillborn, and out of consideration for old Becker, I wanted to let it die quietly. But the matter has become more serious than I thought. And considerations for old Becker are no longer admissible. The Council resolved this evening to repudiate this interloping society publicly – in Paris, New York, Germany and Switzerland. I am charged (for next Tuesday) with drawing up the decree of repudiation. I regret the whole business on account of old Becker. Mais, our society cannot commit suicide on account of old Becker. Herr Strohn writes to me from Düsseldorf that his brother Eugen died suddenly in Hamburg. As for the cotton bankruptcies in Manchester etc., can you send me the Guardian?