In your article concerning me?’ in the Volkszeitung of March 2 ° 
you maintain 

“that Aveling is said to have submitted a bill which contained items that a 
labour agitator, who must know that the donations‘ raised to finance agitation 
come almost entirely out of the pockets of hard-working labourers, really should 
not present”. 

Passing over all the minor points and restricting my reply to the 
one main point, I wish to state: 

The weekly bills submitted by me to the Executive contained all 
my expenses, that is to say both those chargeable to the Party and 
others to be met by me personally. I had made it clear to the 
Executive in advance and in the most unambiguous way—first in 
a verbal agreement with the treasurer, R. Meyer, and then in 
several letters—that all the purely personal expenses were to be 
defrayed by me in return for the $366.00 ($3 per day) guaranteed 
to me by the Executive, and that I left it entirely up to the 
Executive to decide which items of expenditure should be passed 
on to the party, and which items should be charged to me 
personally. 

I never expected—even less demanded—that any of these 
personal items of expenditure should be paid for “out of the 
pockets of hard-working labourers”, and indeed none of them 
have been. For further information about this I refer you to my 

enclosed circular of February 26 to the sections,’’’ to the 

publication of which I can no longer object after what has 
occurred. 

In addition I would point out that a printing error has crept 
into your article. My reply to your article of January 12* was dated 
not “Feb. 1887” but January 26, 1887, and was sent off to you on 
the same day that article came to my notice. 

With social-democratic greetings.” 
Edward Aveling 

London, March 16, 1887