[Draft] 

[London, between 9 and 21 February 1884] 

I cannot say anything definite about the plan outlined by you, so 
long as I do not know what persons are involved and what your in- 
tentions are. All I can say is that I could, in certain circumstances and 
provided they were worth the trouble, enter into a cartel, but never 
form an/alliance, with people who have not comlpetely and unre- 
servedly adopted the revolutionary communist standpoint. Besides my 
time is completely taken up with work that it is absolutely imperative 
I should do, and my international correspondence is, in any case, al- 
ready extensive enough. Clemenceau would certainly have to be in- 
duced to go considerably further before we could ally ourselves with 
him; whether, as the immediate ministerial candidate of the extreme 
Left, he would wish to be on more than ordinarily ‘good terms’ with 
us would seem to be debatable. One can remain thus on good terms 
with socialists of the most diverse shades of opinion until a difference 
of principle or tactics crops up, whereupon sympathy turns into anti- 
pathy. Accordingly, it is now for you to decide whether I am a man 
who would suit your book.