London, 13 November 1883 

Dear Bernstein, 

Encl. for Vera Zasulich.* 

As to Quarck,” you have taken a load off my mind.!!9 I have writ- 
ten telling him that_you were the first to apply and that you would be 
translating The Poverty etc.'! ‘The man has thus been disposed of. His 
pamphlet* is ‘Quarck’.4 Marx would wring my neck were I to 
agree to his being translated by this boastful Hohenzollern-wor- 
shipper and conservative state socialist. 

But it behoves us to make a proper job of it. Nothing pedestrian; 
the thing is by no means so easy. You might, if you have got as far, 
send me the ms. of the first sheet; that would give us an opportunity 
to agree upon the whole modus operandi. 

I have not been sent Plekhanov’s pamphlet‘; only the Manifesto 
and Wage Labour and Capital.‘ From this I learn that it has appeared 
in a German edition.!*° Why has no one deigned to send me and 
Marx’s heirs a copy? 

Nor have I ever received a copy of the new edition of the Manifesto 

* See this volume, pp. 65-66.-° Ibid., p. 66.-° [M. Quarck,] Kommerzienrath 
Adolf Fleischmann als Nationalökonom...-? In German ‘Quark’ = curd or cottage 
cheese; fig. rubbish.-° G. V. Plekhanov, Coyianuzma u noaumuuecxaa 6ops6a (Socialism 
and Political Struggle).- by Marx 

(German).* Nor yet of the 3rd edition of Entwicklung.” And I have 
never heard a word of what became of ‘The Mark’, which had been 
trimmed to size expressly for a separate edition.!?! This, of course, 
only happens to one when ‘easy-going’ Germans are involved. 

Of the portraits of me in existence there is only one that you have 
got; I don’t imagine that the man (in Brighton) would quote a cheap 
price for prints in bulk, but I shall do what I can. So you see, / bear 
no grudge against your office,° but their worships could well be a little 
less touchy about a bad joke, especially since they devote a full half 
column of every number to that kind of thing. 

Beware of the Droit &@ la paresse.1?* Parts of it were too much even 
for the French and it was much exploited by Malon and Brousse at 
Lafargue’s expense. You must certainly see to it that the wailers '?° 
are not provided with an easy excuse just now; even friend Bebel is 
still somewhat Germanic in this respect. Which reminds me of the 
poem about the ‘arse’. If the author is responsible for all the heroic 
deeds enumerated therein, he is entitled to celebrate them in song. 
Besides, I am speaking of the sex organs, and it is difficult for me to 
enter into discussion with people who include their bottoms under 
that heading. 

It certainly must have been hard for our friend Lavrov to have set 
his hand to a document saying that he and his Russians ‘had definitive- 
ly broken with their anarchist traditions’.'?* Not that he set much 
store by them, but all the same there was about them something at- 
tractively ‘Russian’. Besides, he is a thoroughly honest old fellow who 
is, however, invariably the hen that hatches out ducks’ eggs in the 
form of ‘Russian youth’ and watches aghast as the ducklings set out 
across the Horrible water. This has happened to him umpteen times. 

Kautsky’s visit '?° will give me much pleasure; I trust I shall be up 
to the mark again by then. 

Yours, 
F.E.