Letter to Maria Alexandrovna Ulyanova, April 10, 1910

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April 10, 1910

Mother dearest,

I hope you will receive this letter by April 1. I congratulate you on the occasion of your name day, and Manyasha as well. A really big hug for you both.

I received your letter with the new address a day or two ago, and shortly before that I received a letter from Mitya. I did not know that your old apartment was so far from the centre. An hour’s tram journey is awful! I have to travel half an hour by tram from here to the library[1] and I find even that too tiring. To travel every day an hour each way—that is quite impossible. It is a good thing that you have found an apartment near the Zemstvo offices.[2] But, is the air breathable in such places? Isn’t it too dusty and stuffy? Many thanks for the letter to the historian; he has been answered.

It would be simply wonderful for us to get together in August, provided the journey will not tire you too much. From Moscow to St. Petersburg you must book a sleeper, and from there to Abo as well. The steamer Bure from Abo to Stockholm is well equipped; it is in the open sea only two or three hours and in fine weather it is like sailing down a river. You can buy return tickets from St. Petersburg. If the railway journey does not tire you too greatly you will be able to spend a marvellous week in Stockholm!

We still have not decided whether to take a place in the country for the summer. We are wavering—is it better to live en pension as we did last year to give Nadya and Y.V. a complete rest, or to take a cottage where we should have to do our own cooking, which Y.V. finds very tiring?

It is spring here. I have already got Nadya’s bicycle out. We are just longing to be out walking or cycling. Love and kisses. Keep well. Very best regards to Manyasha.

Yours,

V. U.

  1. This was the Bibliothéque nationale, where Lenin usually worked in Paris.—Ed.
  2. Lenin’s sister Maria was at that time working at the Moscow Gubernia Zemstvo.—Ed.