Letter to Nikolai Danielson, February 19, 1887

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To Nikolai Danielson in St Petersburg

London, February 19, 1887

Dear Sir,

I was glad to receive your letter of 22/3rd of this month because I saw from it that the publisher instead of sending you a copy of the English Capital had merely forwarded a prospectus. There have been several of these irregularities which cause us all sorts of vexation and uncertainty as to what has been done. However I have at once forwarded to you per post a copy, registered, on February 12th, and hope you received it safely. I am glad to say the book sells uncommonly well. The high price for the first edition was an unavoidable evil, but as the book is stereotyped, a cheap edition at about one-third of the price of the first will be brought out after some time; at the present moment the high price in no great obstacle here, though it is so to a certain extent in America.

I think you will be doing a good work in showing to the public of your country the application of our author’s theory to their circumstances. But perhaps you had better wait, as you say, until the completion of his work. The chapter on the Rent of Land, although written before he had studied Russian economic conditions, and written without reference thereto, will still be very necessary to you. The 3rd volume will be taken in hand after clearing off some other accumulated work; with the exception of three Abschnitte, the greater part is almost ready for press.

I thank you very much for the Tales of Scedrin which I shall take in hand as soon as ever possible; a slight conjunctivitis of the left eye prevents me reading it at present, as the Russian type very much strains my eyesight.

Up to the present no reviews of the English edition have appeared. The professional reviewers evidently do not know what to make of the book, and are afraid to burn their fingers.

Yours sincerely

P. W. Rosher