rry to reply to their
appeal. I shook it up and succeeded in persuading it that it was for its
own interest to aid in the publication of an anarchist newspaper....

"But do not think that I boldly offered to the anarchists the
encouragement of the Prefect of Police.... I sent a well-dressed
bourgeois to one of the most active and intelligent of them. He
explained that, having acquired a fortune in the drug business, he
desired to devote a part of his income to help their propaganda. This
bourgeois, anxious to be devoured, awakened no suspicion among the
companions. Through his hands, I deposited the caution money in the
coffers of the State, and the paper, _la Revolution Sociale_, made its
appearance.... Every day, about the table of the editors, the authorized
representatives of the party of action assembled; they looked over the
international correspondence; they deliberated on the measures to be
taken to end 'the exploitation of man by man'; they imparted to each
other the recipes which science puts at the disposal of revolution. I
was always represented in the councils, and I gave my advice in case of
need.... The members had decided in the beginning that the
Palais-Bourbon must be blown up. They deliberated on the question as to
whether it would not be more expedient to commence with some more
accessible monument. The Bank of France, the _palais de l'Elysee_, the
house of the prefect of police, the office of the Minister of the
Interior were all discussed, then abandoned, by reason of the too
careful surveillance of which they were the object."[23] Toward the end
of his address, Guesde turned to the reactionaries, and said: "I have
shown you that everywhere, from the beginning of the anarchist epidemic
in France, you find either the hand or the money of one of your
prefects of police.... That is how you have fought in the past this
anarchistic danger of which you make use to-day to commit, what shall I
say?... real crimes, not only against socialism, but against the
Republic itself."[24]

For the last forty years police agents have swarmed into the socialist,
the anarchist, and the trade-union movements for the purpose of
provoking violence. The conditions grew so bad in Russia that every
revolutionist suspected his comrade. Many loyal revolutionists were
murdered in the belief that they were spies. In the belief that they
were comrades, the faithful intrusted their innermost secrets to the
agents of the police.