In Spain, also, at the beginning of the seventies, there was--as was the case with all the Romance countries--a strong Bakuninist party, which was said to have amounted to 50,000 men in 1873. During the Federalist risings the Anarchists made common cause with the Intransigeants, and succeeded in taking possession of several cities for a short time. Their successes, however, did not last long, and they were only able to hold out till 1874 in New Carthagena, where they had finally to surrender after a regular siege by the Government troops. The Anarchist societies and newspapers were suppressed, and the severest measures taken against Anarchists, which only roused them to the most sanguinary form of propaganda. The Anarchists declared that if they were to be treated as wild beasts, they would act as such, and cause death and destruction to the Government and to any existing form of society at any time, in any place, and by any means. In Belgium about this period there was also a great increase of Proudhonish Anarchism, which, later on, as in Switzerland, Italy, and Spain, attached itself to Bakunin, and at the congress at The Hague formed the centre of the opposition to the Marxists. The rapid growth of Social Democracy in Belgium during the second half of the seventies almost extinguished Anarchism there. * * * * * If we wish to characterise briefly this first period of the Anarchism of action, a period terminated decisively by the year 1880, we should define it as the process of separation between the Socialist and the Anarchist tendency. Karl Marx, who had already come into opposition with the "Father of Anarchism," and had attacked his "philosophy of want" with the bitter criticism of "want of philosophy," noted the far greater danger which threatened Socialism from the clever agitator Bakunin, and entered into a life-and-death struggle against him. Although there was a large personal element in this conflict, it was really more than a personal struggle between two opponents. There was a deep division among the proletariat themselves, separating them--unconsciously for the most part--into two great and irreconcilable camps; the first battle had been fought, and the result was decidedly not in favour of the Anarchists. Towards the end of the seventies we notice everywhere, except perhaps in France, where social parties were strongly marked, a remarkable retrogression in Anarchism. It appeared as if, after playing the part of an episode, it was to disappear from the political stage.