Transcription of letter in Kurrent ca. 1880 - difficult word

Question

I am transcribing a letter from about 1880 from the Norwegian Professor of Philosophy Marcus Jacob Monrad to the Swiss "Poet priest" Friederich Oser https://www.wikibook.wiki/wiki/de/Friedrich_Oser:

I am not able to decipher the below word marked with XXX. I attach a picture of the problematic part. Any suggestions would be most welcome.

Seit einem Menschenalter bin ich hier
als Professor der Philosophie angestellt und
trage Logik und Metaphysik, Psychologie, Ethik,
Religionsphilosophie und Aesthetik vor. Mein
System ist wesentlich idealistisch, XXX ich habe
hier meistens — ausser den gewöhnlichen Böoten-
thum — den auch hier aufkeimenden
comte-millschen Positivismus zu bekämpfen.

Answer 1

I submit that it is the word "mich" and that, given the rest of the sentence, it is likely a mistake and should be deleted.

1. The word appears to read "mich" in the first place. Note the ending -ch and a dot above the first half. Other common words ending in -ch ("auch", "noch") seem too much of a stretch (there is no closed "o", no "a", no stroke above the line for the "u").

2. Compare your word to "mich" in l. 1 of the image (which you helpfully included). The second-to-last word quite clearly reads "mich". Furthermore, the sentence goes on like this:

Ich beeile mich daher, Ihnen mein sokratisches Gesicht(?) [...] zu schicken, und füge einige "Textesworte" dazu.

making "mich" the only possibility in this context – as "beeilen" is reflexive and requires an accusative object.

3. There is no room for "mich" in "[mich] ich habe hier meistens [...] zu bekämpfen". I submit that the word is the result of an oversight on M.'s part (maybe a slip of the pen in transcribing from a draft, if this is the fair copy of his letter). Thus, it should be deleted.

(Thanks to Helge for correcting "Ihnen" in my transcription of the quote!)