| Author(s) | Friedrich Engels |
|---|---|
| Written | 1 May 1851 |
TO MARX IN LONDON
[Manchester,] 1 May 1851
Dear Marx,
Within a few days, a week at the most, you will receive another £5 — I'd have sent it today, had I not just had to pay out £10 in cash.
For the past few days I have been vainly searching for the letters from Lupus[1] and Dronke. You must have taken them both with you.[2] If you find them, send them to me by return and I shall then write at once. Nor have I been able to find Fischer's letter from New Orleans.
Ne nous plaignons pas trop de la mauvaise queue![3] I happen to have Savary's memoirs[4] at home. Heaven knows, Napoleon was similarly afflicted. Savary himself providing a splendid example. Nothing could be more mediocre than this fellow. Just as some people think they're UP TO THE MARK, yet don't even understand the Communist Manifesto,[5] so too Savary imagines that he's got the measure of Napoleon, that he's one of the few elect who can comprehend the full greatness of the fellow, and yet he has failed to comprehend one single campaign- or battle-plan. When he wrote these memoirs, virtually no proper account of these campaigns had been written and, since the thing's an apologia both for Napoleon and for himself, he would certainly not have failed to do his best in this respect; instead, we find nothing but a few general platitudes and a disconnected jumble of detail as seen through the eyes of a subordinate. All the fellow knows about Austerlitz,[6] for instance, is that the enemy was surprised by a flanking march, and was split up into as many fragments as there were French columns—a word-for-word copy of Napoleon's bulletin. But how it happened, he has no idea. For the rest, a vast amount of Empire and Consulate tittle-tattle; a real prize crapaud,[7] boastful, mendacious, servile, positively revelling in the noble activities of the policeman, both as regards the pleasures of spying and the delight in wielding authority when making an arrest; at the same time lending himself to all manner of tomfooleries and intrigues, yet so mediocre, so obsequious and so blinkered that he had always to be kept on a short rein and issued with definite orders. Enfin,[8] a far from impressive character, au fond,[9] neither better nor worse, neither more reliable nor more shady than certain amici,[10] and yet in course of time Napoleon made a passable machine of him, a Duke of Rovigo and a courtier who did him no discredit with the Tsar of Russia.[11] But indeed fellows such as these have to be bought, and that means above all money and power.
Savary's memoirs, which were pretty well known in France, have, by the way, been copied by the worthy Thiers[12] with an effrontery which, in terms of plagiarism, yields nothing to that of the English economists, and this not only where tittle-tattle is concerned. Here and there he also uses Mr Savary as his main source on questions of administration, etc., etc.
To go by The Times, things must be pretty terrible in London now that the Tatars, French, Russians and other barbarians have taken complete possession of it. And, withal, the prospect of brigades of informers arriving from all parts of the world, and even Prussian gendarmes, not to speak of German democratic friends à la Otterberg, who'll be turning up in June to see the Great Exhibition[13] and the great men. A fine how-d'ye-do. If you're not careful, you'll have foisted upon you people, with or without letters of introduction, who will demand to be shown Ledru, Mazzini, L. Blanc and Caussidière and who, once back in Germany, will grumble furiously because you failed to procure them an invitation to dinner with Feargus O'Connor. There'll be people coming to you and saying: 'Mr Marx?—Delighted—You'll have heard of me, I'm Neuhaus, leader of the Thuringian movement!'
You probably read about the fracas in the Cologne City Council over Deputy Burgomaster Schenk's address to the Prince of Prussia,[14] and also about the latter's insolent speech.[15] 'The press is bad, the press in Cologne has got to improve!'[16] Ce pauvre[17] Brüggemann—he, of course, is seizing on the occasion to write a lot of twaddle such as, in all modesty and with the best intentions, one used to take the immense liberty of writing under the censorship. But now 'our Stupp' is burgomaster into the bargain, and the greatest man in Cologne, while your brother-in-law[18] is confiscating books with praiseworthy zeal. My only fear is that en Brutus prusso-bureaucrate[19] he will soon be laying violent hands on your stuff, and that might put an unwelcome stop to the payment of fees. This noble fellow's other brother-in-law, what-you-may-call-him Florencourt, has, as announced in the German papers, betaken himself tambour battant et mèche allumée[20] to the bosom of the Catholic Church. Your family is at least interesting, whereas in mine it's I alone who have to cut the capers.
Apropos, you'd do me a very great favour if you would arrange for Daniels, or anyone else you think suitable in Cologne, to send me a letter (direct here and so with a Cologne postmark) as soon as possible, in which he acknowledges receipt of two five-pound notes, as well as one sent previously, that is, £15 in all, adding that he paid this money to specific individuals in accordance with my instructions, and that my accounts with various people in Cologne are settled in full. He could throw in a few casual remarks, greetings, etc., so that the letter doesn't look contrived. For I foresee a discussion about the monies that have been raised, and hence must have a document which will help me if necessary to prove that I have paid debts in Cologne. The sooner I have the letter the better. How you broach the matter I leave entirely to you, and I would rather it was you who procured the document for me, since the business we two transact between us concerns nobody else. For all I care, you can write and say that it was women who got me into debt, or that, for League purposes, I once stood security for this sum and have now been compelled to pay up, or anything else you choose—n'importe![21] The letter will, by the way, be returned promptly in June to the writer. The main thing is the Cologne postmark, date-stamped sometime in the first half of May.
How goes it with your household? My regards to your wife and children, and write soon.
Your F. E.
I have just found the letters from Lupus and Fischer—but I can't find the one from Dronke. I shall write to Lupus today.[22] When you write to Cologne, it would be a good idea to press them for Lupus' fare—you know what these Cologne people[23] are!