Letter to Friedrich Engels, December 4, 1863

Author(s) Karl Marx
Written 4 December 1863


First published in Der Briefwechsel zwischen F. Engels und K. Marx, Bd. 3, Stuttgart, 1913
Published in English in full for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 41


MARX TO ENGELS[1]

IN MANCHESTER

[London,] 4 December 1863

Dear Frederick,

Very many thanks for the £10. Ditto, retrospectively, for the port. It has done me a power of good. Besides the wine, I have (up till now) been having to swill f/2 quarts of the strongest London STOUT every day. It struck me as a good theme for a short story. From the front, the man who regales HIS INNER MAN with port, claret, stout and a truly massive mass of meat. From the front, the guzzler. But behind, on his back, the OUTER MAN, a damned carbuncle. If the devil makes a pact with one to sustain one with consistently good fare in circumstances like these, may the devil take the devil, I say. Incidentally, I still feel light-headed and my knees are those of a broken-down hack, but I imagine the journey will put a stop to all this. Little Tussy told me apropos the OUTER MAN: 'BUT IT IS YOUR OWN FLESH!' By the by, I can't speak too highly of Dr Allen's behaviour towards me. He remarked, by the by, apropos the operation, that GERMAN PHILOSOPHERS were always self-consistent.

As regards the 'sea-girt',[2] by and large, I agree with you.[3]

Obviously, the whole succession business is merely of diplomatic significance. As TO DENMARK, she is not, I think, bound by the Treaty of London38n in as much as the Danish Parliament was intimidated by Russian warships when the vote was taken. I enclose herewith Urquhart's nonsense,[4] R. Schramm's nonsense,[5]

lastly a Danish pamphlet, which is of interest on at least two counts, 1. with regard to the fellows from whom the Schleswig-Holstein movement originally stemmed; 2. with regard to the stand taken by the peasants in Holstein.

In today's Times you will find under the heading 'Schleswig-Holstein' an item by Dr Thudichum that is typical of German historiography.[6]

I shall certainly get hold of a publisher for you in Germany. So, buckle to straight away.

I shall drop you a couple of lines as soon as I am in Trier. I also have to go to Holland, for my uncle[7] is my MONSTER creditor.

Salut.

Your

K. M.

But one mustn't irritate the Danes. They've got to understand that Scandinavians and Germans have a common interest in opposing Russia and that nothing could be more advantageous to themselves than the separation of the German element.

  1. ↑ An excerpt from this letter was first published in English in The Letters of Karl Marx. Selected and Translated with Explanatory Notes and an Introduction by Saul K. Padover, Prentice-Hall Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1979.
  2. ↑ Schleswig-Holstein is meant. 'Schleswig-Holstein meerumschlungen' are the opening words of a patriotic song popular at the time of the Duchies' struggle against Danish rule in 1848-49.
  3. ↑ See this volume, p. 496.
  4. ↑ Presumably the material on the Schleswig Holstein question published in The Free Press, Vol. XV, No. 12, 2 December 1863.
  5. ↑ R. Schramm, Die rothe Fahne von 1848 und Die schwarzweisse Fahne von I863, Berlin, 1863.
  6. ↑ Letter to the editor of The Times signed 'A German who is fond of facts', The Times, No. 24733, 4 December 1863.
  7. ↑ Lion Philips