Letter to Natalie Liebknecht, July 31, 1877

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 31 July 1877


First published, in Russian, in Marx-Engels Archives, Vol. I (VI), Moscow, 1934
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 45


ENGELS TO NATALIE LIEBKNECHT

IN LEIPZIG

Ramsgate, 31 July 1877
2 Adelaide Gardens

Dear Mrs Liebknecht,

May I request you to arrange at your convenience for this note[1] to reach your husband safely? With any luck you will shortly be relieved of labours of this kind and, I hope, for some considerable time.[2] The wives of our friends in Germany have to play their part in the struggle which their husbands are actively waging, and to play it in a manner which would come as a surprise to our wives here, in the security of England. It's all very well for us here to talk and criticise, when in Germany any thoughtless or ill-considered word may entail imprisonment and the temporary disruption of family life. Fortunately our German women do not allow themselves to be deterred by this and prove by their deeds that the sickly sentimentality of which one hears so much is just a class affliction peculiar to bourgeois women.

With warm regards to you and your children,

Yours very sincerely,

F. Engels

  1. ↑ See next letter.
  2. ↑ At that time Wilhelm Liebknecht was serving a sentence in Leipzig prison (see Note 291).