Letter to Paul Lafargue, January 28, 1887

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 28 January 1887


First published, slightly abridged, in Le Populaire de Paris, No. 948, November 29, 1920 and in full in La Nouvelle Revue Socialiste, No. 20, September 15, 1927-January 15, 1928
Printed according to the original
Translated from the French
Published in English in full for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 48


ENGELS TO PAUL LAFARGUE[1]

IN PARIS

London, 28 January 1887

My dear Lafargue,

My eye is at last getting slightly better, but not yet well enough to enable me to shift the mountain of work and correspondence that has accumulated in the meantime. I can only write by daylight and then not all the time, but I am at least able to read for the better part of the evening.

If the Parisians are beginning to feel bellicose just now, they would be better advised to direct their wrath against Russia, which has used them to pull her chestnuts out of the fire and, now that they've burnt their fingers, is abandoning them to their fate. Can they not see that it is Russia which, through the Paris papers in her pay (the most dissolute being, it seems, the Débats[2] ), has incited their revanchist rodomontade with the sole aim of getting Bismarck to capitulate to the Tsar[3] ? And now she has got what she wanted; Bismarck has made his peace with Russia and has sacrificed Austria, while Russia has sacrificed her Parisian dupes to Bismarck.[4] The Russian alliance has its points!

Come to that, I do not believe that Bismarck wants a war which, no sooner begun, would become European. Once France and Germany had got to grips—and it would be a hard struggle and rather long—the Tsar would be compelled, willy-nilly, to march on the Balkans: Austro-Russian war. From that moment on, Bismarck would be at the mercy of unforeseeable circumstances, and I don't suppose he is so stupid to provoke such a situation in cold blood. But the Russian agency in Paris will continue its activities; it is in the interests of Russia to get France and Germany embroiled in a war; then she would have no one left to fight except Austria and, at most, England which would mean, in the opinion of the Russian chauvinists, who despise both England and Austria, a free hand for Russia in the East. And there lies the danger. If those gentry, Cyon & Co., succeed in pushing France into this war, they will be cutting each other's throats for the benefit of the Tsar and the perpetuation of despotism in Russia.

As to the elections in Germany, our prospects are first-rate. I think we shall get 700,000 votes in all, maybe even more.[5] But when it comes to the majority in the new Reichstag, you have to reckon with the German philistine, and he's no angel, far from it.

Here it is being said that the Daily News' scoop was a scoop for Baring on the Stock Exchange. To Bismarck it must have seemed a most unpleasant manoeuvre, making a hash as it did of his electoral manoeu-vres. He has been forced to issue a démenti.[6]

Martignetti has again written to me.[7] It seems that he in at his wits' end and he asks me to find some way out for him, putting forward the most impossible suggestions. I have written to Hamburg and Vienna on his behalf and have also promised him I would write to you. No doubt you will hear from him direct. There's nothing for him either here or in America, since he does not speak a word of English. Might there be some opening for him in France, as a teacher of Italian? As I see it, there is nothing else he could do. Or can you think of something better? He is about to be dismissed from his post. Do try and find some opening for the poor devil, either in Paris or in the provinces.

Pumps is a great deal better and her only serious complaint is intercostal rheumatism. When I saw her this morning she was quite cheerful.

Nothing's going on here among Socialists but inter-clique intrigue. According to Scheu, Champion is sick of Hyndman and would like to topple him, which accounts for his rapprochement with Bax. He ran into Aveling the other day and was as friendly as could be. We shall see how it all ends. In the meantime Aveling is going to hold up before the East End working men the example set by the Americans—that of a labour movement which is independent of the older parties, this being a method of agitation that may well be effective. Last week he spoke at a meeting in Farringdon Street, as did Tussy the day before yesterday, and this they will continue to do both there and elsewhere.

As soon as I have any time to spare I shall write to Laura. Meanwhile Nim would like to know if she has spoken to Longuet yet, and what his answer was.

La Justice has had a copy of Capital[8] in English; if Longuet has taken it, it would save us sending him the copy we have reserved for him. Could you find out? As regards the other copies Sonnenschein is supposed to have sent, we know nothing definite as yet. He is digging his heels in.

Yours ever,

F.E.

  1. ↑ This letter was first published in English, abridged, in: Frederick Engels, Paul and Laura Lafargue, Correspondence. 1887-1890, Vol. 2, Foreign Languages Publishing House, Moscow, 1960.
  2. ↑ Journal des Débats politiques et littéraires
  3. ↑ Alexander III
  4. ↑ Russo-German rapprochement appeared to be on the cards in early 1887. In the course of negotiations between the two countries, the Russian ambassador, P. Shuvalov, proposed to Bismarck that the 'alliance of three emperors', which was expiring in the summer of 1887, should be resumed, but without Austrian participation. Shuvalov's proposal also envisaged Russia's neutrality in the event of another Franco-German war and a free hand for Russia in the Balkans. Addressing the Reichstag on 11 January 1887, Bismarck urged the need for friendly relations with Russia. An anti-French press campaign, the mobilisation of reservists and other steps on the part of the German government gave rise to fears of an imminent military clash with France (the 'war alarm' in January 1887). However, the Russian government refused to back up Shuvalov's proposals and Bismarck's actions.
  5. ↑ On 14 January 1887, Bismarck dissolved the Reichstag in view of its refusal to endorse the proposed seven-year military budget (the bill on the septen-nate). The elections to the new Reichstag, held on 21 February, were attended by a brutal campaign of terror, directed above all against the Socialist Party. Nevertheless, the Social Democrats polled 763,128 votes (10.1 per cent of the total), 213,038 more than in the 1884 elections. However, owing to the undemocratic additional ballots law the number of Social Democratic deputies declined to 11, as against 24 in the previous Reichstag.
  6. ↑ In January 1887 the Daily News reported that the Bismarck government intended to demand that the French government explain the concentration of French troops on the German border. On 25 January the semi-official Norddeutsche Allgemeine zeitung emphatically denied this report.
  7. ↑ See this volume, pp. 5-7
  8. ↑ Volume I