| Author(s) | Friedrich Engels |
|---|---|
| Written | 19 June 1890 |
ENGELS TO WILHELM LIEBKNECHT
IN BERLIN
London, 19 June 1890
Dear Liebknecht,
Hardly a minute goes by without a changement de décoration[1] Schorlemmer has asked me to join him on a cruise in July—a variety of plans have been submitted for my kind consideration. My doctor tells me I must get away as soon as possible and devote this summer to the betterment of my health so as to be up to the mark again when winter comes. I myself have noticed that my bad nights have also been conducive to bad work and that I shall have to break off as soon as possible. So I can't very well reject the plan out of hand.
On the other hand Laura is pressing Lenchen to accompany her on a fortnight's trip to Paris, which would be perfectly feasible during my absence and would do the old lady a power of good.
A further consideration is that your Reichstag is still in session and there's no knowing a fortnight in advance when or whether it will adjourn.
So it could be that in about 10 days' time I shall take myself off for 3 weeks. I shall in any case be back here by 25-26 July and Lenchen probably a few days before that. So if you could arrange your trip in such a way as to arrive after, say, 21 or 22 July, you would find everything ready for you, and a few days later I myself should also be back.
All this is, of course, provisional for the moment, and I shan't be able to tell you anything more definite for a day or two, but I thought it as well to inform you immediately of this circumstance; that I shall go is pretty certain, but there's still some doubt about the details. All that is certain is that I shall be back in London before the end of July and Lenchen before me. None of these plans would keep me away later than the 26th.
So Heligoland is to become German.[2] I really look forward to the outcry of the good Heligolanders, who will fight tooth and nail to prevent their incorporation into the vast barracks of the fatherland. And they have every reason to do so; no sooner has it been annexed than their island will be converted into a large fortress commanding the anchorage to the north-east, and they, poor devils, will be subject to eviction, as though they were so many Irish tenant farmers or, perhaps, Scottish sheep who must make room for deer.
O nay, O nay, enlarge his fatherland they say,[3] yet not one German from without, therein would make his way. A sea-girt Alsace à la Schleswig-Holstein! That was the only prop still lacking in the German imperial force.
Your
F. E.