Letter to Laura Lafargue, September 25, 1890


ENGELS TO LAURA LAFARGUE

AT LE PERREUX

London, 25 September 1890

My dear Laura,

Today being your birthday will be duly celebrated with a good bottle of wine and your health drunk with musical honors — and such musical honors! Nim, Schorlemmer and myself, three splendid musi- cians!

Many thanks for the pears which Nim is expecting with the utmost anxiety. That 'brown fellow' of yours shall be settled before he knows where he is; as for the rest, Nim will certainly take care that their

Lebenslauf
ist angefangen und beschlossen in
Der Santa Casa heiligen Registern[1]

Today, the last number of the Sozialdemokrat is published. I shall miss that paper almost as much as the Neue Rheinische Zeitung. Ede is going to remain here, Tauscher left yesterday for Stuttgart; Fischer, the best of the lot after Ede, will settle in Berlin; the unspeakable muddler Motteler and his elegantly-bred missus nobody knows what to do with, so I suppose they will stay here for some time longer, though we could miss them very well — only unfortunately every- body else seems to be in that same position.

Bebel and Liebknecht have now both removed to Berlin. In case urgent communication with them might become necessary, I give you Bebel's address, the only one I have: A. B. Grossgörschenstraße, 22a, Berlin.

Fine scoundrels in Berlin amongst the nobility — one shot himself while quarreling with a rat du ballet,[2] another for debt and swin- dling, a third in prison for everlasting rows and delirium tremens, a chief officer — Major — of the Unteroffiziersschule[3] at Potsdam shot himself and even the Kreuzzeitung[4] telling the nobility that they are close upon the deluge which they expect only après nous! Could not be better!

Ever yours

F. Engels

  1. births and deaths are registered in the annals of the Holy Inquisition.
  2. ballet dancer
  3. subalterns' school
  4. Neue Preussische Zeitung