| Author(s) | Friedrich Engels |
|---|---|
| Written | 19 May 1891 |
ENGELS TO PAUL LAFARGUE
AT LE PERREUX
London, 19 May 1891
My dear Lafargue,
First of all I did not suggest what tactics you should adopt; I merely said the following: if, at your congresses, you, the Workers' Party, decide in advance how you intend to celebrate 1 May in Paris without regard for the convenience or the wishes of your allies the Blanquists, you must not be surprised if you find them deserting you.[1] If your hand was forced by the provincial gentry, the blame is theirs. In either case you have miscalculated the respective forces at work in Paris and you have been forced out of the committee created by yourselves. That's not what you would call a victory and neither would I.
It remains to be seen what becomes of the Blanquists and, in particular, the Allemanists,[2] to whom you have given the opportunity of once again setting themselves up as the true representatives of the Paris proletariat and at the same time of acquiring a new lease of life. And you complain that the English are too slow for you, although they have forced our own Possibilists, the Social Democratic Federation,[3] to exclude themselves from the great demonstration, and you also say that over there it spread like wildfire. Maybe, but it is Possibilist fire and will eventually flare up in your faces.
There have been demonstrations in the provinces over here, but as I haven't kept the newspapers, I haven't got a list of them.
If you seriously believe Reuters' reports with their estimate of 60,000 people in the Park, do you want us to do likewise with regard to the Havas reports in which your demonstration hardly figures at all? What would you say to that? There were at least 500,000 in Hyde Park.
I see in the German papers that at Fourmies, when the command was given to open fire,[4] the only soldiers to do so were those of the 145th, whereas the detachment of the 84th remained with their arms at the order. And that is why neither the Government nor the Chamber will consent to an inquiry that would establish the fact officially. If this is true, it is a good sign. The Prussian system requires that soldiers be allotted to regiments garrisoned in the region from which the whole of the army corps draws its recruits. Accordingly in the event of mobilisation it is no longer possible, without creating enormous difficulties, to despatch Gascons to the north and Flemings, Walloons and natives of Picardy to the south. This is yet another danger of the system and one that will make itself felt earlier in France than in Germany.
You are right to protest against the ultra-foolish follies attributed to you.[5] That is the danger with countries possessing a revolutionary past, inasmuch as any new region invaded by socialism is tempted to have its revolution within 24 hours. There is no need whatsoever to urge them on; on the contrary they should be reined back. All that the Walloons, in particular, comprehend is rioting and in this they are nearly always the losers. Consider the struggles of the Belgian miners[6] ; organisation nil or virtually nil, irrepressibly impatient, hence doomed to defeat.
Clemenceau has had what he wanted: his day of brilliant opposition,[7] a reminder of the good old times when he made and unmade ministries. On the morrow he remembered that he was now a nobody and that it was Constans who, after all, was the paragon in the eyes of the bourgeoisie. He out-Ferries Ferry.
Tussy and Aveling are in Dublin for a congress of the gasworkers and general labourers.[8] Bernstein's entire family is ill with influenza, Percy and Pumps are disporting themselves in the Isle of Wight, seeing that Percy hasn't yet very much to do because the price list he will have to use is still at the printers. It is snowing here and when it isn't snowing it's raining and feels as chilly as November and we have had fires. For the past week our house has been in utter disorder as a result of repairs to the drains, which stink horribly; we shall have at least another week of it. Old Harney is in Richmond and very ill; he suffers from chronic bronchitis and is afraid, or so he tells me in his letter today, that he will get pleurisy on top of it. Weak as he is, that could be very serious at 75.
Tomorrow I shall at last be able to turn my attention to my Origin of the Family[9] — if nothing crops up!
After Cunninghame-Graham's expulsion and with your Constans in a temper ugly enough to match that of any Père Duchesne, what foreign socialist could feel safe in France? And supposing that, in retaliation against the Japanese attempt on the life of the Tsarévitch[10] (who had committed improprieties and caused scuffles in a tea-garden, to wit a brothel, whereupon the police arrived) a number of minor outrages or coups d'état were to be inflicted upon the Russians in France?
Here comes another squall and it's raining cats and dogs. Dinner in ten minutes. So I shall close this olla podrida[11] of an epistle or, as the Milanese have it, arlecchino.
I believe you get the Vienna Arbeiter-Zeitung. This week it has a letter from Louise on the meeting in Hyde Park.[12]
I spend my evenings studying Louise's books on the physiology of birth and related matters. It's really wonderful — since the process is such an excessively ugly one. I am discovering things of the utmost importance from the philosophical viewpoint.
Give Laura a kiss from me. Regards from Louise.
Yours ever,
F.E.
Herewith Ravé[13] and cheque for £20.