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Special pages :
Letter to Friedrich Engels, August 10, 1870
| Author(s) | Jenny von Westphalen |
|---|---|
| Written | 10 August 1870 |
JENNY MARX TO ENGELS
IN MANCHESTER
[London, 10 August 1870]
Dear Mr Engels,
Moor and Jenny sailed off for Ramsgate yesterday morning,[1] in order to see whether there is anywhere for us to put up our tents. I greatly fear that the rent will be enormous. I have been to see the house-agent, MR Smith, several times already in order to spur him into action.[2] He claims to have taken all the necessary steps and to have written to the owner in Manchester. No reply has been forthcoming from that fine gentleman, who seems to be in no hurry at all about the business. Smith thinks, however, that you are not running a risk of any kind and that there is time enough to settle the matter for you. He promised to write to me again, but since I have not heard anything further so far, I shall go and see him again tomorrow and not mince words.
Lafargue has just sent a number of French papers and I enclose a copy of Le Soir for you here. It may contain something useful for your military articles.[3] You cannot imagine what a sensation these have been making here! They really have made everything wonderfully clear and vivid, and I cannot but think of you as the jeune[4] Moltke.
The nauseating vituperation in the Figaro, etc., really passes beyond all belief. They want to devour the vandals, bones and all, for having had the impudence to concentrate their forces and dare to set foot in the sol sacré de la patrie.[5] They all deserve to be thrashed by the Prussians; for all the French, even the tiny number of better ones, have an element of chauvinism in some remote corner of their hearts. This will have to be knocked out of them. Even here in our house, where there was also a bit of chauvinism, there is now just indignation about these gentry with their CIVILIS-A-A-ATION and their ideas which they were kind enough to try and import into Germany, which is no sol sacré.
From the stamps on the papers which Laura has sent, I see to my horror that they are still in Levallois-Perret and hence close to the fortifications.[6] We have long since warned them to leave Paris and take little Schnäpschen[7] to Bordeaux. But they won't listen, and I hope they won't have to pay for it. I shall close now so as to catch the post and at the same time to rush for the Pall Mall to see whether there are not any NOTES ON THE WAR by 'Z' in it. Yesterday they printed your article[8] as the FIRST LEADER, SO as to make even more capital out of it politically.
The PEACE LEAGUE 6 donated £20 to the International yesterday to distribute the Address[9] in Germany and France. I don't know whether Moor will be happy about Wilhelmchen's[10] translation. The French translation of the braves Beiges[11] is quite wretched; in terms of fadaise[12] it is surpassed only by the translation which has just arrived from the braves suisses.
Please give my best regards to your dear wife.[13]
Your old friend,
Jenny Marx
- ↑ Marx and his family were on vacation in Ramsgate from 9 to 31 August 1870.
- ↑ Marx means renting a house for Engels who intended to move from Manchester to London for good in September 1870 after retiring from the firm of Ermen & Engels. Jenny Marx took an active part in looking for a suitable house.
- ↑ F. Engels, Notes on the War.
- ↑ young
- ↑ sacred soil of the mother country
- ↑ of Paris
- ↑ Charles Etienne Lafargue
- ↑ F. Engels, 'The Prussian Victories'.
- ↑ K. Marx, 'First Address of the General Council of the International Working Men's Association on the Franco Prussian War'.
- ↑ Wilhelm Liebknecht's
- ↑ worthy Belgians
- ↑ absurdity
- ↑ Lydia Burns