Letter to Karl Marx, May 30, 1864

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ENGELS TO MARX

IN LONDON

[Manchester,] 30 May 1864

Dear Moor,

The books haven't gone off yet, nor has the wine. They will go off together. Have heard nothing from either Borchardt or the lawyer; shall call on the latter the day after tomorrow and give him the power of attorney.

Gumpert says that, if the furuncles are merely stragglers, you should do nothing further about them. I discussed little Jenny with him; he says it would seem to be a chlorotic condition and that sudden attacks of asthma are common in such cases, and are due to circulatory disorders; nothing could be done save treat the condition as a whole, nor could he think of anything beyond what Allen is already doing. Anyhow, he didn't seem to take too serious a view of the thing.

The Virginian campaign is once again characterised by inconclusiveness, or more precisely, by the difficulty of taking it to any sort of decision on terrain like this. I set no store by the news received per Scotia; all it means is that a week's rain has saved Lee from the necessity of fighting battle after battle à la Solferino.

And for him, that means a great deal. Another 2 such battles and his army, which had to withdraw to a new position every night and was in any case in a very sorry state, would hardly have been capable of making a stand anywhere before Richmond. Certainly Grant also benefited from the standstill, but not to the same extent. The reinforcements he is now obtaining won't be worth very much. But I shouldn't be surprised if Lee were soon to withdraw to Richmond. Then the decisive battle will take place there.

Bismarck seems to have colossal good luck; it really looks as though there's going to be an Augustenburgian peace. As yet I can make neither head nor tail of it, but my view would seem to be confirmed by the very hectoring article in today's Morning Post. (It says, inter alia, that Schleswig should be partitioned and—the Eider form the new frontier between Danish and German Schleswig!) Nevertheless, plausible though it all seems, I can hardly see the Russians giving up, without more ado, all the spoils of 1851/52, the less so since they would not, so far as one can see, get anything in return.

I have been engrossed in the arithmetic in your Francoeur, a section you would seem pretty well to have ignored, if the failure to correct the scandalous printing errors in the figures is anything to go by. Though individual bits are quite elegant, the practical aspect of arithmetic is handled in a shockingly inept and superficial manner, being better taught at any German school. I also doubt whether it is practical to discuss things such as roots, powers, series, logarithms, etc., even at elementary level, merely in terms of numerals (without any recourse to algebra and, IN FACT, without presupposing an elementary knowledge of the same). Although the use of numerical examples by way of illustration may be a good idea, I should say that to limit oneself to numerals is, in this case, less conducive to clarity than simple algebraic treatment with a+b, precisely because the general expression is simpler and clearer in algebraic form and is something which cannot be dispensed with here. Admittedly, this particular section is really beneath the dignity of the mathematician par excellence.

I shall send you Danske papers tomorrow. In several Jutland towns Prussian officers are said to have objected very strongly before carrying out the confiscation in accordance with orders. Generally speaking, there have been no complaints anywhere about the troops, only about the generals and their orders. In the Dagbladet England is, if anything, more roundly abused than in Germany.

No other news, save that it's bitterly cold. Warm regards to your wife and the girls. I HOPE TUSSY IS CONTENT WITH THE COTTON.

Your

F. E.