Letter to Karl Marx, January 6, 1858

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 6 January 1858


First published abridged in Der Briefwechsel zwischen F. Engels und K. Marx, Bd. 2, Stuttgart, 1913 and in full in: Marx and Engels, Works, First Russian Edition, Vol. XXII, Moscow, 1929
Printed according to the original
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 40


ENGELS TO MARX

IN LONDON

Manchester, 6 January 1858

Dear Moor,

You will have had the article[1] in good time, at any rate, as I posted it before midnight on Monday, which means that it must have been delivered between 12 and 1 o'clock.

I received Lassalle's letter and also wrote to tell you how amused Lupus and I were at the man who wrote Heraclitus.[2] Can my letter have gone astray?[3]

During the worst of the crisis it was absolutely impossible for me to think of anything but the GENERAL CRASH. I could neither read nor write and was, moreover, still irritable as a result of my illness. Then came the HOLIDAYS with fox-hunting and other such frivolities, but now that's all over and I am beginning to feel in need of a quieter occupation and way of life. Such being the case—with the added inducement of a good bout of catarrh—the letter C has come as a boon to me, and I shall embark on it this very evening. I don't imagine it will take me very long; at any rate I shall put my best foot forward and you will be able to send something off each week. Come to that, if Army arrived in October and in time for Volume I[4] then surely C, arriving in January, will be in time for Volume III. In view of the crisis the chaps won't be hurrying into print, otherwise Dana would have written long ago. If you hear from him, by the way, let me know.

Incidentally the crisis, presently at a standstill, is about to take a new turn, at least so far as Manchester and the COTTON industry are concerned. On Monday a great many spinners went to Liverpool and bought 12,000 bales in order to restock to some extent, since many of them had nothing left. This pushed up the price of cotton, and at the same time the Greeks entered the market here and bought a fair amount, which brought about a corresponding rise locally. In Manchester and in Liverpool, the price has already risen by Ad (per lb) above the lowest point. Now the buyers are shying away again but, if the easterlies persist, cotton and yarn will

get even lower before the arrival of full shiploads round about February or March. What à thing to do, pushing up the price of yarn and cotton WITH FACTORIES ON SHORT TIME! It can only result in restricting demand more than ever and, if this has no immediate effect on prices, it is merely because production rises and falls with demand. The price of MIDDLING is again somewhere between 6 U and 6a/8—today probably ô'Ad, although I haven't yet seen the closing prices.

As regards produce, too, the difficulty of investing money seems to have enabled the chaps to effect once again a small, temporary rise which will last until the wind goes round to the west.

The vast amount of surplus capital in the market is, by the way, truly astounding and proves yet again what colossal dimensions everything has assumed since 1847. It would not surprise me in the least if, even before the crisis has passed through its remaining phases, this superfluity of FLOATING CAPITAL were to bring about renewed speculation in shares. This superfluity of disposable capital has undoubtedly helped to keep speculation going in France, and to such good effect that now, having survived the panic, the Crédit mobilier[5] can claim to be one of the soundest institutions in the world.

The letter about Lassalle must have reached you; have another look for it. I wrote it 2 or 3 days after receiving Lassalle's letter.

Enclosed with my day-before-yesterday's article were a few lines from Lupus to your wife and the girls. Cordial regards to them from me.

Your

F. E.

Today a line or two from Schramm saying that he had been rather worse but has now improved again. His worthy brothers now seem to be making the crisis a pretext for leaving him very much in the lurch. He talks of going either to Krefeld or to Virginia so as not to have to worry about where his next meal is coming from! I shall send him five pounds.

  1. ↑ F. Engels, 'The Siege and Storm of Lucknow'.
  2. ↑ F. Lassalle, Die Philosophie Herakleitos des Dunklen von Ephesos.
  3. ↑ Engels' reply to Marx's letter of 22 December 1857 (see this volume, pp. 227-28) has not been found.—239, 242, 250
  4. ↑ Engels' article 'Army' for The New American Cyclopaedia (on Marx's and Engels' contribution to the Cyclopaedia see Note 165) was published not in Vol. I but in Vol. II, which appeared in 1858.—239
  5. ↑ Engels means the establishment of banks similar to the Société générale du Crédit mobilier, a big French joint-stock bank founded by the Péreire brothers in 1852. The Crédit mobilier was to mediate in credit transactions and help in setting up industrial concerns and building railways in France, Spain, Austria, Russia and other countries. It was closely associated with Napoleon Ill's government and under its protection engaged in large-scale speculation. It went bankrupt in 1867 and was liquidated in 1871.—34, 68, 119, 126, 128, 133, 142, 145, 216, 225, 231, 240, 244, 291, 296, 349, 360, 437