Letter to B. Lindheimer, May 3 or 4, 1877

Author(s)	Friedrich Engels
Written	3 May 1877

First published in: Marx and Engels, Works, First Russian Edition, Vol. XXVI, Moscow, 1935
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 45

ENGELS TO B. LINDHEIMER

IN LONDON

[Draft]

[London, 3 or 4 May 1877]

It is indeed incomprehensible to me why I, of all people, should be called upon to pay your travelling expenses. You yourself must have known what was the extent of your means and when the time had come to go home, for you came over here on the off chance and not as a working man at that. You let the time go by and then approached me, a total stranger, for help. You did not produce a single document relating either to your character or your position, for a party card does not serve the purpose of vouching for its holder. Your tales about your position and acquaintances blatantly contradict what you were subsequently obliged to tell me. Finally you attempt to force me to receive you at my house by behaviour which compels me to close my doors to you.

If I nevertheless send you a postal order on GOWER STREET OFFICE for the £1 in question, I do so simply with a view to giving you one last chance to prove that you are deserving of better treatment than that which you have hitherto forced me to mete out to you. Kindly acknowledge receipt.

Faithfully