Letter to Natalle Liebknecht, November 29, 1887

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 29 November 1887


First published in: Marx and Engels, Works, First Russian Edition, Vol. XXVII, Moscow, 1935
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 48


ENGELS TO NATALIE LIEBKNECHT

IN BORSDORF NEAR LEIPZIG

London, 29 November 1887

Dear Mrs Liebknecht,

Thank you and Liebknecht very much indeed for your good wishes on the occasion of my birthday, which we celebrated yesterday. A whole lot of people foregathered; there had first been, in the evening, a rehearsal in a public house of a French play adapted by Aveling, in which he and Tussy both acted and met with great applause, as did the play itself, which has been accepted by a popular actress and hence is now more or less assured of success. Afterwards, the whole company repaired to my house; Lenchen had made some doughnuts and pretzels and Mrs Kautsky a Viennese apple-tart, while midnight ushered in Aveling's birthday, so that we were able to celebrate that as well.

Percy[1] would undoubtedly have come to see you in Leipzig, but he was making only a brief business trip to Dresden and Berlin and had to get back as soon as possible because his buttonholing machine was to figure in an exhibition here which was remaining open only until last Saturday. He arrived in Leipzig in the middle of the night, had to stop there a few hours after missing his connection and left again that same morning for Dresden. Otherwise he would not have failed to pay you his respects.

As far as Mrs Schack is concerned, she has, to my knowledge, declared on three separate occasions that all the German deputies in our party are corrupt and, on two of those occasions, expressly included the names of Liebknecht and Bebel.[2] After she had done this, it was impossible for me to have any further dealings with her, even if she herself had made the first move, which was certainly not the case. Bebel had an opportunity of seeing her in her new role and seemed in no way edified thereby. Liebknecht likewise had that opportunity at St Gallen,[3] she having had the, to my mind, unbelievable impertinence to go there. What she told him while there I, of course, don't know, but it cannot alter the fact that she spoke about him over here in such a way as, in my eyes, to constitute a complete breach. The creature is absolutely determined to cut a figure and if, after what has happened, Liebknecht should help her in any way, whether direct or indirect, to do so, or if he should allow his behaviour to be governed by the moderate attitude you have described, there would be a danger that his enviers, of whom we all have our fair share, would look for other motives for his actions. Of course, you and Liebknecht must know best what attitude you should adopt towards the woman. I, for my part, am glad to be rid of her.

In her conflict with the powers that be, Tussy came to no harm, unlike her coat and hat which were irretrievably damaged. As a matter of fact she wasn't attacked; rather it was she who did the attacking. Now the rumpus is virtually over and, while some trifling incident may be staged in Trafalgar Square, it will only be for fun. But the government will have something to think about. Were old Disraeli to know what dunderheads his successors were, he'd rise up out of the grave and lambast them good and proper.

I am tolerably well again and so is Lenchen. She and the Roshers, ditto the Kautskys and Avelings, send you and your husband their cordial regards.

Very sincerely yours,

F. Engels

  1. ↑ Percy Rosher
  2. ↑ See this volume, p. 76
  3. ↑ The Congress of the Socialist Workers' Party of Germany was in session from the 2nd to the 6th October 1887, at St. Gallen (Switzerland). It was attended by 79 delegates. The congress discussed the following questions: a report of the Reichstag faction of the party, the activity of Social Democratic deputies in the Reichstag and the Landtags, the party's attitude to the issue of taxes and customs duties in connection with the steps taken by the government in the social sphere, the party's policy at the last election and at the election to come, the convocation of an international socialist congress, and the attitude to the anarchists. It was stressed in the congress resolutions that in its parliamentary activities, the party was to concentrate on the critique of the government and on the agitation for the principles of Social Democracy; Bismarck's social policies, it was said, had nothing in common with the genuine concern for working people's needs. It was also pointed out that anarchist views were incompatible with the socialist programme. The congress passed a decision to convene an international labour congress in 1888 to consider labour legislation. Most of the delegates upheld the party's revolutionary wing, led by August Bebel and Wilhelm Liebknecht. The leaders of the opportunist wing found themselves in relative isolation.