Letter to Laura Lafargue, January 2, 1889

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 2 January 1889


First published in full, in the language of the original (English), in: F. Engels, P. et L. Lafargue, Correspondance, t. II, Paris, 1956 and, in Russian, in Istorichesky arkhiv, No. 2, 1956
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 48


ENGELS TO LAURA LAFARGUE[1]

AT LE PERREUX

London, 2 January 1889

My dear Laura,

All our best wishes for the New Year to yourself and Paul! We got into it in a very queer way—we went as usual to Pumps' in a cab, the fog was thickening—in Belsize Road we stuck fast—the man had to lead the horse; by and bye that was not sufficient; a man with a lantern took hold of the horse and led; after a full hour's drive in the dark and cold we arrived at Pumps' where we found Sam Moore, Tussy and the Schlüters (Edward never turned up) and also Tauschen Dinner of course was an hour late in consequence of our adventure. Well, it got blacker and blacker, and when the New Year came, the air was as thick as pea-soup. No chance of getting away; our cabman, ordered for one o'clock, never arrived, and so the whole lot had to stop where they were. So we went on drinking, singing, card-playing and laughing till half-past five, when Sam and Tussy were escorted by Percy to the station and caught the first train; about seven the others left, and it cleared up a little; Nim slept with Pumps, Schorlemmer and I in the spare bed, Percy in the nursery (it was after seven when we went to sleep) and got up again at out 12 or 1 to return to Pilsener etc.; the sun shone brightly on a beauti- fully frozen ground. The spree agreed with all of us most amazingly and none of us is any the worse for the bout. The others drank coffee about half past four, but I stuck to claret till seven.

I am glad to hear that the Boulangitis was a personal affection of Paul's though the Parti ouvrier pretends that Guesde and Deville have given in to him.[2] What you say about the Possibilists we are perfectly agreed on,[3] but I was bound to place before you and Paul

the excuses which Liebknecht and others—for instance the Belgians— may draw from the tender treatment the Boulangists undoubtedly have had from our side. All I insisted on from the beginning, and all Paul declined to let me have, was a clear and unmistakeable assurance that the Boulangists should be treated as bourgeois enemies quite as much as the Cadettists.[4] For under no circumstances could I encour- age our German friends to attend a congress the convokers of which had so far forgotten the old traditional policy of the proletariat as to coquet with a bourgeois party, et encore un parti tel que les boulangistes.[5]

Well, the impending Paris election must bring our people to their senses—that was my first thought on Hude's death,[6] and indeed the Troyes Congress has taken at least one step in the right direction by proclaiming the necessity of an independent socialist candidature[7] (I hope Vaillant 's who seems to me at present the only one to unite a certain number of suffrages, as our own people appear to be quite out of the race at this moment). But no paper says what the other resolutions of the Congress are; there have been individual anti-Boulangist pronunciamen- tos (though none of Paul's that I saw) but nothing on the part of the Congress officially except the above resolution.

Now Liebknecht will come to Paris about middle of January[8] and I have to write to Bebel in a few days.[9] Therefore if Paul wishes me to act in the interest of their congress, he must enable me to do so by a clear and unequivocal declaration as to what our people may expect of him and the others with regard to the Boulanger mania. And the sooner the better, there is not much time to lose.

I have never doubted the really anti-chauvinist character of the Marxists, but that was the very reason why I could not conceive how they could think of an alliance open or disguised with a party which lives upon chauvinism almost alone. I never asked more than the open acknowledgment that Cadettists and Boulangists, dass sie alle beide stinken,[10] surely such a self-understood thing I ought to have had long ago! Also the Troyes resolutions I ought to have.

If there has been an idea of getting some of our people into the Chamber by having them placed on the Boulangist list, that would be far worse than not getting into the Chamber at all. After all, if the poor old Socialiste had been kept alive somehow or other, we should be better off, I think.

Cunninghame Graham was here last Sunday week—a nice fellow, but always in want of a manager, otherwise brave to foolhardiness, alto- gether much of an English Blanquist.

Love from Nim, Schorlemmer and myself.

Ever yours affectionately,

F. Engels

  1. ↑ Excerpts from this letter were first published in French in the journal La Pensee, No. 61, 1955. Concerning the first publication of this letter in the language of the original (English), (see note 40).
  2. ↑ The newspaper Parti Oavrier, the mouthpiece of the Possibilists (see note 19), on 28 December 1888 carried an article 'L'Agglomeration parisienne' that accused the Guesdists of lending support to the Boulangist movement (see note 277) so as to have Jules Guesde, Paul Lafargue and Gabriel Deville in Parliament. The Paris Amalgamation (Agglomeration) was the name of the Paris branch of the French Worker's Party.
  3. ↑ In her letter to Engels of 27 December 1888 Laura Lafargue wrote that the anti-Boulangism of the Possibilists was similar to their other deception. They used to good advantage the pronouncements of the Guesdists in support of the international and, specifically, the German working-class movement and, as a result, the latter lost its popularity in Paris. For the Guesdists' attitude to Boulangism see note 277.
  4. ↑ Cadettists was the name by which members of the Societe des Droits de L'Homme et dn Citoyen were known. The Society was set up on 25 May 1888 by bourgeois radicals and moderate republicans for combating Boulangism. The Possibilists became affiliated with this organisation. Its name came from Rue Cadet, where it was located.
  5. ↑ and, moreover, a party like the Boulangists
  6. ↑ In view of the death, on 23 December 1888, of the deputy to the Chamber from Seine-Department, Antoine Auguste Hude, the Prime Minister Floquet fixed a by-election on 27 January 1889.
  7. ↑ The convention of the French Workers' Party held in Troyes in December 1888 (see note 322) passed a decision on nominating a socialist as an independent candidacy for the by-election of 27 January 1889. The candidature of Boule, a labourer and stonemason, was nominated accordingly. This convention also decided to hold an International Socialist Working Men's Congress in Paris in 1889, thus confirming the decision of the National Congress of the French trade unions (see note 331).
  8. ↑ On 29 December 1888 Wilhelm Liebknecht told Engels he intended to visit Paris and London to hold preliminary negotiations with local socialists about the forthcoming International Socialist Congress in Paris.
  9. ↑ See next letter
  10. ↑ that both of them stink (Heine, 'Disputation', Romanzero)