Letter to Laura Lafargue, March 30, 1891

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 30 March 1891


First published, in the language of the original (English), in: F. Engels, P. et L. Lafargue, Correspondance, t. III, Paris, 1959
Reproduced from the original
Published in English in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 49


ENGELS TO LAURA LAFARGUE

AT LE PERREUX

London, 30 March 1891

My dear Laura,

Very many thanks for your kind offer to revise Rave[1] — qui en sera ravi — but I am afraid you will not be ravie.[2] I have made him do me a sample — two passages from the last chapter, pp. 121 and 140, 190 — which I have looked over and now submit to you with my notes and suggested alterations. Please look it over and then decide for yourself, whether you will undertake the job. Like all professional translators he is the slave of his original and forgets that a phrase to be done from French into German and vice versa, has to be turned topsy-turvy. Moreover he does not understand the synonymic nuance expressed by many German words; he knows what genus it belongs to, but not what species, much less what variety. But that, I am afraid, most translators will fail in.

I shall write to Rave that I have sent the manuscript to Monsieur Lafargue (whom he suggests as revisor) and that I cannot give him a definite answer until I hear from him. As he mentioned Paul, I thought it best not to mix you up with the matter at the present stage.

Jollymeier is coming to-night at last. At Christmas he had a cold and seems to have kept it until now. He intended coming last Thursday[3] but his cold got worse, and as the weather was bad, delayed from day to day. Yesterday it was nice and warm, but he did not turn up, today at last he writes announcing his arrival to-night aber sicher.[4] His deafness seems to bother him awfully.

Sam arrived at Liverpool last Thursday week, and is with his parents at Bumford, will be here about end of this or beginning of next week. Had himself thoroughly examined on arrival by Gumpert who reports him perfectly sound, with only a small enlargement of the spleen, which is expected to be soon curable.

Pumps and Percy are now staying at the old Roshers', they have given up their house and stored the furniture until their removal to Ryde, Isle of Wight, whither Percy will go this week with his brothers to make the commercial arrangements for the new agency for Roshers' cement, artificial stone, and builders' and gardeners' materials generally. After that, he will take Pumps to select a house and then the transfer will take place. I do hope Percy will at last learn how to earn his own living, it's a pretty penny they have cost me and the worst of it is there is no return in the shape of benefit to the party. Of course I shall have to go on subsidising for a year or two until the new business can be expected to begin paying.

Annie has left us and is going to be married this week. We have taken two girls as I want Louise to help me in my work and not waste her time in the kitchen. The devil's trouble it was to get girls but I believe we have been lucky — so far — that is the first week — we are satisfied. They are two girls who have been together and prefer to be again at one and the same place.

The May demonstration will be a severe letting down to the Social Democratic Federation[5] and Hyndman. Their over-cleverness, in trying to play off the Trades Council[6] against the Legal Eight Hours League, 200 has landed them between two stools. They quite forgot that this year the Trades Council has a quite different majority to that of last year. They wanted again two platforms for themselves, but will not get them, as they are represented neither on the Trades Council nor on the Legal 8 Hours Committee (they sent three delegates but these soon stayed away and their names were consequently struck off the roll). Moreover, Edward, in return for the slanderous attacks of Hyndman, 179 now takes the offensive and will have the matter brought before the East End branch of the Social Democratic Federation. Indeed, Hyndman seems already to show the white feather.

Bernstein says he saw in La Justice that on the 1 May Committee in Paris the Broussists 3 applied for admission, that the Blanquists and Allemanists 53 were against, but that on Guesde's motion they were admitted by a majority of 5. Can you give me any details? as contradiction or confirmation? 201 I hear nothing at all about Brousse and Co. now, are they merely lying in wait, or are they so completely down that they dare not stir? I should like to be well au courant of these matters, as the Brussels Congress[7] will very likely bring about a change in the relations of the Social Democratic Federation and the Possibilists with the Germans. If these two sets of intriguers go to Brussels and thereby publicly renounce their pretensions of being the only to be acknowledged parties in England and France, then the Germans will not be able to refuse entering into communication with them. And from Liebknecht's way of acting at present, I should not wonder if he were to try to play the Possibilists off against you, and the Social Democratic Federation against us here, as a means of making you and us more pliant towards himself. I do not know if you read the Vorwärts, but here we are all disgusted with it. Never had a large party such a miserable organ. Anyhow, to be able to guard against possibilities, I have a particular interest just now in the doings, sayings and position of Brousse and Co. Kind regards from Louise.

Ever yours,

F.E.

Will Paul hop over the water while at Calais?

  1. ↑ who will be delighted
  2. ↑ delighted
  3. ↑ 26 March
  4. ↑ for sure
  5. ↑ The Social Democratic Federation, set up in August 1884, consisted of English socialists of different orientations, mostly intellectuals. For a long time the leadership of the Federation was in the hands of reformists led by Hyndman, an opportunist sectarian. In opposition to them, the revolutionary Marxists within the Federation (Eleanor Marx-Aveling, Edward Aveling, Tom Mann and others) worked for close ties with the revolutionary labour movement. In the autumn of 1884 — following a split and the establishment by the Left wing of an independent organisation, the Socialist League (see Note 49) — the opportunists' influence in the Federation increased. However, revolutionary elements, discontented with the opportunist leadership, continued to form within the Federation, under the impact of the masses.
  6. ↑ The London Trades Council (the Council of all London Trades Unions) was formed in May 1860 at a conference of various London trades unions. The Council was composed of the leaders of the biggest ones. In the earlier half of the 1860s it headed the workers' campaigns against British intervention in the USA and in support of Poland and Italy. Later it fought for the legalisation of the unions. In the early 1890s the Council, which embraced mostly old-established unions, opposed the movement for the formation of new ones and for the eight-hour working day, but popular pressure compelled it to take part in the May Day demonstrations.
  7. ↑ The International Socialist Workers' Congress met in Brussels, 16-22 August 1891. The 337 delegates represented the socialist parties and organisations and numerous trades unions in many European countries and the USA. By a majority vote the congress debarred the anarchists from taking part in its deliberations. Representatives of British trades unions attended. The American delegates included trades unionists, as well as socialists. The congress discussed labour legislation, strike action and boycott, militarism and the celebration of May Day. The resolution on the first question called on workers the world over to join forces for the fight against capitalist rule and, where workers possessed political rights, to use these to free themselves from wage slavery. The resolution on strikes and boycott recommended the workers to make use of these methods of struggle and stressed that trades unions were absolutely essential to the workers. The attitude of the working class to militarism was in the centre of the congress deliberations. Wilhelm Liebknecht's and Edouard Vaillant's reports on this issue and the draft resolution tabled by Liebknecht pointed out that militarism was an inevitable product of the capitalist system, that socialist society alone could put an end to it and bring about international peace and that the socialists were the true party of peace. The leader of the Dutch Social-Democrats, Ferdinand Domela Nieuwenhuis, who took a semi-anarchist stand, tabled an alternative resolution, under which socialists in all countries should, in the event of war, call on their respective people to proclaim a general strike. The vast majority of the delegates voted for the resolution tabled by Liebknecht. Referring to the resolutions of the Brussels Congress, Engels pointed out that 'in matters of principle as of tactics the Marxists have been victorious all along the line' (Engels to F.A. Sorge, 2 September 1891).