[London,] 19 June* 1861 

Dear Frederick, 

I have put off writing for so long because Weber (the Palatine 
watchmaker) had promised me a report on the London National 
Association’ meeting, which was the scene of Kinkel’s strange 
experience and was attended by Weber as a guest. I did not 
receive the enclosed from him until today. You will have seen 
from the last Hermann what it was all about.” The final meeting 
has been adjourned until Saturday week.‘ In the meantime, Juch, 
having been given the necessary supplies by a German businessman 
in the City, has set off to Coburg with the intention of getting the 
central committee of the National Association there to expel Zerffi 
(and hence implicite’ Kinkel). It’s really splendid that Gottfried’s 
boot-licking attitude to the English should have inspired such 
fanatical rage in all the liberal bourgeois in the Cry. 

Letters have even arrived from Bonn, threatening Gottfried 
‘with a drubbing’ should he return. The secret behind the support 
given to MacDonald by Zerffi (no doubt acting on instructions) 
and Gottfried *" is this: Gottfried holds an English appointment as 
lecturer at the Kensington Museum,”*!? the good Zerffi likewise at 
an Ashley (Shaftesbury) * instirution. Gottfried’s only atuies are the 
louts of the ‘apolitical’ choral and other drinking societies. Last 
week Gottfried bribed these people (probably with English money) 
to join the National Association en bloc. (For anyone can become a 
member of the beastly association by obtaining a card from 
Triibner, at a minimum contribution Of 3/-.) Again, Gottfried held a 
private meeting of his followers and sent a deputation to 
Heintzmann asking him to resign voluntarily (on account of the 
insult to Gottfried’s dignity) from his position as chairman, failing 
which a motion would be proposed to that end. 

By the by, I should not forget to tell you that, while the row was 
going on, my friend Rheinlander joined the National Association 

a A slip of the pen in the original: 9 June. - > ‘Protokoll der Versammlung der 
Londoner Mitglieder des Nationalvereins am 1. Juni 1861’, Hermann, No. 128, 
15 June 1861. - © The meeting Marx writes about took place on Tuesday, 18 June 
1861. - ¢ by implication - € Shaftesbury, Anthony Ashley Cooper 

(after talking it over with me),and brought in some fifty members. 
(mostly clerks) from his Islington Choral Society; it was they more 
than anyone else who kicked up the anti-Gottfried row. 

Rheinlander tells me that never before has the German business 
contingent in the City taken sides so fanatically over a political 
issue. How priceless it would be if Gottfried were forced to resign 
from the National Association because of his kow-towing to a 
foreign government! That would put paid to his status among the 
German muppte crass riff-raff, and where would he be without 
them? Gottfried is aware that this is the issue upon which he will 
stand or fall, and is therefore busying himself after his own 
fashion. What particularly irks him just now is the way everyone is 
saying that ‘the Volk and “Marx” had been right about him after 
all’.°?? He told an acquaintance of Hirschfeld’s, the printer, that the 
‘Brimstone Gang were the invisible leaders of the whole 
business’. Nice, is it not, that we, who haven't raised a finger, 
should be endowed by our enemies with such mystical ‘powers’? 

The second enclosure I am sending you (which please return as 
I have got to answer it) is a letter from la Hatzfeldt.**' I shall keep 
her as my private correspondent in Berlin as she has incomparably 
more political nous (not to mention her good contacts) than ‘the 
step that bears in itself the systematic principle of its walking’. 
(Lassalle, Vol. II, p. 545.)* (Apropos. I presume you and Lupus 
have had L.’s opus?) There are two passages in her letter I should 
explain to you. With regard to the Blanqui affair, I had arranged 
for a letter to be sent her from Brussels (from Denonville).? 
Initially, its a matter of obtaining money to print a pamphlet, 
emanating from Denonville, about the —infamous—Blanqui trial. 
(Debates, etc., and discussion thereof.) Blanqui himself has, 
through Denonville, expressed his heartfelt gratitude to me and to 
the parti prolétaire allemand (in partibus)* for the sympathy we have 
shown him.*” I consider it a very good thing that we should again 
have direct links with the decidedly revolutionary party in France. 

Second point: In the letter in which I notified Lassalle that there 
was nothing doing just now so far as the newspaper was 
concerned, I endeavoured to sugar the pill by saying that I might 
perhaps come to Berlin next winter.‘ 

a F. Lassalle, Das System der erworbenen Rechte.-» Louis Watteau - © German 
proletarian party (in exile). In partibus infidelium—literally: in parts inhabited by 
infidels. The words are added to the title of Roman Catholic bishops holding purely 
nominal’ dioceses in non-Christian countries. - 4 See this volume, pp. 283-84. 

La Hatzfeldt’s assessments of official democracy in Berlin is 
perfectly correct. She doesn’t, of course, come into contact with 
the genuine rank and file, nor, of course, is she familiar with the 
prevailing mood in the pubs—which is better. 

Many thanks for your letter about America.’ If anything of 
importance (military) should happen, you will, I presume, not fail 
to write and Let me have your views about it. From the picture | 
have gained of General Scott—now 76, to boot—from the 
Mexican War” (see Ripley”), I would expect him to make 
tremendous p1unpers—if, that is, the old jackass isn’t supervised by 
others. Above all, slow and irresolute. Incidentally, from the facts 
appearing in the Tribune I see that the North is now speaking 
openly of a slave war and the abolition of slavery.‘ 

Yesterday in the Commons, on the occasion of the Schleswig- 
Holstein affair, Lord Montagu, having previously given notice of 
his intention, raised the matter of Palmerston’s London Protocol 
(on the Danish Succession) of 1850,°4 etc. The Old Man‘ had 
recourse to his usual method. Hardly had Montagu embarked on 
his speech than he was brought up short by a pre-arranged 
count-out of the House. 

On Saturday‘ I have £2 to pay out in rates and should be most 
grateful if you could send this to me. At the beginning of July I shall 
be getting a bit more money. The fact that I have already spent what 
I brought back with me will not surprise you, since, besides the 
debts which occasioned the trip,” nothing has been coming in for 
nearly 4 months, while school and doctor alone ate up nearly £40. 

What’s this about L. Simon, of whom there is some mention in 
the last part of la Hatzfeldt’s letter?**° Was Simon in the 
Landwehr*'? At any rate, you have sinned more than Ludwig 
(who was nowhere in the field, etc.). I don’t understand the 
business. Regards to Lupus. 

Your 
K. M.