Manchester, 16 January 1868 

Dear Moor, 

I have just discovered that I have left all your letters at home in 
another coat-pocket (including the last letter from your chief 
HONOURABLE SECRETARY * for which I express special thanks) and so I 
shall have to reply from memory. 

You received the Courriers frangais and also the Wiener Tagblatt 
yesterday. 

I am sending you the Prussian report,’ with special explanations. 
Or rather it is only necessary to look at the sketch contained 
therein on the positions on the evening of June 28th in order to 
see that Benedek had brought together 6 corps (not counting 
cavalry) in an area of 2 square miles, faced by the Crown Prince‘ 
with only the 5th Corps and 1 brigade of the 6th Corps. If, on the 
29th, Benedek had attacked Steinmetz (5th Corps), the latter 
would have been thrown back across the mountains on to the 6th 
Corps, and on the 30th Benedek would have been able to attack 
the Guards and the Ist Corps at his leisure with at least 4 corps 
and throw them back, apres quoi* the cautious Frederick Charles 
would have taken great care not to act unrestrainedly. Frederick 
Charles had 5 corps and would have been faced by at least 6; the 
order for them to retreat was, however, certain as soon as the 3 
individual columns of the Crown Prince had been beaten, and 
thereby the campaign would have acquired a completely different 
character. That the Austrians would finally have been beaten, if 
the Prussians had shown some care, is clear from a comparison of 
the figures. But the Prussian rabble would have been forced to 
cast aside their lousy system, and it would not have been the 
reorganisation and Bismarck who triumphed, but the people. 

Cluseret (who, of course, played the Fenian in London as 
well) is even wilder than the Germans with his militia plan. The 
American war’!—with militia on both sides—proves nothing 
except that the militia system demands enormous sacrifices of 

a Laura Marx (see this volume, p. 583) - > Der Feldzug von 1866 in Deutschland... - 
© Frederick William - 4 after which 

19* 

money and men, since the organisation only exists on paper. What 
would have happened to the Yankees if they had been faced, not 
by the Southern militia, but by a standing army of a few 100,000 
men? Before the North could have organised itself this army 
would have been in New York and Boston and would have 
dictated peace with the help of the Democrats, whereupon the 
West could have played at secession. The fellow makes a good 
joke when he suggests that what really counts are good officers 
and the confidence of the men in the officers—two things that 
simply cannot be achieved with the militia system. What impresses 
people everywhere about the militia system is the great mass of 
men obtained at once, and the relative ease of training them, 
particularly in the face of the enemy. This last point is nothing 
new, old Napoleon was able to lead recruits of three months in 
formation to face the enemy; but this demands good cadres, and 
for this purpose something different from the Swiss-American 
militia system. When the war ended, the Yankees still had very 
imperfect cadres. Following the introduction of the breech-loader, 
the time of the pure militia is really at an end. This does not mean 
that [not] every rational military organisation lies somewhere in 
the middle between the Prussian and the Swiss—but where? This 
depends on the circumstances in each case. Only a society set up 
and educated communistically can come very close to the militia 
system, and even then asymptotically. 

With regard to the Viennese papers, I am in some embarrass- 
ment’; I do, of course, see the Neue Freie Presse from time to time, 
but the whole area is rather too alien for me. What are your ideas 
on the subject, also with regard to the Fortnightly? The business 
is worth the trouble of thorough consideration. 

I hope you are sitting again, and have had no further volcanic 
outbreaks. Gumpert laughs at your antipathy to arsenic, says that 
it is just the thing to make you sprightly and is convinced there is 
no better remedy for you. But if you are flatly opposed to it, then 
you should take acids, and that constantly, so once again he 
encloses a prescription for the aqua regia prescribed before, and 
this you really will take. 

Best wishes to your wife and the girls, ditto Lafargue. 

Your 
F. E. 

a See this volume, pp. 512, 515. 

Alberich, the strong dwarf,* I hereby greet most humbly on his 
birthday and empty a glass of beer to his health at this instant. 
They forgot about the corron at the factory so I shall only be able 
to send it tomorrow.