MARX TO ADOLF CLUSS'”’ 

{London, 7 and about 15 May 1852] 

... Herewith you will find a wrapper, in which the contemptible, 
craven, half-crazed Tellering mailed his defamatory opus. (Ad- 
dress:) CHartes Marx, THE Future Dictator or Germany.'? Now I ask 
you, what is to be done with the cur? To start a public row with a 
lunatic of this sort would be doing him too much honour and is 
the whole object of his manoeuvre. Could you not send the 
MANIAC’s Wrapper to the New York postal service in my name? Or 
might not a sound thrashing be the simplest course? I leave the 
whole thing to you. Naturally any packages of the kind will in 
future be returned. But by indulging in this sort of gutter-snipe’s 
trick, the cur also brings me to the notice of the English police, 
which, under the Tories, is far from pleasant... 

Ad vocem* Szemere: I am not by nature inclined to be unduly 
trusting, least of all when it comes to the official great men of 
1848/49. But in Szemere’s case, it’s quite a different matter. I am 
correcting the German translation—for he originally wrote in 
Hungarian—of his ‘character-sketches’.” Every line betrays a 
superior intellect, and the rage of the democrats may be attributed 
to the CONTEMPT AND Mockery-System Which he employs with supreme 
skill. Although, of course, in accordance with the Hungarian line, 
he places, as in Antiquity, ‘the fatherland and the citizen’ above all 
else, his writing is imbued with a fundamentally critical spirit. A 
man who thinks and writes in this way is no Austrian agent. As for 
the ‘Peer Cotone. Wess’, he was negotiating with him without 
knowing who he was, but broke off as soon as he was informed 
what was afoot. The story of his fortune is very simple. Szemere 
himself does not possess a centime. But his wife is the daughter of 
a (now deceased) Austrian ‘Hof-agent’ (as the Austrian Procureurs 
du roi° are called in Hungary); her old man possessed a fortune of 
a million. Throughout the 1848/49 revolution Mrs Szemere lived 
in Vienna with her mother. He had even ordered her to refrain 
from writing to him and to sever all ties with him until the old 

a As to-> B. Szemere, Graf Ludwig Batthyény, Arthur Gorgei, Ludwig Kossuth. 
Politische Charakterskizzen aus dem Ungarischen Freiheitskriege. - © King’s prosecutors 

woman’s death, when she could collect her fortune. His old 
mother-in-law died at the end of 1849 and Mrs Szemere, who was, 
of course, in no way suspect, surreptitiously sold all her 
worldly goods and turned them into cash. In this she was 
aided by the minister, Bach, her father’s lawyer, who seized on this 
opportunity and surreptitiously took his cut. Once her fortune was 
liquid, Mrs Szemere converted it into bills on London and English 
stocks, obtained a passport authorising her to visit the water-cure 
doctor, Priessnitz, in Prussia, but instead travelled to London and 
thence to her husband in Paris. Those Austrians, however, could 
lay their hands on nothing with which to gladden their Exchequer. 
Well, what does all this prove? That Szemere is much too astute to 
make his enemies a present of a million. I have written to Sz. 
himself, telling him that, without mentioning Kossuth, he should 
make a statement about his personal circumstances which I shall 
get into the New-York Tribune for him. 

The Austrian spies are in Kossuth’s immediate entourage, 
notably Madame Pulszky. This Count Pulszky is a Galician Jew by 
origin. Madame Pulszky, daughter of an ultra-reactionary Jewish 
banker in Vienna, writes to her mater each week, and from this 
source the Austrian government finds out anything it wants. It 
may even be asked whether Count and Countess Pulszky (The 
Times regularly derided both these individuals for the assumprion 
of their title)* have not promised to lure Mr Kossuth into the 
snare in the hope that they may thereby retrieve their confiscated 
land. It is known for a fact that as a student, Pulszky denounced 
his comrades’ demagogic activities °° to the Austrian government... 

Enclosed you will find General Klapka’s declaration of princi- 
ples, from which you will see that he, too, is starting to rebel 
against Kossuth. The last part of the document means nothing 
more than that Klapka is going to participate in Mazzini’s 
projected coup. I have, if I am not mistaken, already written to 
you about the plans for a coup hatched by Messrs Mazzini, 
Kossuth, etc. Nothing could be more welcome to the great powers, 
especially Bonaparte, and nothing more damaging to ourselves. 

I have just received a letter from Cologne, dated 3 May.” They 
are asking for 200 or 250 copies of the Brumaire. So pray ask 
Weydemeyer to send me forthwith 300 copies via Engels. At the 
same time, he should advise me of the selling price. I take it that 
he has already dispatched the 50 copies as promised...'"! 

4 The Times, No. 20955, 10 November 1851, leader. - > Bermbach’s letter to Marx 
of 3 May 1852; the original has 11 May. 

To return to Klapka’s document. I would beg you to keep it 
secret for the time being. It was given me in confidence, but with 
permission to publish it. I shall send it to the New York Tribune, 
and I do not want it to come into circulation before then... 

Jones’ srampep paver has come out and the first number has sold 
surprisingly well. I enclose a cutting from the Notes* from which 
you will see that he has knocked Harney out completely. Mr 
Harney is proceeding down the primrose path. One article in his 
paper, signed Spartacus,” attacks Chartism for being only a cuass 
MOVEMENT which ought to be replaced by A GENERAL AND NATIONAL 
MOVEMENT, genuine Mazzinian hot air, etc., etc., etc.... 

Extracts from the Cologne letter *: 

‘Recently Mrs Daniels was favoured yet again with a domiciliary visit in the 
certain expectation that it would yield a letter from you. The Prussian police seem 
to be as putty in the hands of the first jackass to come along. The prisoners’ case 
seems to be approaching its conclusion. The examination has been concluded and, 
for over two months, the files have been back in the possession of the local public 
prosecutor at the Court of Appeal where, however, they seem incapable of 
deciding upon the wording of a petition to the Board of indicting magistrates. It is 
generally rumoured that the thing will be dealt with before a special Court of 
Assizes in June.’ 

Apropos. Ask Weydemeyer if he has yet been to see Dana, who 
is waiting for him to pass on the information I sent him about the 
situation of the Cologne prisoners and the conduct of the Prussian 
government, before writing a Leaver on the subject. He mustn’t 
for God’s sake fail to.do this, if it can possibly be helped. 

If you manage to bring out Freiligrath’s poem against Kinkel et 
Comp* as a broadsheet, you will have an assured sale of 500 copies 
in the Rhineland alone. But the thing must be done quickly. 
Otherwise it will be trop tard! 

Do not allow the articles, etc., in your possession to age so much 
that they lose their bouquet. If you can’t get them printed 
(Eccarius, Engels, etc.),' give them to some paper or other, e.g. 
the Turn-Zeitung, as you think fit. In any case, it is better they 
should be read than left unread. 

If you can’t get Freiligrath’s poem printed, give it to whatever 

4 {E. Jones,] ‘Current Notes’, The People’s Paper, No. 1, 8 May 1852. - > Spartacus 
[pseudonym of W. J. Linton], “The Sense of the Country’, The Star of Freedom, 
No. 1, 8 May 1852. - © Below is an extract from Bermbach’s letter to Marx of 3 
May 1852. - 4 New-York Daily Tribune, No. 3446 of 4 May 1852 used this material 
for its leader ‘Justice of Prussia’. See also this volume, p. 115. - © F. Freiligrath, ‘An 
Joseph Weydemeyer’, I and II. - f too late 

newspaper you think best.’* If, as a party, we make no effort to be 
quick off the mark, we shall always arrive post festum...* 

Few mortals, other than yourself, can boast of having received 
letters from me on 4 successive mail days; but I was anxious to 
show Papa Lupus which of us two is the more punctilious...