London, 10 May 1883 

Dear Liebknecht, 

If you carry on in this way, causing me unnecessary expenditure 
of ink by the schemes you keep hatching and the ill-considered ac- 
tions you perform off your own bat, our correspondence would 
assuredly cease. 

All I asked you for originally was a reply, telling me what my legal 
position was in regard to Wigand. The 1845 contract envisages a 2nd 
edition and lays down the fee to be paid for it.4° Question: 

1. Am J still bound by this? 

2. Ifso, and if Wigand refuses to print a 2nd edition on the condi- 
tions of payment agreed, does that release me outright? 

I have never been able to get an answer from you to these simple 
questions and, since you promised to obtain one for me, I can only 
describe it as ‘neglect on your part’. 

Never have I instructed you either personally or via a third party 
to act on my behalf, and I cannot conceive why, at this moment, you 
took it into your head to set such a thing in motion off your own bat 
and without even reflecting. J would expressly request that you 

20 14, Engels to Bebel. 10-1! May 1883 

make no move whatever; I should at once write to Wigand and dis- 
claim everything. 

Meissner has written today; makes no mention at all of publication 
instalments.* The contract does not entitle us to interfere here. But if 
Dietz can show Meissner that it is to his own advantage, he may do it 
after all. 

Lafargue’s address: 

66 Boulevard de Port-Royal, Paris (close to Ste-Pélagie, handy for 
a chap going to quod).° 

Photographs will be delivered in batches and sent to Dietz as soon 
as possible.”