ENGELS TO FRIEDRICH ADOLPH SORGE ?!8 


IN HOBOKEN 


London, 8 April 1891 


Dear Sorge, 


Today I am able to send you at long last a few new photographs; 
2 small ones are enclosed herewith and a larger one (a so-called panet) 
is going off registered as a Boox packet. They were taken this February 
and hence give a pretty accurate picture of the present state of affairs. 


@ See this volume, p. 154.-” the fourth German edition of The Origin of the Family, 


Private Property and the State - “ See previous letter. 


166 Engels to Sorge. 8 April 1891! 


As to your course of Banting, gout is a perfectly normal conse- 
quence of an increased consumption of meat, eggs and other nitro- 
genous foodstuffs. In fact the sole function of these is to renew muscu- 
lar flesh and other nitrogenous parts of the body (fibrin, in short all 
albuminous substances) and replace what has been wasted. If, how- 
ever, you take more than is necessary for this purpose, they will be 
burned up in the body as normal nourishment for the replacement of 
body heat; the residue from the burning process consists largely of so- 
called uric acid which may appear in the body in greater quantities 
than can be excreted through the kidneys. In which case the surplus 
either lingers in the muscles or else forms crystals in the joints, and 
this is what is termed rheumatism and gout. You must either get 
more exercise or else change your diet and eat more bread, etc., and 
less meat and eggs. Beer you should certainly shun. 

Thank you for your answer concerning the Avelings. The affair 
was at one time tentatively brought up over here, I no longer know 
by whom, and, lest anything precipitate should be done, I took it 
upon myself to consult you about it.* 

Singer and Bebel have written to me in most affable terms.?}° Your 
German can never get accustomed to the fact that someone in office 
cannot lay claim to being handled more gently than anyone else. 
That, at bottom, is the main reason why offence was taken. Since 
I failed to respond to Liebknecht’s pompous drivel? and took no 
notice whatever of any provocations, Liebknecht may imagine that 
he has won a great victory over me. He is welcome to that pleasure. 
In any case he will edit the Vorwdrts out of existence for them soon 
enough and everyone is grumbling about it. Liebknecht is incorrigi- 
ble and will remain so, to judge by the way he still seems to be conniv- 
ing with Rosenberg in America. The decisive role in the party is de- 
volving more and more upon Bebel and that is an excellent thing. Be- 
bel is a calm, clear-headed thinker, and as a theoretician, too, he is in 
a quite different class from Liebknecht. But one can’t just cast Lieb- 
knecht aside; moreover he still wields a good deal of influence, thanks 
to his expenditure of hot air and the vehemence of his tone at popular 
meetings, hence all these compromises. 

Things are going well over here. Hyndman’s attacks on Aveling 
may cost him very dear. Hyndman is incapable of assessing accu- 
rately his powers relative to what he aims to achieve. He thought he’d 


* See this volume, p. 138. 


Engels to Sorge. 8 April 1891 167 


be able to do Aveling down and now he himself has landed in the 
cart. As a result of the last Trapes Union Congress in Liverpool *’ the 
majority of the London Trapes Councr. '°6 has come round in favour of 
the zécac 8 Hours Day. Hyndman sought to play it off against 
the Lecar 8 Hours Leacur ?°° but his plan miscarried; his Federation was 
represented on the Lecat 8 Hours Committee but he withdrew his dele- 
gates and wrote to the Trapes Counci, demanding 2 separate speakers’ 
platforms for the Federation at the demonstration in the Parx.* But 
the Traprs Councit will probably turn this down flat, as has already 
been done by the 8 Hours Commrrtes, in which case Hyndman will find 
himself between two stools.” Aveling is being accorded votes of confi- 
dence from all the associations he works with, since Hyndman refuses 
to voice his accusations in public debate and will, after May Day, 
doubtless have to change his tactics. Over here he is the only trouble- 
maker who stands in the way. He has shown how useless a prog- 
ramme is — however right it may be theoretically — if it fails to relate 
to the real needs of the people. Though in this instance such people 
are Englishmen, they are almost as far removed from the genuine Eng- 
lish movement as is the Socialist Labor Party in America.'?* The 
movement over here has come into its own by virtue of the new TRapes 
Unions, especially the Gasworkers, and of the agitation in support of 
a LecaL 8 Hours (Eight Hours Bill), the Avelings being in the forefront 
of both. There are, in both these spheres of agitation, many people 
who also belong to the Soctat Democratic Federation. But they are the 
very ones who are wriggling out of Hyndman’s clutches and who re- 
gard the Sociat Democratic Federation as a negligible quantity. And, 
if Hyndman oversteps the mark in his squabble with Aveling, these 
are the very people he may have to reckon with. 

In France, thanks to the split among the Possibilists,* our people 
also have the whip-hand in Paris just now. First the Allemanists °? 
(according to Lafargue they’re in the majority in Paris, but I doubt 
it) and then, eventually, also the Broussists, sent delegates to the May 
Day demonstration committee —i.e. they deigned to comply with 
a Marxist resolution. And, since the Allemanists want to chuck out 
the Broussists, our people find themselves in the position of acting as 
advocates of equal rights for the Broussists!! Best of all, our French- 
men are employing exactly the same tactics vis-a-vis the Possibilists as 


 Hyde Park-° See this volume, pp. 185-86. 


168 Engels to Sorge. 8 April 189) 


those recommended by Marx to the Eisenachers for use vis-a-vis the 
Lassalleans °°! And so far with success. 

The Paris miners’ congress all but broke down over the Belgians’ 
tomfoolery with regard to a GENERAL STRIKE.*?° So as to avoid this the 
English called for a vote on the basis of the number of working men 
represented. That would have given the English all but an absolute 
majority and here the others rebelled. I almost hoped that the Wal- 
loon colliers, who on this occasion were at the bottom of all the non- 
sense about a GENERALSTRIKE, might succeed in bringing about a GENERAL 
srRikE in Belgium in favour of universal suffrage; they would be hope- 
lessly trounced and that would put an end to the nonsense. But the 
others in Germany and France would have to take the consequences. 

Schorlemmer was here for a week; he has grown very susceptible to 
changes in the weather, is contending with bouts of deafness brought 
on by a cold, and ought sometime to spend a winter in a warm cli- 
mate. Sam is in Derbyshire and I expect him any day. But I doubt if 
he’ll do any work while over here, as he must recoup his strength for 
another eighteen months on the Niger. Apparently he finds the cli- 
mate out there very pleasant and grumbles about ours. 

Warm regards to your wife.* 


Your 


F. E. 


The duplicate portrait is for Schliter, to whom please convey my 
regards.