London, 27 December 1891 

Dear Baron, 

A line or two in haste. I have fallen very far behind with everything 
as a result of a five-day fog which (abetted by tippling) has again af- 
fected my eyes somewhat and, on top of that, the following extras: 

1. Proof correction of the English Condition of the Working-Class,* 
of which so far 6 sheets remain unread. 

2. Revision of Aveling’s translation of Entwicklung des Sozialis- 
mus, which has got to be done properly; since I live in the place of 
publication I shall ineluctably be held responsible for every slip. 

3. The colossal amount of correspondence, swollen by the festive 
season. 

Not to mention a working day greatly curtailed by having to spare 
my eyes. 

You will understand that, since work on Volume III * must be re- 
sumed as soon as possible and thereafter continued without interruption 
until finished, I shall only be able to run through your ms.*’° very 
cursorily, but what can be done I shall gladly do. 

The new things about exchange value and value in the third edi- 
tion of Capital’ derive from handwritten addenda of Marx’s, of 
which unfortunately there are very few, while such as there are were 
elaborated in the very difficult circumstances of illness. Marx spent 
a long time searching for the mot juste and made a lot of corrections. 

So far as Fireman °°° is concerned, it is certainly quite plausible 
that, iff ='/, ='/3 = '/, = '/s, etc., occurs in practice, then one fraction 
or another should correspond to the proportion whereby profit and sur- 
plus value coincide (crudely speaking, for it is also subject to all man- 
ner of reservations}. However, the chap is nevertheless to be commend- 

* F. Engels, The Condition of the Working-Class in England in 1844.-" F. Engels, Socia- 
lism: Utopian and Scientific.-° of Capital-? K. Marx, Das Kapital. Kritik der politi- 
schen Oekonomie. Erster Band. Buch I: Der Produktionsprocess des Kapitals. Dritte 
vermehrte Auflage, Hamburg, 1883. 

ed for having lighted on this idea. If he is agreeable, please send me 
his paper. It will, indeed, have to remain closeted in my desk until 
such time as I write the preface to Volume III,* at which point, provid- 
ed it is really worth the trouble, 1 shall be able to accord it a place 
alongside other attempted solutions. I can do no more and with that 
Schmidt, too, was content.?°! If he doesn’t like it, let him publish his 
paper and see what happens. 

That poor R. Meyer should be reduced to taking refuge with us is 
almost tragic. Poor previ, in addition to bad luck and diabetes, he has 
found out just what his conservative friends, wherever they may be, 
are like.%? 

Having boxed Gilles’ ears, Aveling is in even less of a position to re- 
ply to his flysheets. Gilles doesn’t of course publish that kind of filth in 
the press over here, and no one could expect Aveling to sue him for .i- 
BEL and spend several hundred pounds on bringing a law-suit only to 
see Gilles vanish into thin air on the eve of the proceedings. Labou- 
chére, when accused of tipeL, was asked by defending counsel: ‘Have you 
EVER BROUGHT AN ACTION FOR LIBEL?’ ‘No,’ came the reply, ‘I Never was SUCH 
aroot.’ Whereat judge and lawyers alike pronounced him one of the 
leading authorities ON THE LAW OF LIBEL. 

The Berliners, or Liebknecht at any rate, have made fools of us 
over the compositors’ strike.4° Mr Doblin, who came over here on 
behalf of the compositors, bearing letters of introduction from Lieb- 
knecht to everyone you can think of save Ede and myself, has not only 
ignored the German party over here, but has treated it de haut en bas” 
and denigrated it, at any rate in a negative sense. At Burns’ he said the 
party had done nothing whatever for them, whereas it had in fact donat- 
ed 20,000 marks. And when Sanders who was there asked him 
whether the entire party press hadn’t backed them up, he was forced 
to admit that it had. And then Liebknecht writes '5% asking me to do 
everything I can for the compositors, but omitting to tell me what he 
and the party have done and not so much as mentioning the fact that 
one of the chaps’ representatives is over here. In the circumstances 
I could not, of course, do anything — after all, it was only through the 
English press that I learnt what was afoot and I wasn’t a fool as 
to impose myself on a man who had carefully shunned the party and 
dealt with the Trapses Councit! direct. This, as you can imagine, 
was grist to the Hyndman-Gilles mill—‘Now you can sce,’ they say, 

b 

* In the ms: of the third edition- ° with contempt 

‘that there’s nothing whatever behind the much vaunted German 
party. Even the workers don’t want to have anything to do with it 
and say it’s no good.’ And only this week we see the fruits thereof in 
the Justice in which Gilles publicly sides with the Independents.’ 94% 
A piece of good luck, as it happens, for it means that Hyndman will 
compromise himself and put his foot in it just as he did of yore with 
Brousse & Co, 

The German bosses will be fools ifthey don’t now introduce linotype 
machines which are increasingly being used by all the big newspapers 
both here and in New York. 

Burns was horrified to learn that the compositors are given 21 M 
a week strike pay whereas here it’s never more than 10 or 15sh. at the 
outside. 

When the compositors sent someone over here, our Berlin chaps 
should either have insisted that he act in concert with Ede, the Ger- 
man party’s representative here, or else have refused to co-operate. 
The party is no longer under any compulsion to throw itself at the 
heads of these aristocrats of the working class. 

Last Sunday? Ede was burgled and lost £10, as you may already 
have heard. His nerves are in a very bad state and he needs rest and 
fresh air. 

Thanks for your good wishes. Our entire household, including Tid- 
lums, wish you and your wife‘ and your son“ the best of health and 
happiness in the coming year. Tidlums has grown into a large, majes- 
tic tomcat, the sultan of all the female cats in Regent’s Park Road 
and the terror of all competitors and rivals. 

Your 
F. Engels