Karl Marx to Friedrich Engels 
in Manchester 
London, Friday, 23 September 1859 

I London. 23 Sept. 

Dear Frederic, 

Bad news. It is not clear to me whether this time the matter here can be got 
over. There are very nasty difficulties in the way. 

Your affair is also not clear to me. Leaving the scandal aside – if the 
fellow’s eye is restored, if it can be proved that he offended you first 
and, moreover, that he had already accepted your compromise, etc. – 
then I do not see what he can do much under English law. In London 
you would be sentenced to a fine of 2–5 l.st. at worst. The whole thing 
seems aimed at obtaining money on false pretences. 

In order not to make the situation here still worse, it would be very 
important if I could send “Infantry” to Dana in about 8–10 days. 
Although he said, 15 Sept. will surely still be time and in any case he 
must see the good will. In this matter it is not a question of its being 
deep, but of its being long. 

If, immediately after your arrival in Manchester and after you had 
made inquiries about the “Engländer”, you had departed again, 
perhaps for London, and had let the swine-hound know through a 
third hand that you had gone to the Continent, you could have made 
any arrangement you liked. Perhaps that is still possible, since, as I 
see from Allen etc., all Englishmen now believe in a general amnesty 
on the Continent, and therefore fear that their debtors will quit the 
country. (The Prussian amnesty, by the way, comes on 15 October.) 
Against such a fellow every stratagem of war should be employed. 

Salut 
D 
KMI 

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