{London,] 13 December 1859 
9 Grafton Terrace, Maitland Park, 
Haverstock Hill 

Dear Engels, 

My BEST THANKS FoR THE £5. You can imagine how opportune it was, 
for in a day or two my wife has to pay an instalment to some fellow at 

a Ch. Darwin, On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection.... 

the County Courr. Yesterday I attempted one last ramny coup which 
may, perhaps, succeed. In which case there would be a chance of our 
being able to breathe again. 

In Russia the movement is progressing better than anywhere 
else in Europe. On the one hand the constitutionalism of the 
aristocracy versus the Tsar, on the other of the peasants versus the 
aristocracy. Moreover, having at long last realised that the Poles 
have not the least inclination to be dissolved in Slav-Russian 
nationality, Alexander blustered frightfully. Thus the extraordi- 
nary successes of Russian diplomacy during the past 15 years, 
notably since 1849, are more than counter-balanced. Come the 
next revolution and Russia will oblige by joining in. 

You have, I imagine, read Bonaparte’s uneasy document 
addressed to the préfets in which he demands that exact returns be 
made of, inter alia, all respectable Orleanists,'* Legitimists,*” 
republicans and _ socialists, but more especially of ‘reliable’ 
Bonapartists? 

From the enclosed note you will see that that louse, Juch— 
Proprietor Of the Hermann—feels entitled to approach me about 
the Stieber affair.”’’ The rotten swine had deleted from Eichhoff’s 
denunciation of Stieber in the Hermann’ everything relating to our 
trial,” the ‘small, insignificant party’ being alluded to only en 
passant. I shall give the low scoundrel a proper dressing-down 
while, of course, doing everything in my power to damage that 
rascal Stieber. Eichhoff, by the by, was simply a tool where all 
these Stieber revelations were concerned. The business originated 
with ex-policeman Duncker in Berlin, whose removal in 1848 was 
largely brought about by Stieber’s yapping from the democratic 
camp. From then on Duncker got his private police to watch 
Stieber’s every step until he finally thought the moment had come 
for him to be kicked out. Furthermore, that ass Eichhoff was 
stupid enough to show his ass’s ears in his last article from Berlin 
in the Hermann, in which HE WOUND. UP HIS DENUNCIATIONS AGAINST 
STIEBER—WITH WHAT? WITH THE REQUEST OF THE RESTITUTIO IN INTEGRUM OF 
virtuous Police Superintendent Duncker.° 

Nothing but fools and rapscallions, all these chaps, against 
whom Freiligrath bears no grudge, even if they do ‘take liberties 
with his name’. 

a [K. W. Eichhoff,] ‘Stieber’, Hermann, Nos. 36-38, 40, 42 and 43; 10, 17, 
24 September and 8, 22 and 29 October 1859. - > [K. W. Eichhoff,] ‘Berlin, 8. Nov. 
(Stieber)’, Hermann, No. 45, 12 November 1859.