[London,] 31 July 1865 

Dear Engels, 

As you may have suspected, the reasons for my prolonged 
silence are not the most pleasant. 

For two months I have been living solely on the pawnshop, 
which means that a queue of creditors has been hammering on my 
door, becoming more and more unendurable every day. This ract 
won’t come as any surprise to you when you consider: 1. that I 
have been unable to earn a rartuinc the whole time and 2. that 
merely paying off the debts and furnishing the house cost me 
something like £500. I have kept accounts (as To THIs ITEM) PENCE for 
pence, aS I myself found it unbelievable how the money disap- 
peared. To top that, I have been sent every conceivable, 
antediluvian IOU from Germany where God knows what rumours 
had been circulated. 

To begin with, I wanted to come up to you to discuss the matter 
with you in person. But, at the present moment, any time lost 
cannot be made up as it is not good to interrupt my work. Last 
Saturday I told the Sub-Committee of the ‘Internationat’?! that I 
was going away, so as at least to have a fortnight for once 
completely free of disturbance for pushing on with my work. 

I assure you that I would rather have had my thumb cut off 
than write this letter to you. It is truly soul-destroying to be 
dependent for half one’s life. The only thought that sustains me in 
all this is that the two of us form a partnership together, in which 
I spend my time on the theoretical and party side of the susiness. It 
is true my house is beyond my means, and we have, moreover, 
lived better this year than was the case before. But it is the only 
way for the children to establish themselves socially with a view to 
securing their future, quite apart from everything they have 
suffered and for which they have at least been compensated for a 
brief while. I believe you yourself will be of the opinion that, even 
from a merely commercial point of view, to run a_ purely 
proletarian household would not be appropriate in the cir- 

@ The letter bears the stamp: International Working Men’s Association / Central 
Council / London. 

cumstances, although that would be quite all right, if my wife and 
I were by ourselves or if the girls were boys. 

Now, regarding my work, I will tell you the plain truth about it. 
There are 3 more chapters to be written to complete the 
theoretical part (the first 3 books). Then there is still the 4th book, 
the historical-literary one,”’ to be written, which will, comparative- 
ly speaking, be the easiest part for me, since all the problems have 
been resolved in the first 3 books, so that this last one is more by 
way of repetition in historical form. But I cannot bring myself to 
send anything off until I have the whole thing in front of me. 
WHATEVER SHORTCOMINGS THEY MAY HAVE, the advantage of my writings is 
that they are an artistic whole, and this can only be achieved 
through my practice of never having things printed until I have 
them in front of me in their entirety. This is impossible with Jacob 
Grimm’s method which is in general better with writings that have 
no dialectical structure.” 

The English version will be dealt with differently on the other 
hand. Fox has no doubt that he can find me a publisher as soon as 
I get the first sheets of print back. I would then arrange with 
Meissner that, in addition to the proofs for correcting, he would 
also send me the clean proof of each sheet, so that the German 
could be corrected at the same time as it is being translated into 
English. Regarding the latter, I shall of course need your 
assistance. I am expecting my real earnings from this work to 
come from the English edition.”° 

As far as the ‘Inrernationat’ is concerned, the position is as 
follows: 

I made over the £5 to Cremer to buy shares in The Bee-Hive. 
But since Cremer, Odger, etc., were going up to Manchester at 
that time, nothing came of it, and Potter wap THE better or 17.7” 
They decided to postpone the matter until the next meeting of 
shareholders (actually, the annual one). But I don’t think that 
anything will come of it. Firstly, because the squabble between 
Odger and Potter has become a public scandal. Secondly, because 
The Miner and Workman’s Advocate has offered its columns to us.””° 
(Apropos. At a recent meeting with the Miner we undertook to let 
it have contributions gratis. So, if you have time to write a little 
article on foreign poitics (Prussian, etc.), now and then, send it to 
me to be passed on to the paper.) 

According to our Rules a public congress ought to be held in 
Brussels this year. The Parisians, Swiss and some of the people 
here, too, are going for it hammer and tongs. In the present 
circumstances—especially since I have so little time to write the 

necessary documents for the Centrat Counc. as well—I can only 
foresee a disgrace. Despite considerable opposition from the other 
side, I have succeeded in turning the public congress in Brussels 
into A PRIVATE PREALABLE CONFERENCE in London (25 September) which 
only DELEGATES OF THE ADMINISTRATIVE Committees Will attend and at which 
the future congress is to be prepared. Official reasons given for 
postponing the congress were: 

1. The need for preaLaBLe UNDERSTANDING between the £executive 
COMMITTEES. 

2. The obstacles to the Association’s propaganda arising from 
the srrixes in France, the elections, REFORM MOVEMENT aNd WORKINGMEN’S 
EXHIBITIONS IN Encianp.”?! 

3. The avien Bite RECENTLY pressed in Belgium” 
Brussels as a renpezvous for an International Workingmen’S ConcREss. 

I do not see the Social-Demokrat any more, as the Workers’ 
Society has also stopped it.7”’ Nor am I taking the Nordstern any 
more, but I do see it occasionally at the Society. It said the 
Rhineland branches had on the main question deserted Bernhard.” 

Edgar‘ is a very expensive guest for us, especially in the present 
circumstances, and he does not seem in the least inclined to pecamp. 

In consequence of the hot weather and related biliousness, I 
have again been vomitting nearly every day for the past 3 months, 
as I did previously in Brussels. 

Salut. 

? which rules out 

217 

Your 
K. M.