Dear Engels,

I return herewith the cover of the letter I received from you
today. Might it have been opened by Pitt Ermen? You must
éclaircir this matter.

Your post office order arrived most opportunely. And this time
celerity has increased the capital tenfold, like Signore Proudhon’s
railway revenues.*”

As you can imagine, I’m not being idle. And with the avances‘
you are making, I hope to collect what is wanting from various
parts of the world.

I’m not writing to you about the mystére since, cotite que coüte, I
shall be coming in any case to see you at the end of April. I must
get away from here for a week.*”

The worst of it is that I now suddenly find myself hampered in
my work at the library. I am so far advanced that I will have
finished with the whole economic stuff in 5 weeks’ time. Et cela fati,°
I shall complete the political economy at home and apply myself to
another branch of learning at the Museum.’ Ca commence a
m’ennuyer. Au fond this science has made no progress since
A. Smith and D. Ricardo, however much has been done in the
way of individual research, often extremely discerning.

Send me an answer to the question I put to you in my last letter.

As you are now devoting yourself to military science, couldn’t
you embark on a fresh study of the Hungarian campaigns with the
help of the Neue Rheinische Zeitung, Palmerston’s Blue Book," etc.?
Ca serait trés utile’ Sooner or later I shall be bringing out 2
volumes of 60 sheets, and that would fit in splendidly.*”? If you
wish to find out any details about intrigues, battles, personalities,
all you have to do is send me the inquiries in unsealed letters
addressed to Baroness von Beck. I have established contact with
her. She was a spy for Kossuth. And she’s a veritable chronicler of

the Hungarian muck. II faut l’exploiter? She’s too stupid to be able
to conceal the truth. I have done some experiments to find
out.

My wife, alas, has been delivered of a girl, and not a gargon.<
And, what is worse, she’s very poorly.

Enclosed a letter from Daniels, to whom I wrote at length about
his Physiologie’ What little sense there is in his letter is a reflection
of my own to him.*™ At any rate let me have the scrawl back and
tell me what you think of it.

Your
K. M.

You would, by the way, oblige me if, dans les circonstances
actuelles, you wrote to me as often as possible. As you know, my
acquaintanceship here is confined plus ou moins‘ to stupid
youngsters.