Manchester, Monday, 19 May 1851 

Dear Marx, 

I'm glad that nothing untoward happened to the letters, it’s 
always better thus. The postmaster here also gave me a satisfactory 
explanation for the late arrival of the letter. In future, when 
writing the address, put street and number above the name of the 
town, so that ‘Manchester’ is right at the bottom. It’s what the post 
office clerks are used to and, because the name of the street was at 

a Now, dear friend 

the bottom, they overlooked the ‘Manchester’ in that particular 
letter and ent it back to London:as a local London letter. 

The latest is that you have been utterly worsted. You believe you 
have discovered the correct theory-of land rent. You believe you 
are the first to demolish Ricardo’s- theory. Malheureux que tu es, 
you have been outflanked, destroyed, beaten, overwhelmed, the 
whole foundation of your monumentum aere perennius has crum- 
bled away. Hearken: Mr Rodbertus:has just brought out the third 
volume of his Sociale Briefe an v- Kirchmann—18 sheets. This 
volume contains a ‘complete refutation of Ricardo’s doctrine 
of land rent and the exposition of a new theory of rent’—last 
week’s Leipzig Illustrierte Zeitung That’s cooked your goose 
for you! 

The great Kinkel’s efforts to: extricate himself from the 
disreputable society known as the European Committee without 
getting into bad odour are most entertaining.“ You'll have seen in 
Saturday’s Sun* that a handful of wailing democrats have 
succeeded in organising a meeting and some little riors near 
Elberfeld, at which they distributed these proclamations. This was 
made possible through German-Catholic connections*'? of 
Ronge’s. Neither Kinkel nor any other member of the chorus 
would have done anything there. 

The Cavaignac business is unfortunate in all respects; if 
Girardin regards him as having the best prospects, it must be true. 
Besides, the fellows are coming increasingly to realise that a 
revision *° is impossible—by legal means. And, if illegal, it would 
be a coup d’état, and whoever first embarks on coups d’état will be 
crushed, the Débats' declares. Napoleon is beginning to grow 
horriblement threadbare. Changarnier’s done for, permanently 
pensioned off; however nice coalition may be, it can have no 
immediate practical results—il n’y a que Cavaignac Whether or 
not the fellow postpones the revolution would after all be of no 
great moment; a few years of determined industrial development, 
a crisis surmounted and a new era of prosperity could do no harm 
at all, particularly if accompanied by bourgeois reforms in France, 
etc. But in France Cavaignac and bourgeois reform mean tariff 
reform and an alliance with England and, at the first opportunity, 
war against the Holy Alliance,””’ with English help, with due time 

a Wretch that you are - > memorial more enduring than bronze (Horace, Carmina, 
HI, 30, 1) - © Illustrierte Zeitung, No. 410, 10 May 1851. - 4 See this volume, p. 
309. - © The Sun, 17 May 1851. - f ‘France. Paris, 15 May’, Journal des Débats politiques 
et littéraives, 16 May 1851. - § there’s no one but Cavaignac 

to arm, with a Jong prepared invasion of Germany, and that might 
cost us the Rhine frontier which is, in any case, the best means of 
quieting crapaud* socialism with a part-payment in gloire 

The Débats, by the way, has fallen so low that it sees no salvation 
for society except in upholding the new electoral law.**! 

The Faucher and Meyen affair is truly splendid. All I have seen of 
the German Illustrated London News is the front page of the first 
number in a shop window, so J was RATHER Curious to know who the 
‘leading German writers’ of this pompous nonsense might be. 

The Frankfurter Journal purports to have heard from Cologne‘ 
that things are now tolerable for the refugees in London, with the 
exception of those in the barracks, amongst whom is Willich. The 
Augsburg Allgemeine actually believes that the Avtens Bur is still 
in force and pictures the refugees—those Wandering Jews of the 
nineteenth century—creeping round London in mortal terror of 
this Bill. 

I'll say nothing about the Portuguese revolution. Except how 
remarkable it is that, as a purely individual insurgent, as 6te-toi de 
la, Costa Cabral, que je m’y mette,’ Saldanha should have achieved 
absolutely nothing, but that from the moment he was compelled to 
ally himself with the liberal bourgeoisie of Oporto and bring to his 
side an omnipyient representative of this bourgeois power in the 
person of Manuel* Passos, the whole army should then have 
rallied to him. The position accorded to Passos,and what happens 
next, will show whether or not Saldanha and the Queen‘ will 
immediately set about trying to cheat the bourgeoisie again. Lisbon 
is nothing, Oporto being the centre of the constitutional 
bourgeoisie, of Portugal’s Manchester School..”” 

You can thank your stars that Mr Goegg didn’t call on you. Le 
diable emporte toutes ces médiocrités gonflées 

Your 
F. E.