{Manchester, 5-6 November,] 1852,° Friday 

Dear Marx, 

I am glad to hear that I am not the only sufferer. Strohn was 
here yesterday and the day before which, of course, meant some 
hard drinking; he left at three this morning and will have sailed 
today, I hope. For me this was the coup de grace and means that 
today I shall be no good at all. For the same reason you won’t get 
a translation today, not that it matters, since there’s bound to be 
some steamer or other from Southampton which the thing’ can go 
by and there certainly won’t be even a Speech from the Throne in 
Parliament before the 11th. 

4 B. Szemere, Graf Ludwig Batthydny, Arthur Gérgei, Ludwig Kossuth... - K. Marx, 
‘Movements of Mazzini and Kossuth.—League with Louis Napoleon.— 
Palmerston’. - € The year was added later by Engels. - 4 K. Marx, ‘Attempts to 
Form a New Opposition Party’. 

So the documents, including the original of Stieber’s letter,’ 
arrived safely. Things will liven up once the gallant Public 
Prosecutor has done. One might strain one’s faculties to the 
utmost, yet never succeed in producing inanities such as those 
uttered by Seckendorf. Because Engels has stated in print that the 
best communists made the most courageous soldiers,” it follows 
that Burgers must be convicted of conspiracy. What the cross- 
examination evidently implies is that the accused harboured the 
intent—suspect de suspicion d’incivisme‘—hence that it is a matter of 
perfect indifference whether or not the accused belongs to the 
League“ —in other words, Mr Seckendorf, despairing of a verdict 
against Daniels and Co., positively invites the jury to acquit 
Burgers and Roéser too! To have become so utterly addle-pated, 
the fellow must have been swilling strong BRANDY AND WATER every 
evening for at least a week. Nowhere in all this mummery is there 
a single word ro rue purpose. Incidentally, ever since the presiding 
judge released particulars of the cross-examination, I have not 
for a moment doubted Burgers’ and the others’ acquittal. Neither 
his plaintive manifesto’ nor his circular tour could possibly be 
transmogrified into an ‘enterprise’ whereby the constitution, etc.” 
Or are the annals of history to read thus: “In May 1851, at the 
time the Crystal Palace**’ was opened in London, the tailor 
Nothjung travelled from Berlin to Leipzig in order to overthrow 
the Prussian constitution and start a civil war.’ In any case, the 
minute book has been set aside and, from Strohn’s account, some © 
of the jurymen are quite decent, namely v. Rath, v. Bianca, Leven, 
Leiden, Herstadt and one other. 

I also believe that, in view of the way the case is turning out, we 
ought at all costs to publish something. But it would be advisable, 
if not essential, for Schneider and one of the accused to come over 
to London after the trial, in which case I should arrange to come 
up there for a Saturday and Sunday. Then, when all has been 
discussed, you could go back with me and the manuscript could be 
ready within a few days. Meanwhile, write to old Ebner, asking 

@ See this volume, pp. 225-26. - > Engels refers to the words ‘the most resolute 
Communists made the most courageous soldiers’ in his work The Campaign for the 
German Imperial Constitution (see present edition, Vol. 10, p. 226). - © under 
suspicion of suspected civic disloyalty - 4 the Communist League - © Gébel - ! The 
Manifesto of the Cologne Central Authority of the Communist League of 
1 December 1850 drawn up by Bürgers and others. The text of the Manifesto was 
confiscated during the arrest of the Communist League members and published in 
the Dresdner Journal und Anzeiger, No. 171, 22 June and the Kélnische Zeitung, 
No. 150, 24 June 1851. 

him whether he couldn’t place this little pamphlet with Lowen- 
thal—so far as I am concerned, we could go halves with him, both as 
regards profits and losses. 

As for Bangya, the most immediate case against him necessarily 
falls to the ground if it is established that he did not address the 
last letter but one to Kothes.* I was completely flabbergasted when 
Dronke said in his letter that it was Bangya who had addressed the 
last letter but one, i.e. the last letter to have arrived safely. How did 
the fiévreuse” little man come to invent such a story? But the 
Collmann business looks fishy too.” This letter of Collmann’s is 
written in exactly the same hand as the earlier ones from 
Fisermann‘; I shall send it back to you tomorrow, but it seems to 
me that we ought to hold on to it. Il y a la un faux Before long we 
shall know through Weerth what is the matter with Collmann‘*; in 
the meantime you should ask Bangya to explain how Mr Collmann 
comes to be writing under a false name, etc., and why ‘the man’, 
and what man, died, and how it is that he has now suddenly come 
to life again. And find out from Mr Bangya the name of ‘the 
commission agent’ in London whom he ‘knows’ according to one 
of the letters. And, so that Dronke may also have something to do, 
get him to make inquiries with a German bookseller about 
Collmann. 

It is most odd that all the letters should arrive by carrier; there’s 
never a postmark on them, and their tone is always so perfunctory 
and nonchalant that one can’t help smelling a rat. This one again 
has been written from ‘a friend’s at an inn’. None of this seems at 
all Businesslike, any more than does the absurd evasion that it is his 
business when the manuscript’ should be published. Enough. 
Even if in this instance Bangya is acting as honourably as can be 
expected of a mendacious Slav, it nevertheless seems to me that 
his friend in Berlin is an archscoundrel. Now, however, everything 
should be cleared up since Mr C. figures here as the immediate 
owner of the manuscript, and also as publisher. If there is no 
bookseller of this name, that clinches the matter. 

Anyway, the notion that a publisher can leave a manuscript 
lying in his drawer for years is a novel one and hardly smacks of 
the book-trade. To my mind, that story about the children’s books 
is also a popcr;in England such muck never comes out at Christmas 
time. Moreover, it is written in such a vague and disjointed way 

4 See this volume, pp. 216 and 232. - > feverish - © See this volume, pp. 237 and 
256. -4 There’s a forgery there. - ¢ See this volume, pp. 251-52.-/ K. Marx 
and F. Engels, The Great Men of the Exile. 

that Bangya could not possibly infer a firm order from it. Nor 
does one write at an inn on such rotten paper, which looks more 
likely to come from a Prussian government office. Enfin, nous 
verrons.” 

However, I myself can’t possibly write to Bangya at this point, 
since I have no details of what happened between you and him, 
what he said to you, what other letters he may have shown you, 
etc. But we’ve got him now. 

Saturday, 6 November 

For physical reasons I did not manage to send off the foregoing 
yesterday. Since then I have read another ‘Stieberiad’ in the 
Kélnische Zeitung.” So the original minute-book has been dropped 
and in its stead H. Liebknecht has risen from the dead in the 
shape of a cash receipt. Monsieur Hirsch and company—for there 
must be a number of them—seem to have well and truly done the 
stupid Prussian police out of a lot of money. Il valait bien la peine, 
their sending a police lieutenant? to London merely to find 
themselves imposed upon in this manner and, on top of that, 
fobbed off with the information about the most secret meeting at 
your house.”*! 

But what is all this about Dronke’s friend, Fleury, whom we 
here find openly and unequivocally described as a police spy? This 
will deflect some of the little man’s wrath from Bangya. It would 
also seem that someone has blabbed about Stieber’s letter, not that 
it matters; the way Stieber himself is drawing attention to this 
document and speaking of ‘infamous calumnies’ can only serve to 
enhance its effect. 

Weerth is in Liverpool and will not be back for several hours so 
that I shall have to hold on to the letters from Schneider and 
Bangya* until tomorrow. 

‘By his own admission, Bürgers worked for the Neue Rheinische Zeitung’ 

That, of course, is enough to send him to the gallows. ’'ve never 
heard anything like it before. 

a Anyway, we shall see. - > ‘Assisen-Procedur gegen D. Herm. Becker und 
Genossen. Anklage wegen hochverratherischen Complottes’, Kélnische Zeitung, 
No. 283, 4 November 1852. - © It was hardly worth the trouble. - 4 Goldheim - 
© See this volume, p. 237. - f ‘Assisen-Procedur gegen D. Herm. Becker und 
Genossen...’ 

This evening, no doubt, the Kélnische Zettung will bring the first 
news that the tide has turned. The lawyers were perfectly right to 
keep everything back, if only they now really put their shoulders 
to the wheel. 

Your 
F. E. 

Don’t forget to send me by return copies of Freiligrath’s poems 
about Kinkel.* We have already people in Bradford who want to 
ask him to read them aloud. 

Hirsch must still be here, at least, he was positivement here last 
week, for I saw him at the Athenaeum.” Another chap who is the 
spit image of him was here as well and this confused me at first. 
Perhaps he has a post here, or is looking for one? By the way, 
when you were last here” we met a fellow once in Broughton 
who cried ‘Good morning, Marx’, and we couldn’t place him. It 
was Hirsch! So the fellow goes ‘on tour’. As soon as the trial is 
over, he must be given a good drubbing.