[London,] 27 July 1854 
28 Dean Street, Soho 

Dear Engels, 

Je vous attends* for Tuesday.** How very boastful Mr Herbert 
was. This same Herbert was Vorontsov’s brother-in-law and at the 
same time English Secretary at War. The way the English brag as 
though Nasmyth and Butler had held Silistria ‘single-handed’ is 
grotesque. Have you read about Monday evening’s session, when 
Disraeli so neatly punctured trie John’s” and the Times’ ‘Sevas- 
topol’ Busse with one prick of the needle? *”? 

I am, hélas,° once again saddled with Pieper who looks like a 
HALF-STARVED Sucking pig seethed in milk, after having lived for a 
fortnight with a whore he describes as un bijou. He has frittered 
away some £20 in a fortnight and now both his purses are equally 
depleted. In this heat it is a bore to have the fellow hanging 
around one du matin jusqu’au soir et du soir jusqu’au matin. And it 
disrupts one’s work. 

On Saturday‘ I got the following note from Papa Tucker: 

* ‘Dear Sir, There is a pretty brisk demand for the “Fly-Sheets” 54! just now. 
Could you send me some articles from the Tribune that could suit the taste of the 

public? The third on Palmerston would move the other two.8 Faithfully Yours 
E. Tucker.’ * 

Incidentally I have also heard from Freiligrath that that rogue 
Triibner is advertising these ‘Fly-Sheets’ under his imprint. You 
will note that he asks for ‘articles From THE Tribune’ in order once 
AGAIN to evade the question of money. Now, 1. So far as he is 
concerned, not one copy of the Tribune is to be had anywhere in 
London, since it is sent only to subscribers and back numbers 
cannot even be ordered from New York; 2. Without substantial 
additions, none of the articles would now suit. Now I must clear 
up the matter with the fellow and this ‘easy-going’ relationship 

2 Y expect [something from] you - Lord John Russell - © alas - ¢ a jewel - © from 
morning to night and night to morning - ! 22 July - 8 A reference to the third, 
fourth and fifth articles from Marx’s Lord Palmerston which were published as two 
separate pamphlets. 

must end. If he is agreeable, and you for your part approve, I 
would suggest the following: 

1. Of the Tribune articles, I shall give him (for publication) the 
critique of the ‘Secret Correspondence’.* For this Dronke would only 
have to send me the 2nd article on this, which was detained by the 
Post Office here. The latter gratis, 2 and 3 to be paid for in cash 
and on delivery of the MSS, namely. 

2. A General pamphlet on Palmerston, beginning with my 
introduction in the Tribune” to which I should, however, add a 
new middle and ending. 

3. A pamphlet that I would have to write in collaboration with 
you, i.e. on England’s diplomacy and MILITARY ACTION since war was 
declared. The articles which have appeared in the Tribune will 
provide us with material for both these aspects. If you agree to 3, 
the question arises: 

How much do we ask? 

After all, my articles do seem to sell better than. Urquhart’s who 
is ‘happy’ if his stuff in the Advertiser is accepted by Tucker for 
the ‘Fly-Sheets’. 

If you agree with all this—(Nos. 2 and 3 would, of course, have 
to be pungent enough To Produce A REAL sensation in London; 
moreover, such is the footing we are on with Tucker that we can 
write anything we choose without worrying about English pre- 
judices)—then compose a letter for me putting these proposals to 
Mr Tucker. Not being sufficiently adept in business matters, I 
have deliberately avoided answering him either orally or in 
writing. But no time is to be lost. 

A book that has interested me greatly is Thierry’s Histoire de la 
formation et du progres du Tiers Etat, 1853. It is strange how this 
gentleman, le pére“ of the ‘class struggle’ in French historiography, 
inveighs in his Preface against the ‘moderns’ who, while also 
perceiving the antagonism between bourgeoisie and _ proletariat, 
purport to discover traces of such opposition as far back as the 
history of the tiers-état* prior to 1789. He is at great pains to show 
that the tiers-état comprises all social ranks and estates save the 
noblesse and clergé and that the bourgeoisie plays the role of 
representative of all these other elements. Quotes, for example, 
from Venetian embassy reports: 

a K. Marx, ‘The Documents on the Partition of Turkey’ and ‘The Secret 
Diplomatic Correspondence’. - b K. Marx, Lord Palmerston, first and second articles 
(entitled ‘Palmerston’ in the New-York Daily Tribune).- © the father - 4 Third Estate 

474 . 238. Marx to Engels. 27 July 1854 

‘Questi che si chiamano li stati del regno sono di tre ordini di persone, cioé del 
clero, della nobilta, e del restante di quelle persone che, per voce commune, si pud 
chiamare popolo’ (Thierry, Histoire... Vol. 1, p. U1]? 

Had Mr Thierry read our stuff, he would know that the decisive 
opposition between bourgeoisie and peuple does not, of course, 
crystallise until the former ceases, as tiers-état, to oppose the clergé 
and the noblesse. But as for the ‘racines dans l'histoire ... d’un 
antagonisme né d’hier’” his book provides the best proof that the 
origin of the ‘racines’ coincided with the origin of the tiers-état. By 
the same token, this otherwise intelligent critic would, have to 
conclude from the ‘Senatus populusque Romanus” that in Rome 
there was never any opposition save that between the senatus and 
the populus. I was interested to discover from the documents he 
quotes that the term ‘catalla, capitalia’, capital, came into being 
with the rise of the communes. He has, by the by, unwittingly 
demonstrated that the victory of the French bourgeoisie was 
delayed by nothing so much as the fact that it did not decide until 
1789 to make common cause with the peasants. Although he does not 
generalise, he depicts very nicely, 1. how from the beginning, or at 
least since the rise of the towns, the French bourgeoisie has gained 
undue influence by constituting itself a parliament, bureaucracy, 
etc., and not, as in England, by commerce and industrie alone. 
This undoubtedly holds true even of present-day France. 2. From 
his account it may be readily shown how the class rises as the 
various forms in which its centre of gravity has lain at different 
times are ruined and with them the different sections whose 
influence derives from these forms. In my view, this sequence of 
metamorphoses leading up to the domination of the class has 
never before been thus presented—at least so far as the material 
is concerned. In regard to the maitrises, jurandes,* etc., in short, the 
forms, in which the industrial bourgeoisie develops, he has, alas, 
restricted himself almost wholly to general, and generally known, 
phrases, despite the fact that here too he alone is familiar with the 
material. What he successfully elaborates and underlines is the 
conspiratorial and revolutionary nature of the municipal move- 
ment in the twelfth century. The German Emperors, e.g. 
Frederick I and Frederick I, issued edicts against these ‘com- 

a ‘These that call themselves the Estates of the realm are of three orders of 
persons, that of the clergy, of the nobility, and of the rest of those persons who, in 
common parlance, may be called the people’ - ‘roots in history ... of an 
antagonism born yesterday’ - © the Senate and Roman people - ¢ guilds, corpora- 
tions 

muniones’, ‘conspirationes’ ‘conjurationes™ in very much the same 
spirit as the German Federal Diet. E.g. in 1226 Frederick il 
takes it upon himself to declare null and void all ‘consulats” and 
other free municipal bodies in the towns of Provence: 

‘Pervenit nuper ad notitiam nostram quod quarumdam civitatum, villarum et 
aliorum locorum universitates ex proprio motu  constituerunt juridictiones, 
potestates’ (Potestad), ‘consulatus, regimina et alia quaedam statuta ... et cum jam 
apud quasdam ... in abusum et pravam consuetudinem inoleverunt ... nos ex 
imperiali auctoritate tam juridictiones etc. atque concessiones super his, per comites 
Provinciae et Forcalquerii ab eis obtentas, ex certa scientia revocamus, et inania esse 
censemus’ [{II, 87].4 

Further: 

Conventiculas quoque omnes et conjurationes in civitatibus et extra ... inter 
civitatem et civitatem et inter personam et personam seu inter civitatem et 
personam, omnibus modis fieri prohibemus.’ (Constitutio pacis Frederici I.)¢ 

‘Quod nulla civitas, nullum oppidum, communiones, constitutiones, col- 
ligationes, confederationes vel conjurationes aliquas, quocumque nomine censean- 
tur, facere possent; et quod nos, sine domini sui assensu, civitatibus seu oppidis in 
regno nostro constitutis, auctoritatem faciendi communiones, constitutiones 
conjurationes aliquas, quaecumque nomina imponantur eisdem, non poteramus nec 
debebamus impertiri.’ (Henrici regis sententia contra communiones civitatum.) [I], 

86] 

Is that not the raide German professorial style to the life—the 
very same which later graced the fulminations of the ‘Central 
Commission of the Confederation’? In Germany, the ‘commune 
jurée” penetrated no further than Trier where, in 1161, the 
Emperor Frederick I put a stop to it: 

4 communes, secret associations, sworn confederacies - » municipal councils - 
© The original has ‘in comitatibus ipsis degentes’ instead of ‘ex’. - 4 ‘It has recently 
been brought to our notice that the guilds of certain cities, market towns and other 
places have, of their own accord, constituted tribunals, authorities (the Podesta), 
consulates, administrations and certain other institutions of this kind ... and 
because, among certain of them ... such things have already developed into abuses 
and malpractices ... we hereby, in virtue of our imperial power, and by our sure 
knowledge, revoke these tribunals, etc., and also the concessions in regard to them 
obtained through the Counts of Provence and Forcalquier and declare them null 
and void.’ - © ‘We likewise prohibit conventions and sworn confederacies of 
whatever kind within the cities and without ... between city and city or between 
person and person or between city and person.’ (Peace Charter of Frede- 
rick I.) -f ‘That no city and no market town may organise communes, 
constitutions, unions, leagues or sworn confederacies of any kind,by whatever name 
they may be referred to, and that, without the assent of their lord, we neither can 
nor should allow the cities and market towns in our Empire the right to establish 
communes, constitutions ... sworn confederacies of any kind, whatever names may 
be conferred on them.’ (Decree of King Henry against city communes.) - 8 stiff - 
h sworn commune 

‘Communio quoque civium Trevirensium, quae et conjuratio dicitur, quam nos 
in civitate destruximus ... quae et postea, sicut audivimus, reiterata est, cassetur et 
in irritum revocetur.’ [I1, 88]? 

The policy pursued by the German emperors was exploited by 
the French vrois who secretly supported ‘conjurationes’ and 
‘communiones’ in Lorraine, Alsace, the Dauphiné, Franche-Comté, 
the Lyonnais, etc., thus alienating them from the German Empire: 

‘Sicut ad culminis nostri pervenit notitiam, rex Franciae ... sinceritatem fidei 
vestrae molitur corrumpere.’ (Rodolphus I, epistula ad cives de Besancon.) [IT, 94]° 

The very same policy was used by the fellows to make Italian 
cities Guelphic.™ 

I’s funny how the word ‘communio’ is often reviled in just the 
same way aS communism nowadays. Thus, for example, the priest 
Guibert pf Nogent writes: 

‘Communio, novum ac pessimum nomen.’4 

There’s often something rather pathetic about the way in which 
the twelfth-century philistines invite the peasants to take refuge in 
the towns, the communio jurata. As, for instance, in the Charter of 
St Quentin: 

‘Eux’ (the burghers of St Quentin) ‘jurérent ensement chescun quemune ayde a 
son juré et quemun conseil et quemune détenanche et quemune deffense. 
Ensement nous avons establi que quiconque en notre quemune entrera et ayde du 
sien nous donra, soit pour cause de fuite ou de paour des anemis ou de autre 
forfait ... en le quemune entrer porra, car la porte est ouverte d tous; et se son 

seigneur a tort ses choses aura détenu et ne le voudra détenir 4 droit, nous en 
exécuterons justice.’ [II, 135]¢ 

Your 
K. M.