{London,} 2 December 1856 
9 Grafton Terrace, Maitland Park, 
Haverstock Hill 

Dear Frederic, 

My wife is still dosing herself continually and hence the house is 
always in such a disarray that it is difficult for me to settle down 
and write. 

As regards the Mieroslawski,* a providential ‘apportionment’ 
would appear to have taken place, most of the excerpts intended 
for you (there were asout two sheets) having been torn out of the 
middle of the manuscript, probably for spills. However, you 
haven’t lost much. I afterwards read Lelewel’s Considérations— not 
to be confused with his popular history.” He, together with 
Maciejowski (?) (I cite the name from memory), provides most of 
the material upon which Mieroslawski exercises his mind. By the 
by, in my recent studies of Polish history, what led me décidément 
to plump for Poland was the historical fact that the intensity and 
the viability of all revolutions since 1789 may be gauged with fair 
accuracy by their attitude towards Poland. Poland is their ‘external’ 
thermometer. This is demonstrable en détail from French history. 
It is conspicuous in our brief German revolutionary period, 
likewise in the Hungarian. Of all the revolutionary governments, 
including that of Napoleon I, the Comité du salut public’ is an 
exception only in as much as it refused to intervene, not out of 
weakness, but out of ‘mistrust’. In 1794 it sent for the employé‘ of 
the Polish insurgents? and asked this citoyen’ the following 
questions: 

‘How is it that your Kosciusko, a popular dictator, tolerates the existence 
alongside himself of a king of whom, moreover, he cannot but know that he was 
put on the thrane by Russia? How is it that your dictator does not dare effect the 

a L. Mieroslawski, De la nationalité polonaise dans l'équilibre européen. - > A reference 
to Considérations sur Vétat politique de Vancienne Pologne et sur Uhistoire de son peuple 
(further in the text Marx quotes a passage from it in free translation), which 
constitutes Part 2 of Volume 2 of Joachim Lelevel’s Histoire de Pologne. Part 1 of 
Volume 1 is entitled L’Histeire de la Pologne racontée par un oncle a ses 
neveux. - © representative - 4 Franciszek Barss - © citizen - f Stanislaus I] Augustus 

levée en masse of the peasants for fear of the aristocrats, who do not wish to be 
deprived of any of their “hands”? How is it that the revolutionary complexion of his 
proclamations pales in proportion to the distance his march removes him from 
Cracow? How is it that he immediately punished with the gallows the popular 
insurgents in Warsaw, whereas the aristocratic “‘traitres de la patrie” are allowed to 
remain at large, or are given refuge in the lengthy formalities of a trial? Answer!’ 

Whereat the Polish ‘citoyen’ could only remain silent. 

Que dites-vous de Neuchâtel et Valangin? This ease has led me 
to try and remedy my highly inadequate knowledge of Prussian 
history. Indeed anp indeed, never has the history of the world 
produced anything so sordid. How the nominal kings of France 
came to be real kings is also one long recital of petty struggle, 
betrayal and intrigue, but it is the history of the birth of a nation. 
Austrian history—the founding of a dynasty by a vassal of the 
German Empire—acquires interest from the circumstance that the 
vassal defrauds himself in his capacity as Emperor, from 
involvement in the East, Bohemia, Italy, Hungary, etc., and finally, 
too, from the circumstance that dynasty assumes such dimensions 
as to arouse fears in Europe of its becoming a universal monarchy. 
Nothing of all this in Prussia. She failed to subdue so much as one 
powerful Slav nation, and took 500 years to acquire Pomerania, 
and then only by ‘barter’.''’ Come to that, the Margraviate of 
Brandenburg—as it was when taken over by the Hohenzollerns— 
hasn’t been able to boast a single conquest, with the exception of 
Silesia. Perhaps it is because this was her one and only conquest that 
Frederick II’s sobriquet is ‘the One and Only’."” Petty theft, 
BRIBERY, OUtright purchase, succession intrigue, and such like shabby 
dealings is all that Prussian history really boils down to. What is 
interesting in feudal history elsewhere—the struggle of the 
monarch against his vassals, double-dealing with the towns, etc.—is 
all of it here dwarfed to a caricature because the towns are 
boringly small-minded, the feudal lords boorishly insignificant and 
the monarch himself a nonentity. During the Reformation, as 
during the French Revolution, she oscillated between perfidy, 
neutrality, separate peace treaties and snatching at scraps tossed to 
her by Russia in the course of partitions organised by the 
latter — vide Sweden, Poland, Saxony. Withal, a dramatis personae 
of rulers with only 3 masks—the Pietist,''* the non-commissioned 
officer, the clown—succeeding one another as surely as night 
follows day, the only irregularity consisting not in the introduction 
of fresh characters but in the varying order of their appearance. 

4 traitors to the country - > What do you make of Neuchatel and Valangin? 

What has kept the State on its legs nonetheless is mediocrity—aurea 
mediocritas*——_meticulous book-keeping, an avoidance of extremes, 
the preciseness of the drill book, a kind of homespun vulgarity 
and ‘ecclesial institutionalism’.''* C’est dégoûtant!” 

How is trade in Manchester just now? Can you let me have 
some particulars about the state of susiness in the MANUFACTURING 
DISTRICTS? 

I haven’t yet informed you that papa Heise passed through on 
his way from Utrecht. Has now rejoined Imandt. He has filled out 
and looks better than ever. 

Gétz, too, suddenly turned up here again. Disappeared with 
equal suddenness. Freiligrath very satisfied with his business and 
with himself. Valdenaire—the ‘agreer’ manqué—is over here on 
a visit from Trier. For what purpose, more in my next. 

Finally, I have a ticklish matter to put to you. At the end of 
December I have some fairly substantial sums to pay out. Could you 
possibly let me have something before then? My wife’s money has 
largely gone on setting up house and making up for very 
substantial losses in income. 

When are you coming down here? What is Lupus doing? 

Your 
K. M.