London, 21 December 1876 
122 Regent’s Park Road 

Dear Becker, 

Have received your post card, the Précurseurs and two copies of 
the French address.”' If you could send a few more copies of the 
same, they would be most welcome (in French_we’d be sending 
them on to Paris); we shall be glad to pay for them as soon as we 
know how much, say, 20 copies would cost. 

Herewith money order for 15 francs, of which 9 fr. for the 
amount still outstanding on the Stunden der Andacht” and 6 fr. for 
two half-year subscriptions to the Précurseur for Marx and myself. 
You can send me both the numbers as this saves postage, and I can 
give Marx his. It’s a very good thing that we have a French paper 
in Switzerland again; the Jurassians are hopelessly addicted to 
cliquism and calumny, and it will enable us to demonstrate that 
peace with them is an impossibility. I couldn’t send you articles 
regularly because I don’t want to tell lies, and all that can be said 
of the workers’ movement here is that it has degenerated into 
Trades Unionism of the pettiest variety, and the self-styled 
leaders, not excepting Eccarius, are tailing after the liberal bour- 
geoisie in order to tout their services as agitators against the alleg- 
ed Turkish atrocities,'*’ and advocate the betrayal of the Balkan 

a Emma Engels - > See this volume, p. 174. 

peninsula to the Russians in the interests of humanity and freedom. 

The fact that De Paepe attended the Berne Congress” is 
wholly consistent with his previous attitude. Since the time of the 
Hague Congress’ he had officially remained with the seceded 
Belgians,”” but as leader of the opposition, and is now really 
doing some good by persuading the Flemings to come out in 
favour of universal suffrage and factory legislation. This is the 
first sensible thing that has been done in Belgium. Now the 
Walloon braggarts will also have to co-operate. But for our people 
in Germany to have fallen into the Jurassian trap was inexcusable. 
Bakuninist organs everywhere exulted to high heaven when it 
became known that the Germans would be sending delegates to 
the Congress.'” Liebknecht knew exactly what he was doing; in 
reply to a question as to what we thought of the proffered 
conciliation and what position we would adopt, I had told him: no 
position at all'; the fellows were just the same as they had always 
been, and if anyone wished to burn his fingers by having any 
truck with them, let him do so. And then they went and acted in 
this silly, gullible way, as though they were dealing with the most 
noble, honest men. 

Have you had the New York, or rather Philadelphia, resolutions 
regarding the dissolution of the General Council**’? In case you 
haven’t I am sending you a few copies; it might provide you 
people with fresh grounds for taking the thing in hand. 

In Geneva an Italian and French paper is appearing under the 
aegis of the Terzaghi of whom we drew a character-sketch in our 
Alliance de la Démocratie Socialiste.* This person is now said to be 
abusing the Bakuninists. For, having long tolerated him, although 
he had already been denounced by us as a police spy, they were 
nevertheless eventually compelled to throw him out as such. He is 
simply a mouchard,” while his henchman Bastelica is a Bonapartist 
agent—in Strasbourg he published an invocation to the French 
workers to restore the Empire. 

There’s nothing to be done in Italy, Bakuninists everywhere, 
and in Spain I no longer have any address, but may soon be sent 
one. 

Kindest regards, Your 
F. Engels