London, 12 December 1878 
122 Regent’s Park Road, N. W. 

Dear Old Man, 

We are all most sorry to hear that things are going so badly with 
you and, so that you may at least have some help straight away, I 
have taken out a money order for you for £2 sterling on which, 
according to the information here, you will be paid 50 frs 40 over 
there. I have been told to retain the order here, as an order will be 
sent you by the Swiss post office in Basle, so unless this is done at 
once, you must complain. I shall see if I can get hold of some 
more money for you very shortly. 

It will, if my own experience is anything to go by, be virtually 
impossible to obtain any agencies for you here. Having been out 
of business for almost ten years, I have seen all my commercial 
connections gradually die a natural death; when a man no longer 
has anything to haggle over, you see, he’s no longer of any interest 
to those gentlemen. However, I shall see if there’s anyone I might 
be able to sound out, although I can’t for the time being hold out 
any prospects for you. 

As for the Précurseur, by the way, if the paper doesn’t pay for 
itself I wouldn’t, if I were you, expend a single sou on it.” I 
cannot see why you should sacrifice yourself for the benefit of the 
Genevan workers and their local Genevan politics. If they want a 
paper, let them pay for it themselves. It’s enough in all conscience 
that you should have to bear the brunt of the worry and the work. 
Considering all the sacrifices you have made, you really do have 
the right to call these people together and tell them that you can’t 
go on paying, and that if they want to keep the paper going they 
must provide the resources themselves. 

Today the news has reached us by telegraph that the Federal 
Council proposes to suppress the magnanimous Guillaume’s 
Avant-garde.’ 1 don’t know whether it will really happen, but if for 
one reason or another the last Bakuninist organ were to 

a ‘(From Our Own Correspondent. The Socialist Movement. Berne, Dec. 11)’, The 
Times, No. 29436, 12 December 1878. 

disappear, and the Genevans proved unwilling to provide the 
resources, the Précurseur could all the more readily succumb. 

Borkheim is still at Hastings, on the coast, confined to bed with 
the left side of his body paralysed and will recover, if at all, only 
very slowly. In other respects he seems cheerful enough, and 
writes from time to time. 

Luckily the Prussians have now also placed a ban on my 
Dühring’? Henceforth nothing may be sold in Germany that is 
directed against bogus socialist rowdies. Thus every anti-Bakuninist 
publication by Greulich.” myself, etc., has been banned. In 
Bismarck’s estimation, anarchist and Duhringian cliquishness 
should lessen our people’s cohesion and bring about what he most 
ardently desires—an attempted coup that would enable him to 
shoot. Despite all this, our workers in Germany are behaving 
altogether admirably, and I hope that they will bring the entire 
Prussian empire to rack and ruin. This much, however, Mr 
Bismarck will have achieved: When the set-to begins in Russia— 
and it won’t be long now—things will also be pretty well au point 
in Germany. 

With warmest regards from Marx and his wife, and hoping to 
hear better news of you soon, 

from your old friend, 
F. E.