London, 22 July 1884 

My dear Laura, 

‘La suite à demain!’... mais je attends encore, cette suite’ which was to 
explain to me the many otherwise inexplicable things in your last let- 

* This man will not go far; he does not know how to bide his time.-> See this 
volume, p. 236.-° Ibid., p. 163.-4 In the original: ‘grauBen’ (South German 
dialect).-° ‘More tomorrow!’ ... but I am still waiting for this continuation 

ter. Why, I thought you lived in one of the finest, airiest, healthiest, 
etc., quarter of Paris, at an elevation sufficient to raise you above all 
earthly things, and now all at once you are going to move, and that at 
this blessed hot time of the year, and Paul is going to Bordeaux, and 
the whole world is all sixes and sevens and the long and the short 
of it is that you are not coming ? but must spend the hot season in 
Paris, and will only leave Paris at that season when Heine admired 
it most: 

die Sterne 

sind am schonsten in Paris 

Wenn sie eines Winterabends 

Dort im Strassenkot sich spiegein.* 

Well, Nim and Jollymeier who came on Friday,” and myself have 
given this matter our most serious consideration and we have come to 
the unanimous, but so far not very satisfactory conclusion: that some- 
thing must be wrong somewhere. 

Anyhow: As La Suite’ won’t come, I hope you will after all come 
yourself and let all these considerations go to the wind. If you wait for 
Paul’s going to Bordeaux to start a paper, that may or may not come 
off these next 100 years. If he does not go, and it is absolutely neces- 
sary that you should move from 66 Boulevard de Port-Royal, well, 
then let Atm hunt for apartments and do the moving. So I do not see 
what should stop you from coming over—if only for 3 weeks say — 
and as soon as you tell me that you are coming, we will make the 
road as smooth for you as we can. 

Tussy and Edward are off on honeymoon No. I, if not back already 
again—the grand honeymoon is to come off next Thursday.’ Of 
course, Nim, Jollymeier and I have been fully aware of what was go- 
ing on for a considerable time and had a good laugh at these poor in- 
nocents who thought all the time we had no eyes, and who did not 
approach the quart @heure de Rabelais? without a certain funk. 
However we soon got them over that. In fact had Tussy asked my ad- 
vice before she leaped, I might have considered it my duty to expati- 

* The stars 

Are at their prettiest in Paris, 

When they are reflected in the street filth 

On a winter’s evening. 
Engels quotes from memory Heine’s Atta Troll, Ch. II.-> 18 July -* continuation - 
4 31 July 

ate upon the various possible and unavoidable consequences of their 
step — but when it was all settled, the best thing was for them to have 
it out at once before other people could take advantage of its being 
kept in the dark. And that was one of the reasons why I was glad that 
we knew all about it —if any wise people had found it out and come 
up to us with the grand news, we should have been prepared. I hope 
they will continue as happy as they seem now, I like Edward very 
much, and think it will be a good thing for him to come more into 
contact with other people besides the literary and lecturing circle in 
which he moved, he has a good foundation of solid studies, and felt 
himself out of place amongst that extremely superficial lot amongst 
whom fate had thrown him. 

Jollymeier is very well and lively now — while I work he takes long 
walks — he is off now on one of them. Pumps has at last got over her 
bronchitis, etc., and will move to-day into her new house in Kil- 
burn — beg pardon, ‘West Hampstead’ (I never knew Hampstead to 
reach as far as Edgware Road, but so it seems). 

Nim is very well and lively — next week I suppose we shall have to 
move towards the sea, but where to? that grand question remains still 
to be solved. As to myself I am right enough on condition of 
keeping — for the present — within very narrow bounds both as to 
exercise, work and enjoyment— I hope the change of air will final- 
ly set me right. 

And now for ‘la suite’, and let it be a good one, a suite that brings 
you over! 

Paul’s Blé has arrived this morning. What a pity he does not fol- 
low the wise counsels of la rédaction du* Journal des économistes! 77° 

Very affectionately yours, 
F.E