London, 29 May 1890 

Dear Sorge, 

Have received letters of 30 April and 15 May, likewise Volkszeitung 
containing passage from my letter.? Your statement will be appearing 
in the Sozialdemokrat but, when I arrived at the office with your 

* See this volume, p.488-91 

statement yesterday, I found that they already had it there, in print in 
the Berliner Volksblatt. So Schliiter had sent it off before. That’s what 
I call Schliiter’s excess of zeal and what tends to be a bit embarrass- 
ing to a chap like me when he turns up at a newspaper office with an 
allegedly brand new ms. only to find the thing has already appeared 
in another paper. Not that I’ve had any other indiscretions to 
complain of since he’s been in America, but I know him from days of 
yore. 

I must now burden you with another piece of gossip about Schliiter 
which I would not otherwise have thought worth mentioning. But 
Motteler, a mortal enemy of Schliiter’s, who was also responsible for 
Schliiter’s leaving here, has recounted his version of the affair to Jonas 
and so it is necessary for you, at any rate, to know the true story. 

Motteler is a crib-biter of the first water and is very difficult to get on 
with; he’s a faux bonhomme,* a Swabian and an unrecognised genius 
who feels he has been downgraded because, though he was at one time 
solely responsible for managing the Sozialdemokrat and for party affairs 
abroad, others had to be appointed alongside himself, things having 
expanded. Not only is he absolutely reliable in money matters, however, 
but, more important still, he is generally recognised to be so by the 
whole of the party, and no one would venture to doubt him. In the post 
of party treasurer abroad, therefore, he is a most valuable man, and the 
others can only be glad to have been relieved of that responsibility for so 
long. Well, should anyone he dislikes happen to join the business, the 
results will be perpetual squabbling and never-ending persecution. 
That’s what happened, first with Derossi and then with Schliiter, both of 
whom were hounded out by him. He now brings two charges against 
Schliiter—first, that he embezzled money. There is absolutely no proof 
of this save that, in accounts that were over a year old at the time and had 
already been passed by the auditors, Motteler discovered a sum of 150 
marks in respect of which Schliiter had failed to provide either proof of 
payment or a signed receipt. No one in Germany or over here, save for 
Motteler, cares a rap about this, for the sums paid out by Motteler 
himself are said frequently to have been certified only by the entries he 
made, and the way the chaps run the business, while egregiously pedan- 
tic like everything Motteler does, is far from businesslike and accurate. 
That Schliiter was careless and guilty of small oversights—which he 

* speciously benevolent 

glossed over in such a way as not himself to be the loser—may well be. 
But nothing more could be alleged against him.—Again, Schliiter is much 
given to the pursuit of the Eternal Feminine, and likes variety at that, and 
it would seem to be a fact that he had flirtations with one or two of the 
book-binding girls they employed in Zurich and even seduced them. But 
since there aren’t any girls in the business over here, that no longer 
applied and the only grounds for quarrelling with Schliiter was Motteler’s 
ineradicable dislike of him. That’s the whole story and, if Schliiter had 
only stood up to Motteler a bit more, things might have gradually settled 
down. We others didn’t make anything of it because the affair of the girls 
had long been a thing of the past, because Motteler himself had refused to 
have the matter out with Schliter in the presence of the party’s auditors, 
and because the same thing could not have recurred over here. 

So if Jonas should start spreading gossip, you will be in possession of 
the true facts. 

Jonas did indeed come to see me, somewhat embarrassed, but found 
Tussy and Edward Aveling here (it was just after the Hyde Park meet- 
ing)°*” who gave him a very cool reception (on applying to the Central 
Committee for a journalist’s pass for the meeting, Jonas had already 
been told by Aveling that he hoped the Volkszeitung would be more 
truthful in its report than heretofore)’. So he very soon went away again 
when the Bernsteins had to leave on account of their children. The more 
elegantly the man tries to dress, the commoner he looks. 

One more thing. For the new edition of the Origin etc.* I have got to 
have Morgan’s last work, but cannot go to the British Museum early 
enough in the morning to compete for a seat in the Reading Room with 
the novel-readers. I am therefore sending you the enclosed letter for the 
department concerned, and two copies of the book. The question now 
is how these things—the letter and 1 copy—should be conveyed, 
whether direct to the department or through an intermediary who 
would vouch for me? Aveling believes that Ely in Baltimore would be 
glad to oblige. You are better acquainted with the chap, and I shall 
therefore leave it to you to decide what the best procedure would be. In 
case you should decide on an intermediary, I have included a second 
copy for him. I also include a note for Ely in case you think fit to use 
him as an intermediary. 

* Frederick Engels, The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (see 
present edition, Vol. 26) —> L. H. Morgan, Houses and houselife of the American 
aborigines 

Iam very glad that the Volkszeitung and the Workman’s Advocate put 
in the piece about the preliminaries to the Hyde Park meeting; through 
doing so they have made possible a rapprochement between the Avelings 
and the Americans. Even Mr Jonas cannot fail to have realised while here 
what a blunder he had made when he contented himself with simply 
parroting the Executive’s accusations against Aveling. 

The meeting, by the by, did not mark the end of the matter over here. 
You will have seen from the last People’s Press that the Central 
Committee is remaining in existence and is founding a Legal Eight 
Hours and International Labour League.” The constitution has been 
drafted and will be submitted on 22 June to a delegates’ meeting to 
which all London labour organisations, radical clubs, etc., have been 
invited. The constitution demands 1. the implementation of the resolu- 
tions of the Paris Congress*”? in so far as these are not yet law in 
England, 2. such further measures for bringing about the full emancipa- 
tion of the workers as may be decided upon by the Association, 3. the 
founding of an independent labour party with its own candidates for all 
constituencies in which they would stand some chance of getting in. You 
may publish this. 

In the Vienna Arbeiter-Zeitung (by the next post) there is a longish 
article of mine* about the happenings over here. 

Cordial regards to your wife,> 

Your 
F. Engels