London, 14 July 1892 

Dear Ede, 

Your and Gine’s postcard of 24 June 1892 (I reproduce the post- 
mark for want of any other date) and letter of 2 July have reached me 
safely. I feel sure that the prospects for your harvest have in the 
meantime improved to such an extent that you are now worth, not 50 
raps but | franc, and, since the value of money whether paid or 
not—-does after all represent + > physical labour, I am equally sure 
that your health can only benefit from your haymaking. But why you 
sweat physically in the heat of the afternoon and mentally in the cool 
of the morning is not very clear unless it’s a slimming cure you are af- 
ter and of that, after all, you have no need. However, you are now in 
Zurich, so that all these comments will arrive after the event and your 
haymaking will presumably have given way to nutrimentum spiritus‘ 
(to stick to old Fritz’s¢ Latin) in the museum or the Tonhalle or 
whatever the places are called there. But you should take spriritus in 
the form vnz aut cerevisiae rather than in that of more abstract spir- 
itous material, otherwise it won’t be a real summer holiday. As for 
what’s happening in the English elections,°°* the Vorwdrts is in any 
case far better informed than the two of us put together.’ 

° Emma Engels-> more or less-° spiritual nourishment-¢ Frederick II-° of wine or 

beer -' See this volume, pp. 459-60 and 464. 

Bax’s editorship of Justice would seem to be over. After the one 
number,°°? in which he radically changed the paper’s tone,* there 
was a hitch; the tone reverted— at any rate in the negative sense of 
ignoring the movement in France, Germany, etc——to what it had 
been, even though the earlier onslaughts were not resumed. But the 
last number is again Hyndman at. over; Keir Hardie is attacked, 
Burns ignored and all the leading articles are supplied by Hyndman. 
Over here it is said that Bax’s attack on Stanley of Africa °? (who 
suddenly turned up in North Lambeth” to oppose the Gladstonians as 
Unionist candidate} has brought about a breach between him and 
Hyndman and that Hyndman has led the Soca Democraric Frepera- 
Tion? in a fervent pro-Stanley campaign in the latter’s constituency. 
I am passing this on to you as related to me. No doubt you will be see- 
ing Bax in Zurich in about a fortnight’s time but whether, having re- 
signed from the editorship of Justice, he will pay me a call before then, 
I cannot say. 

Typical characteristics of the elections are: 1. A complete lack of 
enthusiasm for Homer Rutt in England. 

2. The granting of suffrage to working men has driven vast num- 
bers of petty bourgeois into the Conservative camp, at any rate in 
the larger cities. Your petty bourgeois is beginning to be afraid 
of the workers, or at any rate does not want to be mistaken for one 
of them; Conservative Is RespecrasLe and hence he votes against 
Gladstone. 

3. The strength of the Liberal Party lies in the middle and lower 
middle classes of the smaller towns and counties where the pressure 
exerted by the semi-feudal landowners and the High Church >?’ 
clergy is still a force to be reckoned with. In the larger cities even the 
DISSENTERS, traditional mainstay of the Liberal Party, are beginning 
to vacillate —cf. for instance Birmingham. 

4. Now that the two bourgeois parties are on an almost exactly 
equal footing (today of 3,300,000 votes cast, the opposition’s majori- 
ty over the government amounts zn all to no more than about 76,000), 
it is Labour which is beginning to call the tune. And only in the elec- 
tion of Labour candidates — Keir Hardie, Burns, Wilson and oth- 
ers — was there any show of enthusiasm. Even before the elections‘ I 
had said that these would be the last to be fought out between the two 
official parties, but that they would give the Liberals a foretaste of 

* See this volume, pp. 448-49- ? district of London- ‘ Sce this volume, 
p. 463. 

things to come. As has happened in full measure. Even at the next 
elections the Labour Party will put up quite a different show. The 
current elections must have filled it with confidence in its own 
strength. 

5. The new Parliament is a provisional one. Gladstone will not get 
a majority without the support of the Irish and Labour members, 
which means an early dissolution. So much the better. 

Apropos. Tussy intends to send the Neue Zeit an article on the elec- 
tions * in which, however, only such internal matters will be discussed 
as could be known to someone over here, and then not to all and sun- 
dry. So don’t let it deter you from writing in the Neue Zeit about the 
general results as you see them. Her information, on the other hand, 
consists of specific facts relating to the skulduggery of the various par- 
ties, something quite different to what you will be writing. 

Warm regards from Louise and myself to both of you. 

Your 
F.E.