London, 25 July 1892 

My dear Schorlemmer, 

Do please let us drop the ceremonious ‘Mr’ in future. I’m glad you 
were satisfied with the obituary in the Vorwarts.* I had to write it in 
great haste and without any external aids on the afternoon before the 
funeral. Had I been able to wait until I got back to London I could 
have gone into greater detail. But in cases like these one must work 
exactly like a journalist, i.e. quickly, making do with the material to 
hand. 

Justice, the English Socialist paper, also published an excerpt from 
the obituary. This paper is the organ of Mr Hyndman who is in 
personal control of the Social Democratic Federation,?° a society that 
is Marxist in principle and anti-Marxist in practice. Hyndman is 
a petty-minded intriguer who looks down on the German party with 
indescribable envy because his little society is incapable of achieving 
what our own people can pull off without a second thought and who 
therefore allies himself with anyone who opposes the German par- 
ty —over here with the noble Gilles, for example, with the French 
Possibilists of Broussian persuasion,’ etc. Two months ago, however, 
he stepped down as editor in favour of Bax who is a talented and in 
other respects decent fellow with a complete mastery of German, 
and who often visits me and the Avelings. Hyndman hoped that he 
would thereby get him into his clutches, but apparently Bax has 
decided that there is nothing doing in that quarter so far as he is 
concerned — at all events it was he who published the notice in the 
last number he edited; he knew Carl” very well and often used to 
meet him at my house and elsewhere.—Shall try and send you 
the number. 

But now I had better speak to you about one or two business mat- 

“F. Engels, ‘Carl Schorlemmer’, Vorwdarts, No. 153, 3 July 1892. - ° Carl Schorlem- 
mer 

ters connected with the estate, as will probably be some time before 
you hear from Manchester. 

In accordance with the law over here, every will must be deposited 
with the Court of Probate where anyone may inspect it on payment 
of one shilling = 1 M. But before it gets as far as that, it must be ap- 
proved by the Court of Probate and estate duty must be deducted 
and paid, the amount in your case being 1% or 3% —I cannot say 
exactly which—of the gross assets. The executors must swear to 
the value of the estate they have declared, and all in all this is the 
kind of case that requires the attention of a solicitor from start to 
finish if one is not to be atrociously rooked. So you will doubtless 
have to be patient a little longer and will also have to reckon on 
expenses that are very high by German standards. That, however, 
is inevitable. 

The books, etc, he left will fetch little when sold. The chief 
items in the estate consist in cash on deposit at the bank and the 
copyrights. 

The former will amount to about £1,800 from which must be de- 
ducted the cost of the funeral, current petty debts, estate duty, court 
and solicitor’s expenses, etc., which may amount in all to between 
£200 and £250; I am unable to assess it from here, but it’s neverthe- 
less my opinion that you can reckon on a net sum of at least 
£1,500 = 30,000 marks. 

So far as works on chemistry are concerned, the value of the book 
rights is only of very limited duration. Science is making such rapid 
strides that things become outdated in a year or two unless they are 
constantly revised. And then again the death of an important chemist 
always provides younger men of varying quality with an opportunity 
to take upon themselves the preparation of new editions, which also 
means that they receive most of the profit. The same thing will hap- 
pen here. The executors are consulting me in the course of their nego- 
tiations, likewise Gumpert, so we may be sure that nothing precipi- 
tate will be done. Moreover I have backed them up in their view that 
nothing final should be decided in this respect without the consent of 
the family. That is not only their duty but also an excellent way of 
bringing pressure to bear on the opposing side. The latter, publishers 
no less than collaborators such as Roscoe, is in a hurry to bring mat- 

ters to a conclusion, while the executors, on the other hand, have 
plenty of time and can therefore wait for these people to approach 
them and contribute towards a quick settlement by making this or 
that further concession. So here too it would be in your own interest 
not to press for a quick settlement. 

I hear from Gumpert that you have written and told him your 
mother is unwell and has taken to her bed. I hope for the best but she 
is very old and Carl’s death will have hit her very very hard. But 
I hope that despite everything you will be able to send me better news 
before long. 

Yours very sincerely, 

F. Engels