| Manchester 10 June 1869.
My dear child,
Marx hielt
sich vom 25. Mai bis 14. Juni 1869 mit seiner Tochter Eleanor bei Engels in Manchester auf.
Eleanor blieb vermutlich bis Anfang Oktober in Manchester.
Schließen I was firmly resolved to
leave Manchester yesterday.
But, on the pretext, that, during the first week of my stay, I had been an
invalid, Engels insisted so much upon my
remaining here till Monday next, that I had to give way. He is really too kind
towards me to seriously oppose such a whim on his part.
On our three day’s trip to the Devonshire Arms, near the
Bolton abbey, I made the acquaintance of a most strange fellow, Mr. Dakyns, a geologist, who lives transitorily in
that part of Yorkshire in order to make of it a geological survey. En passent,
you ought to know that a geological map is taken up of all England, under the
orders of government, and under the leadership of Professor Ramsay, of
Jermyn
street. Moore
is himself a geologist. By him Engels and
Schorlemmer
became
acquainted with Dakyns who lives in a farmer house, inmidst
of a Yorkshire wilderness. That farmer’s house
was also an old abbey, and the lower part of it still serves as a chapel. It was
to see Dakyns that we
set
out for that part of the world. D. looks much like a German
peasant, of stunted
side
size, with a face always grinning a broad smile, something monkeyish in the
formation of his head, nothing British about him save the
protruding
upper set of teeth which reminded me of the late Mrs.
Seiler. His
dress is about that of a
slovenly
and “underdressed” farm servant, of
utmost
negligence.
Cravatte
and such
paraphernalia
of civilisation
| he is a stranger too. The first impression he
produces
makes
upon you is that of a
boorish
clown whose good heart
leaps
through his eyes and grins on his lips, but you would give him no credit for
intellect. Still, this is a highly scientific man, even an enthusiast for his
science, and whose name begins already to pierce
through a big valley of rivals. He is naive like a child, without the least
pretention, always ready to communicate his scientific discoveries to the first
comer wanting to pump him out. There is in fact always a couple of other
geological
surveyors
swarming to and from him for the express purpose to beat money out of him, or
fame, by
appropriating
his researches. In fact, we found him in the company of two such fellows, one of
whom, named Ward, was a
timid
youth, and the other, named Green, a
bold,
pushing
man. We had a dinner on his farm—on Sunday last—
under
in
the room directly lying over the chapel. The room had been(?)
evidently formerly served as an assembly-room of the monks, big walled (ich
meine, mit dicken Mauern umgeben), with a look out to magnificent trees, and
to an amphitheatrical group of mountains, the
one overtopping the other, and wrapt in that
blue veil
Pseudonym von
Charlotte Brontë.
Schließen Currer
Bell
is so delighted with. During the very marvellous(?) merry,
and in spite of
his
its
rusticity comfortable dinner, the sing-song of the youth in the chapel, coming from the depth,
intercepted
by the big walls, and sounding as from a far away place, reminded me somewhat of
the Bezug zu Goethes Faust
oder Charles Gounods Faust-Oper „Margarethe“.
Schließen Christian song in Faust.
Well, our friend Dakyns is a sort of Figur aus dem Roman "Felix Holt, the
Radical" (1866) von George
Eliot.
Schließen Felix
Holt, less the affectation of that man,
and plus the knowledge. (By the by, the Tories here say “Felix Holt, the
rascal”,
instead of “the radical”.) He invites once a week the factory
lads,
| treats them to beer and tobacco, and chats with them on social questions.
He is a “naturwüchsiger” communist. I could of course not forbear making a
little fun of him and warning him
to
fight shy of any meeting with Mary Ann Evans
(Pseudonym: George Eliot).
Schließen Mrs. Elliot who would at once
lay
hold if him, and make literary property out of him. He had already written to Moore that the wanted to enter the
“International”. So I brought him a card
and he made a donation, as his entrance fee, of 10 sh., the which is a sum for him. These men get only 150 £ of a year, and have very hard work, mentally and
bodily. The Government could not afford to get these men at th such a price, if it was a mere matter of competition, but most of
them are full of “geological”
zeal
and improve this
opportunity
afforded them of making researches. They are provided with
cards which bind every landowner, farmer, and so forth, to allow them to walk
over their estates and farms, and look into the formation of the soil. Dakyns,
who has a good deal of
farcical
humour about himself, often enters into a farm, takes out his instruments, and
sets at working, when the farmer comes up,
growls
at the impudent
intruder,
and bids him to pack himself off,
lest
he want to become acquainted with the teeth of his dog or
the
momentum of his flail. Dakyns affects not to mind him,
proceeds in his business, and provokes the
boor
by some bad jokes. When the comedy has been approaching to a certain climax, he
pulls out his card, and the
cerberus
is softened. During our stay he gave me to read
in
the nick of time the last number of the Fortnightly review— T.
H. Huxley: The Scientific Aspects on Positivism. In: The Fortnightly
Review. Bd. 5. Nr. 30, 1. Juni 1869. Siehe MECW 43
(1988), S. 293 Anm. a.
Schließen an
article
of Huxley where he merrily
thrashes
old Congreve. Dakyns is also a declared
| enemy of the Comtistes or Positivistes. He is of my opinion that there is
nothing positive about them except their arrogance. As to my friend Beesly, he mentioned him amongst the
“doctrinaires” who mistake their fanciful
crotchets
for science.— J.
S. Mill: Thornton on Labour and its Claims. In: The
Fortnightly Review. Bd. 5. Nr. 30, 1. Juni 1869. Siehe MECW 43
(1988), S. 293 Anm. b.
Schließen In the same number of the Fortnightly is
the second
article
of Mill on Thornton’s Capital
and Labor. I saw from the criticism
that both are equally
small
fry.—Dakyns is a neighbour of ours. That is to say, he lives
at Kilburn, (when in London), with his father,
a lawyer.
Yesterday evening I had the inavoidable tea at Louisa und Eduard
Gumpert.
Schließen Gumperts. Mrs.
Gumpert has been much affected by the teeth of time. I have never
before witnessed a more rapid change. The
hypocrisy
of a Greek nose has given way to the true Jewish type, everything about her
looks rather
shrivelled
and dried up, and the voice has that guttural sound which the selected people is
to some degree cursed with. Speaking of the disagreeableness
to be in a xx(?) omnibus, or at public firework, or xx(?) in
the theatre even near to the
pit—all
this because of the bad smells of the
vile
multitude, she said: “I like the clean million, but not the
dirty million”. I affected to have understood, “clear million”, and said that it
was a very common
predilection
with mankind to prefer a clear million of pounds
sterling to any million of men, whether washed or unwashed.
And now my dear child adio. Give my best wishes to all. On Monday I shall positively leave. As to Tussy, she looks quite blooming, and a little longer stay at Manchester will do her good.
YourOld Nick.
Zeugenbeschreibung und Überlieferung
Zeugenbeschreibung
Soweit aus der Fotokopie zu ersehen ist, besteht der Brief aus einem Bogen grauweißem, vergilbtem Papier. Marx hat alle vier Seiten vollständig beschrieben. Schreibmaterial: schwarze Tinte.
Zitiervorschlag
Karl Marx an Jenny Marx (Tochter) in London. Manchester, Donnerstag, 10. Juni 1869. In: Marx-Engels-Gesamtausgabe digital. Hg. von der Internationalen Marx-Engels-Stiftung. Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Berlin. URL: http://megadigital.bbaw.de/briefe/detail.xql?id=M0001057. Abgerufen am 28.03.2024.