KARL MARX

THE 'ECONOMICS' 3'174
3'161
Koppen unchanged: the drinking session with Koppen did him 'a power
of good'' 01 and Koppen presented him with his two-volume study on the
Buddha. Marx also visited old friends in the Rhineland and spent two
days with his mother. She interested him with her 'subtle esprit and
indestructible stability of character' 102 - and she cancelled some of his old
debts into the bargain. Marx defined his attitude towards a return to
Germany as follows: 'Germany is so fine a country that one is better
living outside its boundaries. I for my part, if I were quite free and not
burdened with something that you might call "political conscience", would
never leave England for Germany, still less for Prussia and least of all for
this frightful Berlin with its dust and culture and over-clever people.' 103
And Jenny's views were even sharper: 'My wife is particularly against a
move to Berlin', Marx informed his uncle, 'since she does not wish our
daughters to be introduced to the Hatzfeld circle, and it would be difficult
to keep them away from it." 04
The whole family was, however, enchanted by the gifts from Lassalle
that Marx brought back with him. There was an atlas for Engels and
cloaks for the girls and for Jenny, who strutted up and down so proudly
in hers that Eleanor called after her: 'Just like a peacock!' Jenny was
grateful for other reasons, too, as 'anything like this makes an impression
on the philistines of the neighbourhood and earns us respect and credit'. 105
On his return to London Marx failed to pursue any co-operation with
I .assalle. He was too busy working on his 'Economics' and trying to spin
out his meagre earnings from journalism: the New York Daily Tribune had
anyway cut Marx's quota of articles by half owing to the Civil War and
most of what Marx wrote was for the Viennese paper Die Presse which
praised his contributions highly but only printed - and paid for - one
out of every four or five. Many of these articles dealt with the American
Civil War. Unlike Engels, Marx was confident that the North, being
industrially more developed, would win in the end in spite of early
setbacks. 106 'In this struggle', he wrote in the Tribune, 'the highest form
that the self-government of a people has so far attained is giving battle
to the lowest and most shameful form of human slavery yet seen in the
annals of history.' 107 Marx was particularly pleased that the English
working class, although their interests were damaged by the blockade of
the south, were staunchly opposed to intervention.
In July of the following year Lassalle reciprocated by visiting London
at a time when Marx had just returned from several weeks' refuge in
Manchester to find a mass of debts. Lassalle stayed in the Marx household
for three weeks and spent a lot of time at the International Exhibition.
The strain that he imposed on Marx's finances, working time and nerves
made him extremely bitter. 'In order to preserve a certain facade', Marx