happened which she pretended was the cause of her adopting that aggressive step.

This was clearly and forcibly shown in a despatch from Lord Clarendon to Sir G. H. Seymour, our Minister at St. Petersburg, dated July 16, 1853; and by M. Drouyn de Lhuys, the French Minister for Foreign Affairs, in a circular addressed to the diplomatic agents of his Government, and dated July 15. Lord Clarendon said:

"I shall now proceed to place on record at what time and for what reasons the British fleet was sent to the Turkish waters.

"Prince Menschikoff, acting, it must be assumed, on the orders of his Government, stated in his note of the 5th of May, of which a copy was received in London on the 18th of May, that any further delay in answering his proposals respecting the Greek Church could only be considered by him as manque de procédés envers son Gouvernement, ce qui lui imposerait les plus pénibles obligations.'

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Again, in his note of the 11th of May, a copy of which was received in London on the 30th of May, Prince Menschikoff says, that in case of an unsatisfactory decision on the part of the Porte

si les principes qui en forment la base [of the articles he was negotiating] sont rejetés, si par une opposition systématique la Sublime Porte persiste à lui fermer jusqu'aux voies d'une entente intime et directe, il devra considérer sa mission comme terminée, interrompre les relations avec le Cabinet de Sa Majesté le Sultan, et rejeter sur la responsabilité de ses Ministres toutes les couséquences qui pourraient en résulter.'

And lastly, in his note of the 15th of May, received in London June 1, Prince Menschikoff concludes

Il appartient à la sagacité de votre Altesse de péser les suites incalculables et les grandes calamités qui pourraient en résulter, et qui retomberaient de tout leur poids sur la responsabilité des Ministres de Sa Majesté le Sultan.'

"This succession of menaces, addressed to a power whose independence Russia had declared her determination to uphold, and in support of claims so much at variance with the assurances given to Her Majesty's Government, together with the vast military and naval armaments which for months had been preparing on the very confines of Turkey, left no doubt on the minds of Her Majesty's Government of the imminent danger in which the Sultan was about to be placed. They deeply lamented that this danger should arise from acts of the Russian Government, which was a party to the treaty of 1841; but, as Her Majesty's Government adhere now, as firmly as in 1841, to the principles which that treaty records, and believes that the maintenance of European peace is involved in the maintenance of the Ottoman empire, they felt that the time had arrived when, in the interests of peace, they must be prepared to protect the Sultan; and, upon learning the abrupt departure of Prince Menschikoff, it was determined that the British fleet, which up to that time had not quitted Malta, should be placed at the disposal of Her Majesty's Ambassador at Constantinople.

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On the 1st of June a despatch was forwarded to Lord Stratford

de Redcliffe, authorising him in certain specified contingencies to send for the fleet, which would then repair to such place as he might point out. On the 2nd of June instructions were sent to Admiral Dundas to proceed at once to the neighbourhood of the Dardanelles, and there to place himself in communication with Her Majesty's Ambassador.

"On the previous day we received a copy of Prince Menschikoff's note of May 18, announcing the termination of his mission, and that the refusal of the guarantee demanded devra désormais imposer au Gouvernement Imperial la necessité de la chercher dans sa propre puissance.'

"On the 2nd of June I communicated to Baron Brunow the measure taken by Her Majesty's Government; it could not have been made known by him at St. Petersburg before the 7th or 8th, and consequently it could in no way influence the decision taken by the Russian Government; for Count Nesselrode's note to Reschid Pasha, announcing that dans quelques semaines ses troupes recevront l'ordre de passer les frontières de l'empire,' was dated the 31st of May; and his despatch to Baron Brunow, in which he said that if the Porte did not sign Prince Menschikoff's note within a week after the arrival of the note to Reschid Pasha, the Emperor ordonnera à ses troupes d'occuper les Principautés,' was dated the 1st of June.

"It is thus clearly established that the British fleet was not sent to the waters of Turkey in disregard of considerations submitted to Her Majesty's Government by the Cabinet of St. Petersburg, and that on the day before the instruc

tions to Lord Stratford de Redcliffe left London the decision to occupy the Principalities was taken by the Russian Government; and I say that decision was taken, because the Russian Government could never for one moment seriously have expected the submission of the Porte to the terms, sans variante,' that a regard for its own dignity and security had a few days before compelled it to decline. Yet Count Nesselrode, in his circular despatch of July 2, affirms that the presence of the English and French fleets in the Bay of Besika has mainly provoked and fully justifies the occupation of the Principalities; he insists that they are in sight of the capital, from which they are nearly 200 miles distant, and that their maritime occupation of the Turkish waters and ports can only be balanced by a military position on the part of Russia.

"But Her Majesty's Government must, in the strongest terms, protest against this assertion; and they deny that any resemblance exists between the position of the combined fleets in Besika Bay and that of the Russian armies in the Principalities. The fleets have the same right to anchor in Besika Bay as in any port in the Mediterranean. Their presence there violates no treaty and no territory; it infringes no international law; it is no menace to Turkish independence, and it assuredly ought to be no cause of offence to Russia; whereas by occupying the Principalities Russia does violate the territory of the Sultan and the special treaty which regards that portion of his dominion. It is an infraction of the law of nations, and an act of direct hostility against the Sultan, which

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This measure, one entirely of precaution, had no character of hostility towards Russia. It was imperiously called for by the gravity of the circumstances, and amply justified by the preparations for war which for several months past had been making in Bessarabia and the harbour of Sebastopol.

"The motive for the rupture between the Cabinet of St. Petersburg and the Porte had, so to speak, disappeared. The question which might have been raised on the sudden at Constantinople, was that of the very existence of the Ottoman empire; and His Imperial Majesty's Government will never admit such vast interests to be mooted ("se trouver en jeu") without instantly claiming that share of influence and action which properly belongs to its power and its rank in the world.

To the presence of a Russian army

upon the land frontier of Turkey, the French Government had the right and the duty to reply by the presence of its naval forces at Besika, in a bay freely open to the ships of all nations, and situated without those limits which treaties prohibit the passing in time of peace.

"For the rest, the Russian Government was soon about to take upon itself to explain the necessity for the movement of the two squadrons. For on the 31st of May, when it was impossible to know at St. Petersburg, where the news only arrived on the 17th of June, the resolution that might be adopted by France and England, Count Nesselrode sent to the Porte, in the form of a letter to Reschid Pasha, a final ultimatum, with a brief delay, and which contained a very clearly-expressed threat of an approaching occupation of the Danubian Principalities.

"When this decision had been come to with a solemnity which no longer permitted a Government jealous of its dignity to modify it-when, by a circular dated June 11, His Majesty the Emperor Nicholas caused his resolution to be announced to Europe, as if to render its execution more irrevocable-our squadron was yet at Salamis, and that of England had not left the port of Malta.

"This simple comparison of dates suffices, Sir, to show from what quarter proceeded that initiative now sought to be denied, while the responsibility of it is thrown upon France and England: it is also sufficient to prove that between the communication made to Paris and London of the proposition made directly to Constantinople by Count Nesselrode,

and the rejection of that ultimatum, time was materially wanting for the Governments of His Imperial Majesty and Her Britannic Majesty to exercise their influence at Constantinople one way or the other. No, Sir, I say it with all the force of conviction, the French Government in this grave debate has nothing to reproach itself with: it repudiates from the depths of its conscience, no less than before Europe, the responsibility imputed to it; and, strong in its moderation, appeals in its turn, without fear, to the judgment of the Cabinets. Setting aside the so different objects of the two demonstrations, there was, perhaps, a sort of analogy between the respective situations when the Russian army was on the left bank of the Pruth and the English and French fleets cast their anchors at Besika. The analogy has disappeared since the passage of the river, which forms the limits of the Russian and the Ottoman empires. Count Nes selrode seems to admit this when he supposes the squadron to be already within sight of Constantinople itself, and represents the military position taken up by the Russian troops on the banks of the Danube as a necessary compensation for what he calls our maritime occupation.""

Threatening and indefensible as was the attitude of Russia, the Western Powers were still anxious that the Porte should not be involved in hostilities, and the representatives of England and France at Constantinople exerted themselves to prevent any declaration of war by the Turkish Government on account of the invasion of the Danubian provinces. Before the Pruth had actually been crossed, but while Russian

troops were crowding to the frontier, and the passage of the river seemed inevitable, Lord Stratford, on the 20th of June, wrote thus to the English Government:—

"The military occupation of any part of the Ottoman empire without the consent of the Porte would, no doubt, justify a recourse to hos-tilities. But the preservation of peace, so long as it is possible to preserve with it a chance of settling by negotiation the existing differences, is of such deep importance, that I have not hesitated to advise forbearance on the approaching invasion of the Ottoman territory. It is notorious that the Principalities are placed under circamstances of a special character with reference to the neighbouring Powers, and the consequences of a foreign military occupation within their limits are in practice by no means so likely to disturb the interests of the Porte as if a similar act of aggression were committed against those parts of the empire directly administered by this Government. It may be added that, in a military point of view, resistance could not be offered to Russia in that quarter under present circumstances with any prospect of success. Reasoning from the above distinction, the Porte, I conceive, may defer the commencement of actual and reciprocal hostilities without the discredit or increase of risk."

And when the event here foreseen had occurred, the same pacific policy was pursued. A conference of the representatives of the Four Great Powers was held at Vienna, and the result was that, by the end of July, a Note, originally drawn up by the French Government, was, after some modifications in London and Vienna, finally adopted

by the Conference, as that which they agreed to propose for the acceptance of Russia and Turkey, embodying as it did the terms for a final settlement of the dispute. A copy was immediately dispatched to St. Petersburg and another copy to Constantinople. The Emperor, without hesitation, signified his assent to the Vienna Note, but the Ottoman Porte declared its inability to do so unless some alterations which it suggested were made in the language in which its provisions were expressed. This conduct of the Porte was at first disapproved of by the Four Powers, who expressed disappointment and dissatisfaction. The Austrian Government "greatly lamented the modifications which the Porte had thought it right to introduce into the Vienna Note, but strongly recommended their adoption." The British Government earnestly hoped the modifications proposed by the Porte might receive the Czar's assent." The French Government avowed its dissatisfaction" and "disappointment" at the course of the Porte, but "hoped, as the modifications did not alter the sense of the original Note, they would be admitted by the Emperor of Russia.".

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harmony (entente) which have been unhappily disturbed by recent and painful complications, has carefully undertaken the task to find the means to efface the traces of those different points.

"A supreme iradé, of date having made known to him the Imperial decision, the Sublime Porte, &c., congratulates itself at being able to communicate it to H. E. Count de Nesselrode. If at all times the Emperors of Russia have shown their active solicitude for the maintenance of the immunities and privileges of the Orthodox Greek Church in the Ottoman empire, the Sultans never refused to confirm them anew by solemn acts (1) which attested their ancient and constant benevolence towards their Christian subjects.

"H. M. the Sultan Abdul Medjid, now reigning, animated by the same dispositions, and being desirous to give to H. M. the Emperor of Russia a personal proof of his most sincere friendship, only listened to his unbounded confidence in the eminent qualities of his august friend and ally, and has deigned to take into serious consideration the representations (2) of which H. E. Prince Menschikoff rendered himself the interpreter to the Sublime Porte.

"The undersigned has consequently received the order to declare by the present that the Government of His Majesty the Sultan will remain faithful to the letter and the spirit of the stipulations of the treaties of Kainardji (3) and of Adrianople relative to the protection of the Christian worship(4); and that His Majesty regards it as a point of honour with him to cause to be preserved for ever from all attacks, either at present or in future, the enjoyment of the spiritual privi