OH. xxxv1.] DENMARK AND THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT. O35

do was to maintain the integrity of the Danish monarchy, 1864
and to sustain the balance of power in Europe. Kings, Zr. 60.
Emperors, Princes were represented at that meeting, but
the people had not the slightest voice or right in the matter.
They settled the treaty, the object of which was to draw
closer the bonds between those two provinces and Denmark.
The tendency of the great majority of the people of those
provinces—about a million of them altogether—was altogether
 in the direction of Germany. From that time to this
year the treaty was followed by constant agitation and discord;
 two wars have sprung out of it, and it has ended in
the treaty being tornto pieces by two of the Governments
who were prominent parties to the treaty.” *
The question was whether England should go to the aid
of the weak Power against the two strong ones. Lord
Palmerston and Lord Russell were in favour of vigorous
intervention both before the war broke out, and after the
failure of the London Conference. They undoubtedly encouraged
 Denmark to resist. They were held back by
colleagues; against whose timidity the two veterans bitterly
murmured to one another.’ When the London Conference
broke up, there was a universal apprehension that the active
party in the Cabinet would still carry the day, and that
Great Britain would find herself committed without an ally
to the terrible peril of a war with Germany.
“At the end of June,” as Cobden described it, * the
Prime Minister announced that he was going to produce the
protocols, and to state the decision of the Government upon
the question. He gave a week’s notice of this intention, and
then I witnessed what has convinced me that we have
achieved a revolution in our foreign policy. The whippersin—~-you
 know what I mean—those on each side of the House

I Speeches, ii. 841.
} Mr, Ashley's Life of Lord Palmerston, ii. 437-8.