The Fortnightly Review: No. CCCCLXIII, New Series [‎597r] (84/239)

HOW IT STRUCK A CONTEMPORARY.
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dated December 11th, 1863—eleven days before Holstein was occu
pied by German troops—in which he “ begs most respectfully that
your Majesty will be gracious enough to receive Lord Wodehouse ”
(on his way from Copenhagen, where he had been sent to offer good
advice to King Christian), “ so as not at once to deprive him of the
hopes set by England on the result of the Copenhagen negotia
tions.” 1 Prussia, in other words, had made up her mind to act,
whatever England might say or do, though it was more convenient
not to disclose her intention until the allied troops were actually
in possession of the Duchies. It must by this time have been as
clear to Bismarck, as it was a fortnight later to our own Govern
ment, that England could not act single-handed, nor obtain the
assistance either of Russia or France, except on terms which it
was impossible for her to accept. The Prussian Minister never
missed a point in the European game, and he was well aware of
the estrangement which had arisen between England and France
from the coolness of Lord Palmerston towards the Emperor’s
grandiose project of a European Congress and from the fiasco of
the joint remonstrance of the two Powers against the Russian
treatment of Poland. This extraordinary man at all times in his
career knew twice as much about the affairs of his neighbours as
any of them knew about the designs of Germany, and it must
have been plain to him at this moment that England never was in
a worse position to gain European assistance.
Lord Salisbury was wrong in yet another respect. It did not
dispose of the question of the Duchies to speak of it as a German
” raid on Denmark.” Though Prussia had tied herself in a knot
by her adhesion to the Treaty of London—that ‘‘terrible treaty,”
as the Prussian King kept calling it—which guaranteed the succes
sion of Christian IX. and his suzerainty over the Duchies, the
German Confederation which forced the question was not bound
by that treaty, and the Federal Diet had always protested against
the Danish constitution of 1855 (which incorporated the Duchies
with Denmark) as an infraction of its rights. More than this,
Holstein had always been a part of Germany, and the inhabitants,
even of Schleswig, were to a large extent German-speaking. These
circumstances may, or may not, have justified Prussia in picking
holes in the Treaty of London, but they explain the excitement in
Germany and the strong exception taken by Germans to the
‘‘ Danification ” of the Duchies. It was a mistake to interpret these
feelings as the aimless excitement of a democracy bent on aggres
sion which could be checked by plain speaking on the part of the
British Government. At the same time, a contemporary observer
had every excuse for misreading the signs of the times in the early
(1) The Correspondence of William 1. and Bismarck. Vol. I., 37.
v