out-of-the-way city above named, in June, 1851, and the effect of which, in connection with the London Treaty, would be to place the Imperial House of Russia next in succession to the Throne of Denmark, in the event of failure of the male line of Prince` (now King) Christian; removing no less than thirtyfive lives, fifteen of which were males, which stood in the way. To make the position clearer, let us state, that the original protocol of London, of 1850, and the draft convention of March, 1852, between Austria, France, Great Britain, Prussia, Russia, and Sweden, after stipulating the accession of Prince Christian, of Holstein Glücksburg, after failure of the reigning family, provided that in case of extinction of the male line of that prince, "the high contracting parties engage to provide by an ulterior convention for the maintenance of the integrity of the Danish Monarchy;" whereas, in the Treaty of London, of the 8th May, 1852, this condition was altered, at the instance, there is no doubt, of the Emperor of Russia, the contracting parties only stipulating "to take into consideration the ulterior overtures" which the King of Denmark "might think proper to address to them" in the eventuality supposed. The protocol of Warsaw declared that the Emperor of Russia, as head of the House of Gottorp, renounced the eventual rights (they were very remote, at the bottom of the list) which pertained to him in favour of the Prince Christian of Glücksburg, and his male descendants. It then went on to state :-" At the same time it is understood that the eventual rights of the younger

branches of the House of Gottorp shall be expressly reserved; that those which the august head of the elder branch shall abandon for himself and his male descent in favour of, etc., shall revive in the Imperial House of Russia at any time when (which God forbid) the male descent of that Prince shall become extinct." By this stipulation, the agreed joint action of the contracting parties, in the event of failure of such issue to Prince Christian was effectually avoided, and the purpose with which the Treaty was signed invalidated. Will it be believed that the respectable Ambassador from the Czar in his résumé mentioned only the renunciation of his master, and deliberately suppressed the reserves set forth in the above extract? It so happened, however, that on the very day on which the Treaty was signed, Baron Brunnow, the Russian Minister, sent a memorandum to M. Bille, the Danish Minister, citing the whole of the stipulations of the Warsaw protocol, and notifying that in signing the Treaty he did so, on the part of his Government, under reserve of all the rights therein asserted. The Baron afterwards sent a copy of this memorandum to the Earl of Malmsbury, enclosed in a curt official communication, stating:"In accordance with the orders of my Government, I communicate to your Excellency the accompanying note, which I have this moment given to the Minister of Denmark, upon signing, conjointly with him, the Treaty of this day's date." Lord Malmsbury took five days to consider this obliging communication, and then contented himself with

F

acknowledging its receipt, doubtless under the wholesome reserve, that "the least said is the soonest mended."

Whilst upon the subject of this ill-considered treaty, it may be proper to state that the reservation by the Emperor of Russia was not the only act of treachery connected with it, tending to frustrate the avowed intentions of the contracting parties. Long after the signing of the Treaty, but about the time when circumstances prognosticated that its provisions would shortly take effect, it became known that previous to, and as a condition of, their signing the Treaty, Austria and Prussia had stipulated with Denmark certain conditions with respect to the internal government of the duchies, which would operate in direct violation of the "integrity" of the Danish kingdom, and of the sovereign independence of the state, which was the primary object of the Treaty. And what momentous results have flowed from this little bit of underhand dealing! The federal "execution" in the duchies, afterwards superseded by their joint occupation by Austria and Prussia, to whom they were eventually eeded by treaty, was the first stage of that lawless. aggression which afterwards sealed the doom of Austria and the minor German States at Sadowa, and culminated in the overthrow of France at Sedan. The Treaty of London is no more, and the ultimate fate of Denmark, and the supremacy of the Baltic, are questions which will, in due course, again embroil the Northern and Western Powers of Europe.

As a pendant to the case of Lord Malmsbury,

take we now that of Lord Palmerston, who, having during some twenty odd years filled the office of Secretary at War, without a seat in the Cabinet, and without having throughout the period distinguished himself by any marked participation in state affairs, was, in 1830, in obedience to the exigencies of party, appointed Secretary for Foreign Affairs. The late Sir Henry Lytton Bulwer (afterwards Lord Dalling) in his recently published memoir of Lord Palmerston, prints a short letter written on that occasion by the latter, to an intimate friend and relative, which, as the noble biographer says, "characteristically manifests the situation of a man entering for the first time that laborious department." This remarkable communication, which no discreet friend would have thought of publishing, runs as follows:

"My dear Sullivan,-I send you the note you wish for. I have been, ever since my appointment, like a man who has plunged into a mill-race, scarcely able by all his kicking and plunging to keep his head above water.

"Yours, etc., PALMERSTON." When it is considered that upon the "kicking and plunging" of this untried and inexperienced Minister depended the foreign relations of a great nation, and, to a certain extent, the future of all the nations of the world, the mind trembles to think what might have happened, and thanks Heaven that things are no worse, so far as they have gone. The "statesman" thus improvised, commenced his career by inaugurating a policy which has throughout its course been

the subject of great and warm contention, and which, up to the present date, has not, in any essential particular, arrived at a recognized solution; the only unmistakeable result being that England, without effecting any definite object, or establishing any claims to consideration, has only brought down upon herself the suspicion, jealousy, and ill-will of surrounding nations.

And what shall be said of the other Foreign Ministers of our own day? Lord Stanley (now the Earl of Derby) naturally claimed the seals of the Foreign Office, as eldest son of the leader of a powerful party; and to him we owe the first admission of the principle of arbitration in reference to the Alabama Claims. Earl Granville's diplomatic qualifications are clearly deducible from the fact of his being the son of a nobleman who for many years was Ambassador to Paris on the part of this country; his statesmanlike qualities having been subsequently developed by a two years' occupancy of the important post of Master of the Buckhounds. Lord Clarendon became recommended to, and influential at the Foreign Office, from the circumstance that he was supposed personally to enjoy particular recommendations to the esteem of the Napoleonic régime.

Are these the men, we would ask, to cope in hard, and subtle, and not over scrupulous diplomacy, with a Nesselrode or a Gortschakoff, a Manteuffel, or a Bismarck, a Talleyrand, a Metternich, or even with a Daniel Webster or a Fish?

But whilst a want of purpose, stability, perspicacity, and all the higher qualities of statesmanship, too generally characterize the head of the