When Russia, therefore, not content with the settlement effected with respect to the Holy Places, determined still to provoke a quarrel with Turkey, the Western Powers were not united upon the problem that invited their attention. England and France alone resolved to resist her pretensions, while the others—Austria, Prussia, and the minor States of Germany—practically ranged themselves on her side. The demands made upon the Porte are of little importance; any pretext is good, where an object is to be gained. The Sultan was required to accept the protection of Russia over his Christian subjects, and he refused to submit (May 23, 1853). In this determination England agreed; indeed, it is clear that it would have been impossible for him to deliver over a very considerable section of his people into the hands of his hereditary enemy. Thereupon a Russian force, under Prince Michael Gortchakoff, crossed the Pruth (July 2nd), occupied the Principalities (now the kingdom of Roumania), and established itself upon the Danube. The Turks immediately made great efforts to meet the emergency, by collecting troops and despatching them both into Asia Minor, and into Bulgaria. But no declaration of war took place, for the Western Powers persuaded the aggrieved party to have patience, while they sent representatives to Vienna to try to avert hostilities by the arts of diplomacy. These endeavours failed entirely, not to say ridiculously. An Instrument was drafted, called the Vienna Note, to which both the Tsar and the Sultan were to consent, as a basis for a future arrangement. The former did so readily, but the latter peremptorily refused his adhesion to it. That he was right, is shown by the fact that the Note was so loosely drawn, as to be capable of an interpretation, whereby the full demands of Russia would have been agreed to by Turkey; and in the negotiations which followed, it became apparent that this was the only interpretation which the Emperor Nicholas had adopted! So the intervention projected at this centre of Russian intrigue, came to an end with the full concurrence of the British and French Governments, who were obliged to recognize that they had been duped. In October, the Porte formally called upon General Gortchakoff to evacuate the Danubian Principalities, and ordered Omar Pasha, the Turkish Commander-in-chief in Bulgaria, “to commence hostilities if, after fifteen days from the arrival of his despatch at the Russian head-quarters, an answer in the negative should be returned.” After the stated interval, towards the end of the month, the war commenced, not only on the Danube, but also on the Armenian frontier in Asia.