"One thing, then," said I, "is only wanting for this desirable consummation, and that is, the consent of the princes. I admit that you may have little trouble with Baden, Wurtemberg, and the like, but what say Austria, Prussia, and Bavaria to this wholesale abdication of their thrones?" "We don't affect to deny that there may be a crisis approaching. Austria has her hands full for the present with Italy and Hungary, and has given no definite reply. But the clubs are strong and active at Vienna, and on the very first opportunity you will see a general rising. 'Anarchy first--order afterwards,' is our motto. Then, as to Prussia, we do not want to push on matters too rapidly there. The king has been playing into our hands; and, to tell you the truth, we depend upon him alone for the continuance of our five florins a-day. So that, in the mean time, you may be sure we shall be moderate in that quarter. Bavaria may do as she pleases. If the others yield, that power must necessarily succumb." "Then I want to understand a little about the justice of your cause. You have claimed Schleswig-Holstein as part of Germany, and you have sent German troops, for the purpose of recovering it as your right?" "Quite true." "And at the same time Germany, or you as its representatives, have acknowledged the right of all foreign nations to their own independence?" "We have." "Then, will you have the kindness to explain to me how it is that your philanthropic parliament, holding such principles, has not thought proper to insist that every Austrian soldier, belonging to the confederation, should be immediately withdrawn from Lombardy and Hungary? How is it that General Wrangel, in the north, has ceased to be a Prussian, and become a German soldier, whilst Marshal Radetsky, in the south, is fighting without remonstrance at the head of troops which you claim as your own, and against that independence of a foreign nation, which you have thought proper expressly to recognise? If Germany claims Schleswig on the ground of unity of race and language, how can she, at the same time, countenance a subordinate German power in infringing the very principle which she has so determinedly proclaimed?"