When the mischief was done they did not fail to adopt the most severe measures. The French were the first to move. On the 15th of December M. Drouyn de Lhuys wrote a despatch which reached Lord Clarendon the next day. In this, after showing that Russia had given out that she would take the offensive "in no quarter," and how her action had falsified that assurance, he proposed that Admiral Dundas and Admiral Hamelin should declare to the Russian admirals, that every Russian ship met at sea by the Allies should thenceforward be "invited" to return to Sebastopol, and that every subsequent act of aggression should be repelled by force. Lord Cowley was desired by the Emperor personally to urge this measure on the Government, and convey to them a sense of his great disappointment if the suggestion were not adopted. On the same day, and before he received Lord Cowley's letter, Lord Clarendon wrote to Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, informing him that the most effectual means should be taken to guard against a disaster similar to that of Sinope. He had no doubt, he said, that the combined fleets had entered the Black Sea. "Special instructions," he wrote, "as to the manner in which they should act do not appear to be necessary. We have undertaken to defend the territory of the Sultan from aggression, and that engagement must be fulfilled." On the 24th of December Lord Clarendon informed Lord Cowley that her Majesty's Government agreed to the French proposal. It was not until the 27th that he sent the formal instructions to Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, directing him to inform the Russian admiral of the determination arrived at by France and Britain. It was not until the same day that Lord Clarendon instructed Sir Hamilton Seymour to make known to Count Nesselrode the nature of the orders sent to the East, orders issued with "no hostile design against Russia," but rendered imperative by Russian acts. Russia was not to mistake forbearance for indifference, nor calculate on any want of firmness in the execution of a policy having for its object the maintenance of the independence and integrity of the Ottoman Empire.