The King's next warning was remarkable. Letters, he pointed out, are almost invariably read in the post. This was inconvenient, no doubt; but the fact, once properly grasped, was not without its advantages. 'I will give you an example: we are still plagued by Prussia concerning those fortresses; now to tell the Prussian Government many things, which we _should not like_ to tell them officially, the Minister is going to write a despatch to our man at Berlin, sending it _by post_; the Prussians _are sure_ to read it, and to learn in this way what we wish them to hear.' Analogous circumstances might very probably occur in England. 'I tell you the _trick_,' wrote His Majesty, 'that you should be able to guard against it.' Such were the subtleties of constitutional sovereignty.[44] It seemed that the time had come for another step. The King's next letter was full of foreign politics--the situation in Spain and Portugal, the character of Louis-Philippe; and he received a favourable answer. Victoria, it is true, began by saying that she had shown the _political part_ of his letter to Lord Melbourne; but she proceeded to a discussion of foreign affairs. It appeared that she was not unwilling to exchange observations on such matters with her uncle.[45] So far, so good. But King Leopold was still cautious; though a crisis was impending in his diplomacy, he still hung back; at last, however, he could keep silence no longer. It {76} was of the utmost importance to him that, in his manoeuvrings with France and Holland, he should have, or at any rate appear to have, English support. But the English Government appeared to adopt a neutral attitude; it was too bad; not to be for him was to be against him--could they not see that? Yet, perhaps, they were only wavering, and a little pressure upon them from Victoria might still save all. He determined to put the case before her, delicately yet forcibly--just as he saw it himself. 'All I want from your kind Majesty,' he wrote, 'is, that you will _occasionally_ express to your Ministers, and particularly to good Lord Melbourne, that, as far as it is _compatible_ with the interests _of your own_ dominions, you do _not_ wish that your Government should take the lead in such measures as might in a short time bring on the _destruction_ of this country, as well as that of your uncle and his family.'[46] The result of this appeal was unexpected: there was dead silence for more than a week. When Victoria at last wrote, she was prodigal of her affection--'it would, indeed, my dearest Uncle, be _very wrong_ of you, if you thought my feelings of warm and devoted attachment to you, and of great affection for you, could be changed--_nothing_ can ever change them'--but her references to foreign politics, though they were lengthy and elaborate, were non-committal in the extreme; they were almost cast in an official and diplomatic form. Her Ministers, she said, entirely