PROPOSALS FOR PEACE. _November 27th._--At length there really does appear to be a prospect of putting an end to this odious war, and my conjectures of a few days ago are assuming the shape of realities. Yesterday morning I met George Lewis in the Park and turned back and walked with him to the door of his office, when he told me the exact state of affairs. I had received a letter from the Duke of Bedford in the morning, who said that Charles Wood, who was at Woburn, had told him the statement in the 'Press' a week ago was so substantially accurate that they must, he thought, have received their information from some French official source. This was in itself confirmatory of all I had already inferred and believed. Lewis's story was this: The Austrians have framed a proposal for peace which they offer to send to Russia, and, if she refuses it, Austria engages to join the Allies and to declare war. The Emperor Napoleon agrees with Austria, and is resolved not to go on with the war if peace can be arranged on the Austrian terms. This resolution he has communicated to us, and invited us to accede thereto; Walewski's letters are not merely pressing, but even peremptory. It is in fact a second edition of the Vienna Conference and proposals, with this difference, that, while on the last occasion the Emperor knocked under to us and reluctantly agreed to go on with the war, he is now determined to go on with it no longer, and requires that we should defer to his wishes. Our Government are aware that they have no alternative, and that nothing is left for them but to acquiesce with a good grace and make the best case they can for themselves here, the case being that the Emperor is determined to make peace, and that we cannot carry on the war alone. This was the amount of Lewis' information, to which he added the expression of his disgust at the pitiful figure we cut in the affair, being obliged to obey the commands of Louis Napoleon, and, after our insolence, swagger, and bravado, to submit to terms of peace which we have already scornfully rejected; all which humiliation, he justly said, was the consequence of our plunging into war without any reason and in defiance of all prudence and sound policy. Afterwards I saw Charles Villiers and had a talk with him. He told me Clarendon had been sent for on Sunday to Windsor in a great hurry to meet Palmerston there. The Queen had received a letter from the Emperor, brought by the Duke of Cambridge, which no doubt contained in a private and friendly shape to her the communications which Walewski had already made officially to the Government and she wanted to know what answer she should send to it. Charles Villiers told me that Palmerston had already thrown out a feeler to the Cabinet to ascertain if they would be willing to carry on the war without France, but this was unanimously declined. I can hardly imagine that even Palmerston really contemplated such a desperate course.