statesmanlike tact and rare skill on the proposition that a war with Germany would be the gravest calamity to England. A perfect storm of applause was the orator’s reward, and Lord Palmerston left the House in evident uneasiness.”[188] And no wonder. He knew that his colleagues would now be all the more disposed for peace, for it was only too obvious that the result of Lord Derby’s interview with the Queen at Osborne had been a pledge that he would not permit his party to aid the Prime Minister in goading the country into war. “That particular danger,” writes Count Vitzthum, “was over. Twice more, however, in the course of that Session did Lord Palmerston attempt to drag the Cabinet along with him and carry his project of a war. Each time he was outvoted. Thrice did the Queen gain a victory over the would-be Dictator in the bosom of his own Cabinet.”[189] The criticism of the Tory chiefs was, however, directed to raise general distrust in Palmerston’s foreign policy as a whole. Lord Derby described it as one of “meddle and muddle.” “_Nihil intactum reliquit_,” observed Lord Derby, laughingly, “_nihil tetigit quod non conturbavit._” In the meantime the whole question was passing out of the sphere of diplomacy. On the 14th of January, Austria and Prussia asked the Diet to sanction the occupation of Sleswig, pending the withdrawal of the obnoxious Constitution incorporating Sleswig in Danish territory, and all fulfilment by Denmark of her engagements to respect the civic privileges of all Germans in the Duchies. The Diet considered that the Danes might comply with the German demand, and thus recover the Duchies. Hence the Austro-Prussian proposal was defeated, the ostensible reason given by the Diet being that it had no jurisdiction beyond Holstein. Prussia and Austria then intimated that they would themselves occupy Sleswig. The Prussian Chamber, adopting the view of the Diet, refused to grant the Government supplies, because, as Herr Schultze-Delitzsch said, this policy could only lead to the restoration of the Duchies to Denmark. Von Bismarck’s retort was “_Flectere si nequeo superos, Acheronta movebo._[190] If you refuse supplies, the Government will take them in spite of you.” Austria, eager to recover the military _prestige_ she had lost in Italy, and alarmed at the progress which democracy was making every day in the Duchies, perhaps also somewhat afraid lest Prussia might win all the glory of a strong and resolute pan-German policy, joined Prussia, thereby striking a mortal blow at the authority of the moribund Germanic Confederation among the German-speaking race. On the 1st of February the Austro-Prussian Army of occupation crossed the Eider, which was the answer the allies gave to Lord Russell’s “demand” for a Conference and the establishment of the _status quo_. Within a week the Danes were driven northwards behind their fortifications in Düppel--their last line of defence in Sleswig. Lord