the delusion that France was still a loyal ally, while the English Foreign Office was in utter darkness as to the subterranean negotiations in which Napoleon was engaged. Nothing now made for peace, except the scruples of the King of Prussia, who was personally attached to the Austrian Emperor, and who regarded with horror anything approaching fratricidal strife. The project of a Conference was abandoned because Austria disliked it. Prussia refused to submit to the arbitration or jurisdiction of the German Diet, the majority of which took the side of Austria, and the Austrians accordingly plunged into war, with Bavaria, Würtemberg, Hanover, Saxony, and many of the smaller States as their allies. In England fashionable opinion was all in favour of Austria. Her army, we were assured by the leading organs of the upper classes, was invincible. As for the troops and the generals of Prussia, they were spoken of as if they were beneath contempt. On the 14th of June the Diet, 1866, on the motion of Austria, resolved to put in Federal execution against Prussia, in Holstein. On the 16th Prussian troops were marching through Hanover, Hesse-Cassel, and Hesse-Darmstadt in three columns on Saxony. This swift blow paralysed the minor States; in fact, Bavaria, with her army of 100,000, was not ready to come to the help of Austria till the war was over. Western Germany north of the Maine thus fell an easy prey to Prussian skill and valour. But that skill and valour were more conspicuously displayed in the chief theatre of the war. The Austrian commander, Marshal Benedek, having allowed the Prussians to seize Dresden at the outset, joined the Austrians in Bohemia. In two columns, one under the “Red Prince” (Frederick Charles), and the other under the Crown Prince (the “our Fritz” of the Queen’s family), the Prussians poured like a rapid and resistless torrent through Saxony and the Silesia passes, in a parallel line, into the plains of Bohemia. What need to tell the tale? The flower of the Austrian army--its German troops--was wasted in Venetia. The Italian and Hungarian regiments in Bohemia were disaffected. The Prussians had the needle-gun, whereas the Austrians had the old, slow-firing muzzle-loader. Von Moltke, the ablest strategist in Europe, directed the Prussian attack, and thus fight after fight was lost by Austria. On the 3rd of July, 1866, the crowning victory of the war was won by Prussia at Sadowa, where the Crown Prince, aided by Blumenthal, played the part of Blucher at Waterloo, and the invincible Austrian Empire lay prostrate in the dust. In Italy the Austrians were more successful. They won the battle of Custozza and the sea-fight of Lissa--victories which were barren of results. Peace was signed at Prague on the 23rd of August, 1866. Venice had been surrendered to France, who was to hand it over to Italy. Austria was expelled from Germany, and the Danish duchies were transferred to Prussia, but with