CRISTO RAUL.ORG

THE FOUNDING OF THE GERMAN EMPIRE BY WILLIAM I.

BOOK XI.

PANNEVIRKE AND DUPPEL.

CHAPTER I.

OUTBREAK OF THE WAR.

At the end of January the troops destined for the occupation of Schleswig were, with the exception of a few regiments still on the march, assembled in the neighborhood of the Eider. They formed three army corps: the first consisted of the 6th and 13th Prussian divisions (Generals von Manstein and von Witzingerode) with the corresponding cavalry and artillery, under the command of Prince Frederick Charles of Prussia; the second, of the Austrians under Lieutenant Field Marshal von Gablenz, four brigades of infantry, one of cavalry, and seven batteries, six battalions of this force being Germans, and the remainder—to pre­vent national fraternization with the Schleswigers—Czechs, Hungarians, Poles, and Italians; the third, of a division of Prussian guards under General von der Mülbe. The strength of the whole was 57,000 men.

The commander-in-chief, Field Marshal von Wrangel, once a gallant and dashing cavalry leader, was now quite eighty years old, and had not, as was soon to be seen, gained with age in breadth of view and keenness of insight, in sureness of judgment, nor in evenness of temper and will. The officers and men of his army, however, were with few exceptions admirable, at once full of spirit and thoroughly disciplined, each body of troops being well arranged and compactly organized, and so forming a united mass always ready to be directed against any object of attack. There was, therefore, reason to hope that, at least against the enemy now in question, the excellence of the parts might make up for anything that seemed wanting in the supreme command.

The state of things on the Danish side was in a certain way the reverse of this. The commander-in-chief, General de Meza, was an energetic and prudent officer, who had signally proved his capacity in the war of 1850; and not less excellent were the active officers of the army, even when it was on a peace-footing. But the little state was obliged, owing to the smallness of its financial resources, to keep the number of its officers and non-commissioned officers in time of peace within very narrow bounds, and to limit the term of service of the soldiers to ten months. Therefore, when the mobilization came, the number of men in the different regiments was increased more than fourfold; this necessitated the employment of a great number of imperfectly trained officers of the reserve; and, the discipline of the troops being superficial, the battalions, in spite of the courage of individuals, lacked the internal unity which was so conspicuous among their German enemies.

Besides this, there was for the Danes in this particular war another element of danger: the complete unrelia­bility of the regiments recruited in Schleswig-Holstein, who saw in the German troops, not enemies, but liberators. The total strength of the army was about 55,000 men, of whom not quite 40,000 were available for the approaching contest in Schleswig. Nevertheless, considering the peculiar fitness of the country for defence, the deeply penetrating gulfs, the swampy hol­lows, and the plains everywhere surrounded by heights, the 60,000 allies could not consider that they had greatly the advantage in numbers, especially since Denmark possessed in her superior fleet the means of effecting a surprise by transporting her land troops from one point of the scene of war to another far more quickly than was possible for her opponents.

As General Moltke had foreseen, it had been decided at Copenhagen to offer serious resistance, not at the Eider, but only at the position of the Dannevirke. The Dannevirke was a strong line of fortifications, surrounded by deep morasses, and extending from the city of Schleswig to the sources of the river Rheide. This was still further protected on the east by that broad arm of the sea, penetrating far into the country, called the Schley, the point of crossing which at Missunde, a mile and a half from Schleswig, was strongly fortified; and on the west by the river Rheide, and then by the Treene as far as where it empties into the Eider, both these streams being bordered by extensive swamps and fens.

As the German attack would doubtless be directed at the Dannevirke itself, the main body of the defenders was placed there, about 22,000 infantry and artillery, together with a reserve of 5,000 infantry and 2,000 dragoons. The guarding of the Treene was left to only- one brigade; while the covering of Missunde and of the Schley, a distance of nearly twenty-three miles, was intrusted to a chain of outposts consisting in all of 9,000 men. The whole position, in spite of its great length (of more than forty-two miles), was a very strong one. The people at Copenhagen regarded it as impregnable. In Paris, the Emperor Napoleon gave it as his opinion that the Germans might spend two years before its walls without gaining any great results. If the worst should happen, the way of retreat for the Danes would lead by Flensburg to the Sundervitt, where, opposite the island of Alsen and in front of the bridge to Sonderborg across the strait, a no less strong group of fortifications would secure to them a threatening position on the flank of the enemy, as these passed to the northward.

While these Danish preparations were going on, General Moltke, at the command of King William, was considering the German plan of operations. “This war,” said the General, “is easy to carry on, but difficult to finish. A speedy conclusion can be brought about only by cutting off from the enemy all possible sources of assistance, that is, by occupying as large tracts of country as possible.”

The first thing was naturally to master the Dannevirke; and in Moltke’s opinion this was to be done, not by direct assault upon the front, but by making a detour on the eastern flank; that is, by crossing the Lower Schley. The General considered that a front attack on the Missunde fortifications would take quite as much time and be quite as unprofitable as one on the Dannevirke. It was necessary, however, to place troops before this strong sally-port and at the same time to keep the Danish main-body in its position by prudent demonstra­tions at the Dannevirke. If, now, Prince Frederick Charles could succeed in getting his men across the Schley a few miles below Missunde at a point where the southern shore was higher than the northern, and in gaining Flensburg immediately by a rapid march, then the Danish army would be cut off from retreat toward the north and east: it could be driven into the western part of the country and there be annihilated.

Should the warlike ardor of Denmark not be extinguished by this, or the result aimed at in these opera­tions not be completely attained, Moltke considered that time and blood should not be squandered in besieging the fortifications of Düppel, since the capture of that place would bring with it no other advantage than the possession of a couple of hectares of Schleswig soil. The allies had force enough, he thought, to be able to leave a division behind to prevent the Danes from making sallies, while the main body could overrun the whole of Jutland, the loss of which would be most seriously felt at Copenhagen. Should this, however, not lead to peace, the Germans should again not stop to besiege the Jutland stronghold of Fridericia, but confine themselves to keeping a watch upon that, and at once transport a strong body to the island of Fünen, a movement that would without doubt oblige the enemy to make a final submission.

This plan of operations was communicated to the headquarters of the army, that it might be there taken into consideration; but it was not intended as a binding order. On the contrary, in the general instructions drawn up by the King on the 29th of January for the guidance of the Marshal, it was expressly stated that all opposition on the part of Denmark was to be overcome by force of arms, but that the Commander­in-Chief was to have complete freedom of decision. Attention was, however, called to the following points: “ It is a main object to destroy the enemy’s army before it reaches a place of embarkation. If it is in any way possible, the enemy’s retreat to Düppel must be cut off. When any advantage has been obtained, it must be followed up as energetically as possible. After the occupation of the Duchies has been completed, the country must be insured against the return of the Danish troops. The necessary measures against diversions in the rear of the army must be taken, and accordingly the harbors of Eckernförde and Kiel must be secured.”

So far as political matters were concerned, the Field Marshal was instructed to take upon himself the government, to carry it on as far as possible according to the existing laws, meeting the costs out of the revenues of the country, and to suffer no Danish, Augustenburg, or Democratic demonstrations. At the same time, the King remarked in regard to this latter point that no force was to be used, nor any pedantic or petty measures to be resorted to: the Marshal was to interfere only when public proceedings took place of such a nature as. might arouse hostile feeling in Europe generally.

The former President of the Police, Von Zedlitz, was joined with the Field Marshal as civil commissioner for the administration of the country; and it is as well to mention here that Von Zedlitz later received as a diplomatic colleague, Herr von Wagner, and from the Austrian side, Baron Revertera also. The latter, however, left the management of administrative business almost entirely to his Prussian associate.

Wrangel, who, on the 29th of January, had changed his headquarters from Hamburg to Bordesholm, sent from there on the following day to General de Meza a summons—naturally without effect—to evacuate Schleswig; and on the same evening he gathered together his leaders of the divisions and his generals for a conference, in order to make arrangements for the next few days. At this council the opinion was unanimous that the Dannevirke must be taken, not by a direct attack, but by making a detour.

It was decided that this should be undertaken by the division of Prince Frederick Charles. While the Aus­trians and those of the Guards that had arrived from Rendsburg were to advance on Schleswig and keep the main body of the enemy occupied there, the Prince was to march from Kiel directly to Missunde, to storm the fortifications at that place, and then, crossing the Schley, to strike the Danish army in the rear. Right here, accordingly, in a very important point, the Field Marshal departed from Moltke’s suggestions. Some doubts expressed as to whether the Missunde fortifica­tions could be taken by storm were briefly and emphatically disposed of by Wrangel, who persisted in the arrangement that had been made, and gave further orders that the Prince should march from Missunde to Glücksburg, and from there to Düppel. The old General for the moment forgot all about the Gulf of Flensburg, which lay right in the way of such a movement.

On the morning of the 1st of February, then, the two armies, nearly equal in strength, crossed the Eider at different points without meeting any opposition. Dur­ing that day the Danish troops retired every where from position to position almost without fighting; so that the first division, following up the enemy eagerly, went beyond the prescribed limit of march, and after a slight but vigorously-fought skirmish reached the town of Eckernförde.

Leaving there on the 2d, the troops arrived a little before midday in the vicinity of the fortifications at Missunde, where they were at once received with a well-directed fire. The Prince brought up his artillery, sixty-four cannon, in the hope that the fire from these, covering a large portion of the works, would do so much injury that an assault might be made in accordance with the orders he had received. A cannonade of three hours therefore ensued, during which the Prussian sharpshooters who protected the guns, in their zeal for battle, pressed very near to the enemy’s redoubts and suffered a loss of nearly 200 men killed and wounded. As the firing made no impression on the works, the Prince, who had not in his heart agreed with Wrangel, broke off the fight with much vexation.

A consultation with the Field Marshal on the 3d of February had no result. Colonel Blumenthal, Chief of Staff of the first division, then prevailed upon General Manteuffel, who happened to arrive, to obtain from Wrangel, on the 4th, permission for the army to cross the Schley farther down, near Arnis or Kappeln. The march thither was made on the 5th, under great difficulties, upon a road covered with ice and in the midst of a driving snowstorm. About midnight it was learned that the Danes had abandoned the opposite bank, and General Roder at once carried his men over in boats. On the morning of the 6th of February the remaining troops followed on a pontoon bridge that had been hastily put together; and no sign of the Danes anywhere appeared. The news of other astonishing events was soon received.

The Austrians and the Guards had advanced in their march toward Schleswig as far as the river Sorge on the 1st of February, and on the 2d as far as Nordby. As they were going northward from there on the 3d, the Austrian brigade of Gondrecourt met a body of the enemy near the Hahnenkrug, while the Austrian jäger and Prussian grenadiers on the left likewise found the village of Jagel occupied. At both points the Danes were vigorously attacked, and driven back after a brave resistance. They again took up a position in the village of Overselk, whence they were again driven by the bayonet, and retreated to Königshügel, a little height near the first fortifications of the Dannevirke and situated within range of its guns. The Austrians, however, stormed this also with irresistible enthusiasm, in spite of severe loss. They then took up a position there, and at once received twelve Prussian cannon for the purpose of firing upon the works.

The battle with its gradual advance had lasted four hours, and had cost the Danes 417, the Austrians 430, men. On the 4th of February, on the ground thus gained, batteries were constructed all along in front of the eastern wing of the Dannevirke, and the bombardment was begun. On the western wing the Prussians drove in the Danish outposts along the meadows of the Rheide. A staff officer, accompanied by two men, succeeded in reaching the wall on the other side of the flooded morass. He found that the ice would bear, and that the fortifications thrown up for the protection of the dams were weak. According to his report, which unfortunately arrived too late at headquarters, an attack on this point might have been made even as early as the 5th.

On the Danish side King Christian with his Minister, Monrad, had, on the 8d of February, come to the camp to encourage his army, now engaged in the struggle. He found officers and troops in the best temper possible; and on the 4th, with his mind relieved, he returned to Sonderborg, his departure being pressed by the Minister, who may have feared that the King would interfere disadvantageous in the command of the army.

General de Meza had, like every one else, shown the King a confident countenance, but in his heart he was full of great anxiety. He knew, what the Prussian officer had seen, that the frost had put an end to the defence afforded by the water. The effect of the enemy’s cannonade was found to be much greater than had been suspected. The troops, courageous in battle, were not sufficiently experienced to endure for a long time such a winter bivouac in the works as the close proximity of the enemy would demand. Under these circumstances, how long could the defence be continued, and what would be the fate of the army, if a successful attack by storm should bring the Germans into the works ? And Denmark possessed only this one army. If that should be destroyed, the war would be ended in five days from its commencement; and accordingly, De Meza’s instructions had expressly indicated the preservation of the army as the most important of all objects to be kept in view.

After the manner of strong characters, the General came to a decision without long delay. On the evening of the 4th, he assembled his higher officers for a council of war, and laid before them the facts that caused him so much anxiety. If permanent action on the defensive appeared hopeless, there was only one means of maintaining the position, and that was to make a sally with their entire force against the besieging enemy, to wage an offensive battle in front of the works. It was known by the cannonading at Missunde that the enemy had sent strong detachments to the eastward; and there was, therefore, a prospect that the fight might be carried on at the Dannevirke with fairly equal numbers. But on the other hand, this also would be staking everything on one card. If the victory should not be gained, the complete destruction of the army was as good as cer­tain. And after the fighting on the 3d of February, when the force of the enemy had made itself so severely felt, an absolute confidence in the Danish superiority was no longer entertained.

The council of war recognized the fact that the organization and training of the troops were by no means what is required in a well-prepared army. The prospect was therefore not very favorable either for defensive or offensive action; and nothing remained but to evacuate the Dannevirke immediately, in order to preserve for Denmark the army and with it the possibility of continuing the struggle, as well as to gain time for the friendly Foreign Powers to interfere.

The whole council, with the exception of General von Lüttichau, adopted this view. The order to retreat was at once sent to Missunde and Friedrichstadt; and on the evening of the 5th, the march of the troops out of the Dannevirke began, the stationary guns being left behind. By midnight the fortifications were entirely empty. The army proceeded at once to Flensburg. On the 6th, the rearguard was engaged at Oversee in an extremely bloody contest1 with the Austrian brigade of Nostiz which was in pursuit. Except for this the Danes reached Flensburg unassailed, and from there the greater part of the infantry was transferred to the works at Düppel. Two brigades, however, and all the cavalry were sent northward.

Thus not in two years, as Napoleon had thought, but in five days, did the Dannevirke fall into the hands of the Germans. To be sure, this had not been accomplished by making a detour in accordance with Moltke’s plan, which would have resulted in the annihilation of the enemy’s army. The evacuation had not been brought on by the making of a detour, but on the contrary, that portion of the German army which was performing this manoeuvre was spared from any fighting or loss by the vigorous threatening of the Dannevirke. Prince Frederick Charles, instead of being sent at once to Arnis, where the weak Danish outposts would not have been able to hinder his passage across the Schley, had been kept, during the 3d and 4th, before the strong works of Missunde where he could accomplish nothing. Instead of being satisfied with making significant movements at Overselk, the full force of the brave troops had been launched against the enemy.

“ There are,” wrote Colonel Blumenthal to Moltke,  but few men, indeed, who can execute a simple plan in a simple way. The Danish army does us the kindness of so placing itself that by making a detour we can bring it into the greatest possible embarrassment; instead of this, we run so violently at their strongest position and produce such terror there, that an early opportunity is taken by them to sound a retreat. The Danes on the 4th of February were wiser than we: we made our detour two days too late.

If Moltke’s plan had been exactly carried out, the war would most probably have been at end, or the occupation of Düppel and Alsen, of Jutland and Fünen, would have been a military promenade. As it was, the army was to shed many a drop of noble blood, and Bismarck to spend many an hour of mental anxiety and toil, before a profitable conclusion could be reached.

Nevertheless, the impression made by the speedy capture of the Dannevirke was very great. The more exaggeratedly the Danes had boasted to themselves and to others of the invincibleness of their works, the more stunning was the effect of the blow upon the public mind in Copenhagen. The people stormed through the streets, crying that the nation was betrayed, betrayed by that incapable parson Monrad, by the German generals in the army, and by the King himself who came of a German race. There were tumults that required the interference of the troops, who were themselves Schleswig-Holsteiners. The Queen and one of her daughters were publicly insulted. The Government had the weakness to yield to this outcry, and to sacrifice the savior of the army, General de Meza. The General and his Chief of the Staff, Kaufmann, an equally able officer, were deprived of their places, and the supreme command was given for the time to the only man who had dissented in the council of war, General Lüttichau.

No less keen was the excitement abroad. In Paris the sensation was all the greater, since the Danish embassy had just before put in circulation dismal false reports of defeats suffered by the Germans. All sorts of sentiments were manifested in confusion in Paris society: great wrath on the part of Russians and English, surprise and annoyance on the part of the French. As for the French Government, the expressions of the Emperor and his Minister showed a mixture of feelings: earnest congratulations to the Prussians for their victory, but a secret regret that it had been gained with such effective assistance from Austria. For, as has been said, the French had encouraged Prussia in the war, with a hope that it would lead to complications between the two allied German Powers concerned in it. It could not, therefore, but be disagreeable to see a laurelled brotherhood-in-arms confirm too emphatically the intimacy between Berlin and Vienna. Napoleon again took occasion to speak of the rumors that Prussia had guaranteed to the Cabinet of Vienna the possession of Venetia, provided that Cabinet would agree to her annexation of the Duchies. And again was Goltz obliged to repeat the official assurance that not a word of this was true.

Still more decidedly was Lord Palmerston’s hostile disposition displayed. He declared to Count Bernstorff that Prussia’s proceedings involved the most unjust aggression and the most outrageous action known to history, that is, an attack at the moment when the enemy has promised to fulfil all demands and has only asked for the delay necessary to make the accomplishment of this possible. We have explained above, how little this criticism amounted to after the official declaration of Monrad, that Denmark would never agree to the political autonomy, nor to a division, of Schleswig: the proposed delay would only have led to profitless writing and talking, and would have postponed military operations to a season of the year more favorable to Denmark. After making the above complaints, Palmerston also added the milder observation that nothing would, indeed, now be done until Parliament had expressed its opinion; but that in the spring England would not fail to assist the Danes.

The greater part of the Press concurred in this view. In the Parliament, also, the majority of all parties sympathized with Denmark; but it was another ques­tion whether on that account a war should be entered into with Germany, the German market be closed to English trade, and a door thrown open to the ambition of Napoleon. The leader of the Tories, Lord Derby, declared that he should shrink from such a war as from the greatest of misfortunes, and Lord John Russell admitted that England had never held out to the Danes any hope of material support.

The state of things in Sweden was much the same. The people and the Estates had no inclination whatever to go to war; but they made all the more complaint of the unjust attack of the Germans upon their northern Teutonic kinsmen. The King, however, secretly wished to take an active part in the war in the hope of making capital out of it for a Scandinavian Union; and his Minister, Manderström, said without reserve that if France or England gave any assistance, Sweden would at once also send troops. The utter uncertainty of the state of things is thus evident; and it seems natural enough that Gortschakoff should charge the Prussian ambassador to urge prudence upon his Government. “Russia,” he said, “will never arm against Prussia, never! But for Heaven’s sake, hold fast to the London Protocol, so that you may not, in addition to Denmark, have England, France, and Sweden upon your hands.”

In Germany, the astounding news of the capture of the Dannevirke called forth all sorts of feelings: delight and enthusiasm, discouragement and confusion; in general, a joyful disposition among the people, and dismay among the party-leaders and the Governments. The agitation for Augustenburg began to lose importance, now that the interest of the public was turned almost exclusively to the military operations. Seeing this, some said: “Brute force has now the upper hand; things can be properly settled only by the approaching revolution.” Others argued: “ If Austria and Prussia continue to whip the Danes, everything will be right in the end; but who could have trusted this Bismarck beforehand?” The Committee of Thirty- Six published an energetic manifesto against such views, urging a vigorous continuance of the agitation, with the only half untrue remark, that without that national agitation Austria and Prussia would never have gone so far as they had done.

Among the people of the Lesser States, numerous expressions of regret began to be heard that their troops had no share in the laurels of victory. The foreign ambassadors to the Confederation spoke publicly of the Prussian annexation of the Duchies, and their German colleagues listened with silent annoyance. Reports of a like nature reached Berlin from Hanover and Munich: the annexation was everywhere spoken of as a certainty. King Max asked the Prussian ambassador what the real state of things was, what he knew about all these things, the annexation of the Duchies, and the guaranty for Venetia undertaken in considera­tion of the same. Herr von Arnim answered what was true, namely, that he had received no information on the subject, but that he distinctly did not believe in the existence of any such agreement. “But,” asked the King, “where do all these rumors come from?”— “Your Majesty,” answered the ambassador, “they spring from the feeling of every unprejudiced observer, that the state of things they indicate is the natural one.” Thereupon the King let the conversation drop.

But yet once more was the wretchedness of dismemberment in Germany to be stirred up from its very bottom.

The common note sent by the two Great Powers on the 31st of January had renewed the bitter feeling of the Governments in the Lesser States, especially in Saxony and Bavaria. Without regarding the conclusion of the note, they saw in it only a renewed recognition of the compacts of 1852; and above all, Beust, Roggenbach, and Pfordten expressed lively indignation.  Roggenbach said that the declaration made by the Great Powers on the 14th of January ought to have been met at once with the recognition of Duke Fred­erick and the setting on foot of a Confederate army; the action of Austria and Prussia threatened, in his opinion, the independence, nay the very existence, of the Lesser States.

The Bavarian Government sent to the Courts that shared its views an invitation to another conference of ministers at Wurzburg, for the purpose of arriving at an understanding in regard to some common action. Minister von Schrenck was of a somewhat calmer tem­perament than Beust and Roggenbach, but his stand­point in the matter agreed entirely with theirs. In an interview with the Prussian ambassador he explained this standpoint with great emphasis. “ The conflict,” he said, “ is now unavoidable. So soon as the Confed­eration shall have decided the question of succession, the Lesser States are bound to march at once to Hol­stein in support of the Duke. It is to be hoped that the Great Powers will not then take military measures against Germany. Should they do so, we should be overpowered by force of arms.” The ambassador pointed out to him that the adoption of such an attitude would simply mean inviting the French to interfere. “I shall not call upon them,” said the Minister; “but if they should come to the aid of the Lesser States when the latter are unjustly assailed, I could not hinder it.” The conversation continued for some time in this tone very warmly and quite without result.

In the Saxon Chamber, Beust came out with a lengthy polemic against the policy of the two Great Powers: “It is now seen” he said, “how exaggerated was their dread of foreign interference. The Foreign Powers have become reconciled to the advance into Schleswig; they would be still less inclined to make opposition, if the German Great Powers were to act in harmony with the Lesser States and the German people.”

Simultaneously with the reports of these doings there arrived at Berlin many complaints from Wrangel and his officers about the uncomplying disposition of the Confederate commissioners and their officials in Holstein in all that concerned the necessities of the army in the field: they refused quarters to the troops that arrived; they oftener delayed than hastened the delivery of supplies; they allowed the army only one wire in the telegraph, and, on the other hand, gave passage to a host of false or even mischievous newspaper reports. “These men,” wrote the Prussian ambassador at Hamburg, “ are entirely under the influence of the so-called Ducal Government.” Zedlitz also reported that now, too, in the Schleswig towns of Friedrichstadt, Husum, Tonning, and Gading, immediately after the departure of the Danes, the people, at the instance of Holstein agents from Altona, had proclaimed Duke Frederick sovereign of the country; and the French ambassador pointed out very earnestly to Bismarck the consequences that might follow such revolutionary symptoms.

Bismarck, who had no intention of letting Prussia be at all embarrassed by the Confederation or by Augustenburg, instructed Sydow on the 8th of February to demand, in common with Kübeck, a speedy remedy for these complaints. He also called attention to the fact, that, in order to make secure the military basis of operations for the army, it would be necessary to propose that the most important points of communication, Rendsburg, Neumunster, Kiel, and Altona, should be occupied by Prussian troops. The two representatives succeeded with some difficulty in extracting from the committees on the 9th of February a letter to the Confederate General Hake, which met in as limited a way as possible the Prussian demands concerning quar­tering, supplies, and the telegraph.

But in the mean time a Prussian brigade had already arrived at Hamburg, who were to occupy the several points of communication; and before Bismarck could have his motion about this matter brought forward at Frankfort, Wrangel had taken practical steps, by calling upon Hake on the 10th of February to admit bodies of Prussians into Neumunster, Kiel, and Altona. When Hake refused, the Marshal, on the 12th, sent into Altona on his own authority a battalion, which quartered itself on the inhabitants as a permanent garrison, but which at the same time did not interfere with the Hanoverians. Some days after, the other towns were occupied in the same way.

When Hake’s telegraphic despatch concerning Altona was received, the ill-humor of the Lesser States, which had been accumulating for a month, was poured forth in violent outbursts of wrath. Beust was for repelling force with force. Count Platen in Hanover did, indeed, give the Hanoverian commandant in Altona, General Gebser, orders contrary to this, but he declared that Prussia’s behavior was inexcusable. The really delicate point in the question was touched by Herr von Schrenck. He said to the Prussian ambassador: “We know well that the occupation has for its object, not simply to get possession of the military points of communication, but to hinder the establishing of Duke Frederick in his rights. Extreme measures are unavoidable, unless speedy satisfaction is made.” In Frankfort all the representatives of the Lesser States unanimously agreed that the withdrawal of the Prus­sian garrisons with a guaranty against a repetition of the steps taken should be demanded, and that a considerable re-enforcement of the Confederate troops in Holstein must be provided.

The occupation of the Holstein towns by a permanent Prussian garrison was certainly not in accordance with the Confederate decrees passed up to that time; but the same was true of the toleration of the Augustenburg agitations by the Confederate commissioners. Bis­marck, moreover, in arguing the matter, persisted calmly in his standpoint, that the promise given by the Confederate Diet on the 22d of January to further all military operations could not but justify the belief that the securing of the military basis for such operations would be agreeable to the Confederation. To be ready for any emergency, he caused a portion of the Silesian army-corps to be concentrated on the Saxon frontier, so that Herr von Beust's ardor might be a little cooled; but at the same time King William decided to send General Manteuffel to Dresden and Hanover with autograph letters, and so to offer the right hand of reconciliation to the two Sovereigns.

General Edwin von Manteuffel was a man of decided character and great natural intelligence; he was culti­vated in many directions, and for the most part by his own efforts; he was independent in his judgment, full of original views, and always able to express them in a manner peculiar to himself. Politically, he held closely to the Conservative party. Without the prejudices of a doctrinaire, he had a practical conviction that only one could be master, and that in Prussia that one must be the King. Entertaining this view of the matter, par­liamentary methods seemed to him decidedly burdensome ; and even from the agitation for German Unity he feared rather a dissolution of the solid frame of the Prussian state than hoped for a political strengthening of the German nation.

His remarkable ability had won for him in a great degree the personal confidence of Frederick William IV, and had then brought him into the difficult position of head of the royal military council, where he took an important part in the work of newly organizing the army, made a thorough clearing out of the useless elements in the corps of officers, and several times undertook with success military, and occasionally even diplomatic, missions at foreign courts. In this way he gained considerable acquaintance with the people that held the most prominent positions in Europe, to all of whom he was from the start recommended by his well- known political principles. He had formed for himself a peculiar fashion of intercourse in these relations: while preserving all the courteous forms of respect, he took advantage of that frankness so well suited to a soldier, and said the most disagreeable things with natural honesty, always making it a point to hit the nail on the head. For a confidential negotiation like the one now in hand, he was in every respect the man to choose.

He armed himself, moreover, for his mission to Dresden, with a political treatise, in the composition of which his friend Leopold Ranke, I almost think, had something to do with guiding the pen. After some observations on the European significance of the Schles­wig question and on the necessity of considering, besides the claims of Augustenburg, the political rela­tions involved, this document continued: “The Princes must not believe that their Chambers are enthusiastic for Augustenburg on account of his hereditary rights. Nor does the present conflict spring exactly from democratic principles or from a desire for revolution. The question is, to whom shall the preponderating influence in public affairs fall—to the majorities in the Chambers, or to the Sovereign? If the Chambers succeed in putting through their candidacy of Augustenburg, they will be the masters in public affairs. The Great Power's alone are strong enough to prevent this. What would the consequences be, if the Schleswig-Holstein question should lead to an open breach between the Great Powers and the Lesser States — especially if the latter should summon France to their aid! France would perhaps give ear to this wish. But England would certainly oppose it; and Russia also would take sides. What a fate would then await the German Princes! Should one man die, they would all be lost. But even if that man lived, he would not be able to defend them against such an evidently superior force. If he himself were assailed and in danger, he would be more ready to sacrifice them than himself and his dynasty: they would be ruined, and no one would pity them.”

On the 16th of February, Manteuffel was graciously received by King John. The General at once presented the royal letter, which in friendly words pointed out the impossibility for the two Great Powers of letting themselves be bound in European affairs by majority-decis­ions of the Confederate Diet, emphasized the necessity of a secure basis of operations, and complained of the spectacle which was presented to the world at large by all this petty friction in a great cause of common national importance.

King John expressed his thanks for the friendly epistle, and his readiness for reconciliation; but he persisted in his opinion that satisfaction must be made to the Confederation. Manteuffel then took the liberty of remarking that there had been peace for so many years that war had long ceased to be understood: the troops were facing the enemy, and it was impossible to introduce by diplomatic proceedings every measure necessary for their safety.

The conversation turned on the two different points of view thus indicated. Manteuffel said that when both parties were fighting for the same object and against the same enemy, it was no time to debate about points of form. The King answered that unfortunately the objects were different: the Lesser States wished to bring about the elevation of Augustenburg, the Great Powers to hinder it. When Manteuffel read his polit­ical treatise, the King asserted that he was far from thinking of a Rhine Confederation, nor was he by any means dependent upon his Chambers.

A conversation between the General and Beust brought more precise explanations. Beust spoke very calmly. He regretted that he was obliged to go to the Wurzburg conference, and could not, therefore, fittingly give a final answer beforehand. Manteuffel admitted this, but begged the Minister to consider that “we could be in Saxony tomorrow; do, therefore, use your great abilities to prevent so unfortunate a contin­gency.” — “ What! ” cried Beust. “ What do you mean might occasion an advance of your troops into Saxony ? ” — “ It is very simple,” said the General. “ If a single Prussian soldier should be shot in Holstein, the King could not do otherwise than occupy Saxony. We must both do what we can to avoid that.” Beust then expressed his satisfaction at having spoken with the General before his departure for Wurzburg.

When he returned on the 24th of February—we shall say a word later concerning what happened at that conference—King John wrote to King William that he must persist in the conviction that Augustenburg was the rightful heir; and that therefore the Confederation ought to help him to obtain his rights. “ Nevertheless,” he said, “ Saxony, while asserting and maintaining her position as to the rights of the question, will facilitate, so far as in her lies, the operations of the Great Powers, which at any rate must tend to weaken the common enemy.” General Hake, he added, would receive orders to avoid every chance of a conflict.

Meanwhile Manteuffel had arrived at Hanover on the 19th of February. The course that things took there was substantially the same as at Dresden. King George spoke in disjointed sentences, somewhat more warmly and with more irritation than King John had done. “The forms must he observed,” he said. “Wrangel seems to pass over forms very lightly; but forms are necessary for the maintenance of the Confederation.”

Minister Platen declared that he was no enemy to Prussia, but that he could show his sentiments only within the proper limits of the principles of the Co­federation. “Hanover’s position,” he said, “is difficult. Here the National Association rules; and in South Germany the Democracy. Saxony stirs the fire. If our Government takes a strong stand, it will sink at once into dependence upon Prussia; and as Hanoverian Minister, I cannot favor that.” He, however, promised that he would do all he could to maintain concord; and the King in the same tone answered the letter of the Prussian Monarch. The affair was thus smoothed over for the time; and the Prussian battalions remained in the Holstein towns.

Manteuffel was soon engaged in a more extensive and more important negotiation. The Confederate Diet had already received its first warning as to the weight that its Majority would have, when opposed to the Great Powers. Once more the folly of a Confederate Consti­tution that placed the authority to say and the power to do in different hands had been made manifest through the false steps taken by those who had the authority. But the lesson was not yet severe enough. After it, as before, the Majority persisted in its opposition to the main policy of the two Great Powers.

CHAPTER II.

GENERAL VON MANTEUFFEL IN VIENNA.

After the first dismay at the evacuation of the Dannevirke had been overcome, the determination was still alive in Copenhagen to resist to the very last. An embargo had already been laid on the 3d of February, not only upon Prussian and Austrian ships, but also upon all German ships lying in Danish ports; so that in a supplementary way the Confederate chastisement of Holstein was also branded as an act of war, and a proper title given to the Confederation for the declaration of the Confederate war. At the same time a blockade of Holstein and Schleswig ports was decreed by Denmark; and soon afterwards this was also ex­tended to a number of German ports on the Baltic Sea.

Side by side with these operations, negotiations went on with reference to an intervention of the Foreign Powers. This had already been requested in a circular note of the 6th of January, without any specification, for the time, of the form in which assistance was desired. When, then, England on the 20th of January renewed her proposition of a conference, and Russia also seconded it, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Quaade, a quiet and temperate man, who had only out of patriotism taken his seat in the Eider-Danish Cabinet, announced the approval of his Government. Thereupon England repeated her proposition in Berlin and Vienna, and at the same time demanded, as the necessary condition of calm negotiations, the immediate proclamation of an armistice.

Without any previous conference with each other the answers of the two Courts were the same: that they were ready to consent to a truce if Denmark would first withdraw from Düppel and the island of Alsen. This demand was, politically considered, the consequence of the original plan of holding all Schleswig as security, and from a military point of view imperative in order to protect the flank of the allied army against possible offensive attacks of the enemy. But inasmuch as Denmark categorically refused to comply, and furthermore now declared that she could not negotiate at all unless the Germans should evacuate Schleswig entirely,—there was nothing to be done but to let military operations take their own course.

After the allies had on the 7th of February occupied Flensburg, a lively discussion ensued in headquarters as to the next steps to be taken. On one side it was deemed advisable to take possession as soon as possible of the Düppel redoubts; and on the other side the most effective means of overcoming the resistance of the Danes appeared to be the occupation of North Schleswig and Jutland. Moltke, who was still of the opinion that the sacrifice and expense connected with a siege of Düppel were out of all proportion to the benefit derived from its possession, whereas the occupation of Jutland would necessarily produce a decisive impression in Copenhagen, hastened, himself, to headquarters.

In conformity with Moltke’s opinion, Wrangel then gave the order to Prince Frederick Charles on the 10th of February to remain behind with the 1st army-corps to keep watch of Düppel, and commanded Gablenz and the division of the Guards to march forward towards Jutland. The smaller portion of the Danish army under General Hegermann-Lindencrone, to whom had been left the defence of this province, had entirely quitted North Schleswig, so that the allies by the 17th of February reached the Jutland boundary without meeting any opposition.

Meanwhile, however, the Austrian civil commis­sioner, Baron Revertera, had already, on the 14th, informed the Chief of Staff, General Vogel von Falckenstein, that for diplomatic reasons it would be hardly advisable to cross the Jutland frontier; in reply to which Falckenstein with the express approval of the Field-Marshal begged the Austrian to forbear making such diplomatic representations to him, since at head­quarters only military considerations could have any weight. Falckenstein, nevertheless, had the Prussian diplomat, Wagner, telegraph the whole circumstance to Bismarck without delay. The latter, who had hitherto had no share in the deliberations and discussions about the military operations, now took a decisive and resolute part in them.

All moves that had hitherto been made in common with Austria had been wholly confined to Schleswig.

Werther kept sending reports continually of Rechberg’s increasing anxiety about a break with England and a consequent English-French alliance. On the 7th of February, Werther had particularly sent word that the Emperor Francis Joseph rejoiced at the successes thus far, but had expressed his hope that it would not be necessary to pursue the Danes into Jutland.

If in spite of this the army should march forward, then, in view of such sentiments in Vienna, to which at that time Karolyi gave decidedly the tone, there seemed to be danger lest General Gablenz might suddenly receive contrary orders from his own Govern­ment, and before the eyes of Europe the paths of the two Powers might widely diverge. This must not be I On the 15th of February the royal order was sent to Wrangel not to cross the frontier before receiving further directions; on this occasion the Minister of War felt also called upon to instruct further the Field-Marshal to make no more definite arrangements in Holstein without taking preliminary diplomatic steps concerning the same in concert with Bismarck.

How needful such measures actually were, was made evident on the very following day, when Werther telegraphed that upon hearing Revertera’s report, the Emperor Francis Joseph had written directly to King William, and had at the same time sent express orders to General Gablenz under no circumstances to join in an invasion of Jutland: it was now possible to pacify the Emperor with the announcement that Wrangel had already the day before received similar instructions.

But the Field-Marshal himself was enraged at the reception of such orders. He telegraphed to the King that these diplomats who had upset the finest plans deserved the gallows;1 yet he hastened on the 17th of February from Apenrade to Hadersleben, in order to be on hand to make the necessary arrangements. But here he received the news, on the 18th, that the hussars of the Prussian Guard at the van of his army had had a hand-to-hand engagement with a small squad of Danes, and in the pursuit had crossed the Jutland frontier and had occupied the nearest city, Kolding. Thereupon Wrangel gave orders that Kolding should be held, but no further advance made. Moltke hurried back to Berlin to explain this accidental occurrence, but .with the intention to recommend the maintenance of the position once secured, and in general to advocate the pursuance of the plan determined upon.

Here he encountered no difficulties. The King and Roon had always shared his opinion; and Bismarck had no objections to offer, if Austria’s consent could be secured. “The storming of Düppel and the crossing to Alsen,” he wrote on the 16th of February to Werther, “would involve enormous sacrifices. Why make them, if we can gain the same results by a pressure brought to bear upon Jutland?” Werther, on his part, and upon a hint from Rechberg, urged that some one might come to Vienna on a special confidential mission, to try to influence the Emperor personally.

Since the news of the occupation of Kolding produced again great excitement in the Hof burg, instructions were given to General Manteuffel, after his Hanover mission should be finished, to proceed to Vienna with an autograph letter from the King. Bismarck’s idea was to take this opportunity to revise the whole basis of relations with Austria, and to involve in the pending military question the whole political situation in general.

The letter of the King to the Emperor, dated the 21st of February, summed up the matter in the following manly words: —

“ Our policy would be abortive if we did not follow it out to a satisfactory conclusion. I place great value upon England’s friendship; but do not believe that England or any other Power will find it in their interest to attack us, so long as we remain united. And even if the danger lay nearer than is in my opinion the case, there are still circumstances in which I do not consider it would be possible to yield to the fear of it. Therefore, I believe that nothing could be more likely to make this danger imminent than such conduct on our part as would betray any anxiety about it

The instructions given to the General contained also the following declarations: “ There are two questions involved: the advance of the army into Jutland, and the settlement of the dispute between the Lesser States and the Great Powers over the possession of the dominant position in Germany: these two questions are, moreover, intimately connected. The occupation of Jutland is indispensable as reprisal for the capture of German ships and the blockade of our ports, which must soon be expected; and it is very clear that we cannot take such reprisals in Schleswig. We owe it to public opinion in the army and among the people, to carry out our programme resolutely and completely, to assert our power and influence in Germany, and not to yield to any direct attacks from the Lesser States. The motion of Austria and Prussia together, that they should share in the Confederate chastisement in Holstein, must be accepted by the Confederation: the Lesser States must learn that if they attempt to subject the European policy of Austria and Prussia to the control of the majority of the Confederation, they will make the continuance of such confederate relations impossible for these two Powers. The matter has been brought to the critical point by the Lesser States themselves; and the moment is favorable for bringing them to a decision, because neither England nor Russia would now take the part of the Lesser States, their policy being exactly the contrary of that adopted by those Powers. As for France, Austria and Prussia need fear no protest on her part, so long as they remain united.”

It is clearly seen that in this statement the German question was considered as immediately depending upon the Schleswig-Holstein affair, and that in making it Prussia took the standpoint from which in the following years she brought about the overthrow of the Confederation and the founding of the German Empire.

Manteuffel was confidentially told to avoid every mention of any propositions for a close or permanent alliance between Austria and Prussia; and if Rechberg should suggest such, Manteuffel was to reply that they lay outside of the scope of his instructions. Only when forced to do so, might he allow it to be understood as his personal opinion that the King would hardly before­hand assume a guaranty for the protection of territory or any obligations of the nature of a treaty, yet would consider an alliance with Austria advantageous for special purposes and in special cases, since each of the two Powers seemed to him forced by her own interests, in the event of the other’s being attacked by a more powerful enemy, not to leave her in the lurch; that for the present, however, the relations with France gave no occasion for such apprehension: on the contrary, if England continued to make trouble, it might not be impossible to employ French influence against England.

When Manteuffel arrived with this commission in Vienna, he found himself in an atmosphere entirely different from the fresh and ambitious spirit which breathed through his instructions. After the short excitement of 1863, the people had very soon again lost every inclination to make war: the fight on the distant Baltic might perhaps be the source of great profit to Prussia, but could bring only danger and sacrifice for Austria. The war had grown universally unpopular. “The Danes have done us no harm,” was heard on all sides. A vague distrust of Prussia was widely prevalent among the people, as well as in the administrative circles. Beside this, the finances of the Empire were disordered, the deficit great, credit bad, the majority in the Imperial Council upon strained terns with the Government, and all Hungary as one man openly protesting against the unifying tendencies of the imperial Constitution.

More than once Rechberg declared to the Prussian negotiator, and the Emperor confirmed his statement, that until a reconciliation had been effected with Hungary, Austria would not be in a position to carry on a great war, and, indeed, it would be hard even to send a re-enforcement to the army-corps in Schleswig. There was everywhere a great fear of a French attack, which outweighed other considerations and induced Austria to try to keep on good terms, not only with Prussia, but also with Russia and England, and to do nothing that might estrange these Powers from the Court of Vienna.

Serious symptoms had been perceived of a closer intimacy between France and Italy; and therefore the force stationed in Venetia had just been increased by twenty-one battalions. To please Russia, a state of siege had been declared in Galicia on the 24th of Feb­ruary, and the final coup de grâce was thus given to the Polish Rebellion, which was still alive in that country; but in consequence, the garrisons there had to be strengthened. From England the news came that Lord Palmerston had declared in open Parliament that the criminal German war against Denmark had been made doubly heinous by the violation of the Jutland frontier; and it was at the same time learned that he was making every possible effort to induce the Emperor Napoleon to favor an intervention in aid of the Danes.

And just now this most feared and most hated of men was wrinkling his brow and suggesting to the Austrian ambassador the possibility of a diplomatic media­tion on the part of the two Western Powers, while he rather seriously (probably to give Prussia a slight hint of his displeasure at her increasing intimacy with Austria) made the inquiry in Berlin, whether it was the intention of the Government soon to call back the troops from Jutland; to which Bismarck replied by asking whether the neutral Powers would perhaps be willing to insure the protection of the troops in Schles­wig against Danish attacks. In view of all this, the Prussian proposal to occupy not only Kolding, but also all Jutland, seemed to the Vienna Cabinet in the highest degree dangerous, as almost certain to cause Napo­leon and Lord Palmerston to unite upon some hostile plan.

All these fears and distresses will serve the present observer only as new proofs of the abnormal and disorganized state of affairs in Germany. The Foreign Powers had recognized, although with reluctance, the justice of the ends proclaimed by Austria and Prussia as the object of the war: namely, the protection of Schleswig against the threatened incorporation into Denmark. Now, by what international law in the world could the right to make use of that unavoidable element of warfare, an advance into the enemy’s country, be at this time called into question? or by what logic could military occupation be construed into an attempt to make a permanent conquest of Jutland?

This is so palpably evident, that only the most evil intentions could seize upon such an excuse for hostility; and King William in his letter had plainly enough said what the honor of a great nation in such a case demanded. That there was no need, however, of worrying about such an event, was emphasized by Moltke in his plain language : “As Napoleon did not attack us on account of Schleswig, he certainly will not do so on account of Jutland.”

In spite of all this, Manteuffel had great difficulty in representing in Vienna the force of the Prussian position. He was, it is true, graciously received by the Emperor and heartily welcomed by Rechberg; but he found the generals, though very polite, not so cordial as in former years. With regard to Jutland, at the very first mention of the subject he was told that noth­ing could be definitely decided until further news should come from Paris, especially about Bismarck’s proposition that the Great Powers should guarantee the protection of Schleswig against hostile attacks, in place of an occupation of Jutland. Some time was spent in thus waiting, although Bismarck immediately replied to this by saying that his remarks about such a guaranty had been nothing more than a rhetorical figure, and that Talleyrand had understood it just as it had been meant; that, indeed, both of them knew very well no such guaranty was at all practicable.

Meanwhile, Manteuffel discussed with the Emperor and Rechberg the second portion of his commission, the subordination of the Lesser States. On this point they were at once agreed; for Beust’s policy in favor of Augustenburg was condemned by the neutral Powers more severely than by Austria and Prussia. It was agreed that the plans adopted in Wurzburg, namely, the summoning of the Holstein Estates and the march of South German troops to Holstein, must at all events be hindered, even, if need be, by force of arms. If the majority of the Confederation should proceed to recognize the title of Augustenburg, and receive his ambassadors at their courts, then the two Great Powers would, with a protest against such measures, recall their deputies from Frankfort and thenceforth take into their own hands the conduct of German as well as Holstein affairs.

This was entirely consonant with Bismarck’s senti­ments. To be sure, the Viennese were especially energetic in expressing these opinions, simply because they were firmly convinced that it would not finally come to such extreme measures, but that a strong diplomatic pressure would be quite sufficient to gain the end desired.

While awaiting the news from Paris, the military questions were also talked over. General Hess, the most influential of all, declared the projected advance into Jutland to be, from a strategic point of view, a mistake; for it would extend too much the line of operations and expose many weak points to dangerous flank-attacks from the Danes. A very detailed memorial drawn up by General Huyn in defence of this theory was sent to Berlin. It asserted that the object of the war was the occupation of Schleswig, and this did not require an invasion of Jutland, but rather the taking possession of Düppel and Alsen; the advance into Jutland would split up the forces and make it possible for the Danes to overcome with superior numbers each one of the isolated divisions.

“A genuine piece of official pedantry of the old style,” was Moltke’s criticism. “The occupation of Schleswig is not the object of the war, but merely a means, in itself insufficient, of attaining the real end, the establishment of a legitimate and law-abiding state of things in the Duchies. All misgivings about the advance into Jutland and the lengthening of our line of operations are removed by the simple consideration of the strength of the respective forces: the Danes have today not more than 34,000 active men in the field; of these they can collect at the very most 27,000 for an offensive attack; but we have 31,000 at Kolding, 29,000 in the vicinity of Düppel, besides 5,000 men in Holstein. So that nothing can be more opportune for us than any attempt to attack us, and nothing could be worse for us than a total cessation of operations, by which we should declare that we had reached the limit of our powers.”

Manteuffel, on his part, explained to the Emperor that to the seriously-demoralized Danish army no time nor leisure ought to be given for recuperation; that to prohibit the Germans from crossing the Jutland frontier and at the same time to allow the Danes to pass it freely was an anomaly; and that it would be sacrificing a great deal of the European and national influence of both Powers to declare that, in response to the reasonable demands of the army and the complaints of the plundered ship-owners, nothing could be done because of the fear of a possible war, and because of Austria's unwillingness.

The Emperor persisted that Austria’s position was attended by too many difficulties. With almost indig­nant resoluteness he rejected the idea of diplomatic negotiations with France, such as Bismarck suggested to Count Karolyi. Manteuffel replied, however, that the Emperor need not be troubled on that account; Bismarck had, of course, canvassed with Karolyi all possible eventualities, but was a genuine son of Brandenburg, and consequently by no means a friend of Bonaparte; and furthermore the King would have sent to Vienna another than himself if he had intended to propose to the Emperor a French alliance.

Thus they prolonged these discussions for five days without advancing an inch. At last more favorable reports were received from Paris and London. Palmerston felt, to be sure, more and more embittered; but in spite of all sympathy with Denmark, neither Queen Victoria, nor the majority of the Ministers, nor the leaders of the Opposition were willing to commit themselves to a war against Germany.

But Napoleon chuckled with delight at the embarrassment of the hated Lord John Russell. He might, perhaps, have taken up with an alliance with England against Prussia, if England had been willing in return to guarantee to him the acquisition of the left bank of the Rhine or of Belgium,—but unfortunately it was just such ambitions on the part of France that held back English statesmen from taking decided steps against Germany. No definite nor binding declaration could even now be obtained by Prince Metternich from the French Monarch.

Then there had to be taken into account also the defiant attitude of the Danes, which had been aroused by Palmerston’s speeches. They made preparations with all their might,, levied recruits for the army and the navy, were unwilling to enter into negotiations until they should have reconquered Schleswig, and would accept an armistice only upon condition of their retaining Alsen and of the Germans’ evacuating Kolding. Lord John thereupon inquired in Berlin whether Prussia would without any armistice join in a conference. Bismarck replied immediately that she would. So it was impossible for the neutral Powers, in the face of Prussia’s conciliatory attitude, to take sides actively with Denmark, thirsting as she was for war.

Some result was, then, at last arrived at in Vienna. Rechberg’s personal opinion had been, as Manteuffel had believed, favorable to Prussia from the beginning; and now, on the 29th of February, the Emperor also announced that he inclined to the plan of going ahead and of delaying no longer. Yet he wished to have an exact statement from Prussia, giving the reasons for invading Jutland, and also what military measures were projected, so that they could be specified to the Great Powers.

Bismarck replied by telegraph as follows: “The reasons are threefold: reprisals for the capture of German ships, the scattering of the Danish forces, and the breaking down of the Danish resistance to an armistice and conference. No specifications should be made to the Powers beforehand, which might occasion annoying responses, but rather official notice simultaneously with the act, which would deprive it of any political significance.” Manteuffel was left at liberty in the matter of military plans to accede to the wishes of the Austrians so far as possible.

Accordingly, Manteuffel, Werther, and Rechberg came to the following agreement on the 1st of March. Consistently with the original understanding about the occupation of Schleswig, the possession of Düppel and Alsen was to be the central object of further operations; but that such operations might be protected against Danish attacks from the direction of Fridericia, Wrangel was given permission to cross the frontier of Jutland; for the Danish hostilities on the sea justified the extension of the war to the Kingdom of Denmark in its more restricted sense of the term. The Powers were to be informed that this purely military measure in no way changed anything in former declarations; a conference or an armistice would be accepted as readily as ever, the latter either upon the basis of the existing military status, or of the simultaneous evacuation of Jutland by the Germans and of Alsen by the Danes, and furthermore, under all circumstances, of the discontinuance of Danish privateering. Moreover, since in accordance with Article V of the agreement of January 16th the breaking out of the war had nullified the treaties of 1852, the two Courts were to come to an understanding, upon the basis of the new propositions to be recommended by the conference, concerning the position of the two united Duchies in the Danish Mon­archy as a whole.

After receiving the imperial approval, this agreement was sent to Berlin, and there signed on the 5th of March. The corresponding military orders were issued on the 6th.

This new treaty was a curious production, resulting from a mixture of Prussian and Austrian wishes. Prussia had succeeded in obtaining permission to occupy Jutland, in spite of Huyn’s anxiety about too long a line of operations, and in spite of Rechberg’s fears of European complications. But in order that this move should appear to the neutral Powers as merely made for the protection of troops engaged in the main action in Schleswig, Prussia had decided, in spite of Moltke’s serious objections from a military point of view, to begin in earnest the siege of Düppel. Lastly, it was of political significance that Austria had recog­nized the nullification of the treaties of 1852. As a counter-weight to this, however, Prussia had committed herself by agreeing to make it the first demand of the two Powers at the conference that the Duchies of Schleswig-Holstein should have a common sovereign with Denmark, and should thus be united with the Kingdom under the rule of Christian IX. By this a complete separation of the two countries would still be avoided and the claims of Augustenburg absolutely put aside.

In short, Prussia and Austria had arrived at an understanding. The Emperor rejoiced at the strengthened bond which united to him that Monarch whom he revered as an undaunted champion in the struggle against parliamentary encroachments, in marked contrast to the fickle Courts of the Lesser States. Even Bismarck, too, was well spoken of at that time in Vienna: “One cannot love him,” they said, “but one must respect him for his energy and his devotion to his King.” Manteuffel considered these sentiments the chief cause of that sudden wheeling about of Austria in November from the Lesser States to the side of Prussia.

However that may have been, after the Emperor Francis Joseph had once made up his mind, he showed again enthusiasm and zeal for carrying on the war. Inasmuch as it did not seem practicable, as we have said, to increase his land-forces in Schleswig, he was ready to send six or eight large war-ships from the Adriatic to the North Sea in order to protect German commerce in those parts and to break up the Danish blockades,—although it was just by means of a maritime move that England’s jealousy was likely to be aroused upon a most sensitive point.

Rechberg wrote at this time to Karolyi, that if ever again any misunderstanding should arise between Berlin and Vienna, he only hoped the King would straightway send General Manteuffel to them once more.

In Jutland, operations had begun immediately after the orders of the 6th of March had been issued. The greater portion of the Prussian division of the Guards advanced from Holding against Fridericia, took two hundred Danish prisoners on the way, and surrounded the fortress on all sides. A short bombardment of the city by the Prussian field-artillery naturally resulted in nothing. The Austrians, re-enforced by Prussian cavalry, stormed Veile on the 8th of March in a sharp engagement.1 This produced such an effect that Gen­eral Hegermann-Lindencrone abandoned the idea of further resistance, and temporarily withdrew, conveying his troops for safety beyond the Lijm fjord to the island of Mors, and into North Jutland. About the 20th of March, the greater part of the country south of the Lijm fjord was given up to the German occupation.

Wrangel wished to establish here also a German administration, and to raise a large contribution for the benefit of the injured German merchants; but he received without delay the notification that these plans should be included under political measures, which he had no right to put into force without instructions from his superiors, and that for the present he must content himself with demanding from the inhabitants provisions for the support of the troops as is usual in times of war. The Field-Marshal gave expression to his vexation at this fresh reproof by asking whether under provisions for the support of the troops he was expected to include shoes for the soldiers. Roon calmly replied in the affirmative.

Moreover, Wrangel was no more amiable as a superior than as a subordinate. Zedlitz was continually com­plaining that the Field-Marshal, now here, now there, had disturbed by a hasty order some carefully planned arrangements in the administration of Schleswig. The officers, too, were often heard to grumble at the way in which with tiresome restlessness he used to meddle in the details of operations, without showing any trace of having in his head as superior commander any general plan of action. Therefore every one was glad of the presence of the Crown Prince, who had tarried in the headquarters from the beginning of the campaign and with the most unwearied good-nature had wisely and firmly done his best in smoothing away such occasions for friction. The King, therefore, on the 20th of March gave the order that in the future Wrangel should make no dispositions without first consulting the Crown Prince, which, as a matter of fact, meant the giving of the supreme control of the army into the hands of the latter.

With the same zeal with which Wrangel had favored the occupation of Jutland did he, in a report to the King on the 23d of February, oppose the plan of laying siege to Düppel. In this document he says that “ this cannot be carried out without the presence of heavy artillery. The transportation hither of the necessary bombardment-train would take a very long time, since there exists no bridge between Hamburg and Harburg, nor any connecting track between the different railway­stations in Hamburg; and furthermore, the highway from Flensburg to the Sundewitt peninsula has now no solid foundation, owing to the dreadful weather and to the great amount of military transportation over it. Four weeks might pass before the required artillery stood in readiness before Düppel, and this would cause an interruption of all operations. Therefore it is better to give up that plan altogether, especially since the conquest of that little corner of the earth would be no real gain. It would not even lead to the possession of Alsen, since the passage thither could not be effected without the help of a fleet.”

Yet, had these arguments been twice as forcible, it was necessary after the recent Vienna agreement to go ahead and do something. Moltke, too, had gradually withdrawn his opposition, after considering that that town, in front of which nearly half of the army had now been reconnoitring and skirmishing for a whole month without effecting anything whatever, must at length be taken, as a matter of honor especially for Prussian arms, which had not as yet found an opportu­nity for accomplishing anything of importance.

Already on the 26th of February orders had been given for placing twenty-four heavy cannon in readiness; and then, after the decision at Vienna, on the 8d of March the transportation of the same was arranged and the despatch of an additional detachment. On the 13th, the first section arrived, consisting of twenty-six cannon from Westphalia, which were used in establish­ing batteries near Gammelmark on the south shore of the Bay of Wenningbund, from whence across the water at a distance of about three thousand feet the left flank of the Danish redoubts could be fired upon, and at a somewhat greater distance the town of Sonderburg on the island of Alsen and the bridges between that town and Düppel would be covered.

On the 15th of March a fire was opened there, which caused the burning of some houses in the town and annoyed not a little the Danish garrison of the redoubts by destroying their barracks; and then, after the Danes had been driven out from the villages of Westerdiippel and Rackebull in front of the redoubts, a battery could also be set-up on the north shore of the Wenningbund. After the arrival of more and heavier pieces of artillery, it was planned toward the end of the month to proceed to the actual siege, and to dig the first parallel trenches.

Yet the redoubts seemed to be very much stronger, when more nearly approached, than had been at first supposed; and so Colonel Blumenthal hit upon the idea of reversing the present plan of capturing first Düppel and then Alsen, and proposed to effect a landing upon Alsen, to overcome the Danes upon the island in a pitched battle, utterly annihilating them (as he hoped), and thus to insure the fall of Düppel without any further efforts.

Prince Frederick Charles at first considered the undertaking to be exceedingly hazardous. General Moltke, too, however desirable the project seemed to him in the event of success, declared it to be impracticable, unless some ships of war could be brought from the Pomeranian coast to the Sound of Alsen to cover the attack; he would have decidedly preferred a landing upon the island of Fünen by the Prussian Division of the Guards, where the Danes were at the time not at all prepared for an attack. But this would have neces­sitated new negotiations with Vienna, which would very likely have dragged along for weeks, and finally be without any result; and in Berlin, in view of the urgency of England for a conference and a truce, every one was very anxious that some speedy and brilliant achievement might soon be consummated.

Inasmuch, then, as Blumenthal held fast to his proposition with all the tenacity of a carefully formed conviction, and since he importunately urged his arguments upon the attention of Frederick Charles and Moltke, as also of the Crown Prince and Wrangel, persisting that the scheme was practicable, and asking even if it were somewhat hazardous, what great successes were ever achieved in war without great dangers?—therefore the plan was approved on the 25th of March, and in order that during the landing a sufficient force might be on hand in front of Düppel, the greater part of the Division of the Guards was called back into the Sundewitt, whereupon the Austrians were concentrated again at Veile and Fridericia.

Now, the northern portion of the Alsen Sound is more than twice as wide as the southern; and on the other hand, the Danes, in order to support Düppel, had stationed their troops almost entirely in the southern half of the island. So that, although the transportation of the successive divisions of the troops across the northern end of the sound would take a much longer time, yet in return for this there was greater prospect of surprising the Danes and of effecting a landing without a fight. Consequently, the village of Ballegard in the north was selected as the place for crossing; and of course it took some time to get together the boats and pontoons required in the passage, and for the regiments of the Guards to march thither.

Meanwhile, the Danes in fierce engagements on the 28th of March were driven still further out of the region in front of the redoubts; so that on the night of the 29th the first trench could be dug at about one hun­dred feet in front of the enemy’s works. It could, however, be furnished only with a few mortars, since the heavier and more effective artillery had to be sent to Ballegard to cover the passage and to protect it against Danish ships of war. The weather was very auspicious, the sea quite quiet, and the night of the 2d of April was chosen for the landing. Twenty-six battalions were assembled in Ballegard and its vicinity.

At midnight everything was ready. But just at that moment the weather changed suddenly, and the sea became so boisterous that every sailor and pontoonier declared the passage out of the question.

After all these preparations, by which the plan had been made known to many thousand men, it could no longer be hoped that the Danes would be surprised, as was necessary, in a later venture. Indeed, all the argu­ments against this plan of action now made themselves felt, after this miscarriage, with redoubled force; and it went almost without saying that the long-postponed siege of Düppel should now at last be undertaken with as much energy and haste as possible. The number of heavy pieces of artillery, too, had meanwhile been doubled, and was soon quadrupled by fresh re-enforcements. Everything was soon in readiness for opening upon the redoubts an overwhelming fire.

While these military deliberations were being carried on in the vicinity of Düppel, Prussia went through a few naval episodes, which could be looked upon as propitious signs of future maritime feats. On the 16th of March a battalion of Schlegell’s Brigade successfully crossed, though in a violent storm, the arm of the sea that separates the island of Fehmarn from the Holstein coast, and upon surprising the Danish garrison on the island, took prisoner every one of the enemy thus taken unawares. On the 17th of March, Captain Jachmann with two screw-corvets and one wheel-steamboat, carrying altogether forty-three cannon, put out to sea from Swinemünde to reconnoitre the Danish fleet under Rear Admiral Dockum, which consisted of six ships with one hundred and eighty-three cannon, and lay off Rügen eastward from Arcona. In spite of the tremen­dously superior force of the enemy, Jachmann attacked them boldly, kept up an exchange of shots for two hours, did considerable damage to a Danish frigate, and then, amid the enthusiastic exultation of the people, brought back his light vessels, well preserved, if not wholly without damage, safely into port again. To the astonishment of the whole world, the initiative and fearless courage in making an attack were here seen only on the German side, and on the part of that famous old Maritime Power, Denmark, only the most cautious and well-considered movements in her own self-defence.

CHAPTER III.

THE STORMING OF DÜPPEL.

It grew, in very truth, more and more desirable by the end of March for Prussia to confirm and strengthen her position as a Power in Europe by some effective and brilliant success of her arms. For the time was drawing near, when the attitude of the Great Powers to the German-Danish question must be once for all decided. It was evidently then of the greatest consequence, in what light the figure of Prussian power should stand before the eyes of the European Nations.

We have seen above that Denmark had sharply rejected the English proposals fora conference of the signers of the London Protocol of 1852, always persisting in the belief that if the state of war were only continued long enough, the other Powers would at last interfere in her favor, and perhaps, too, the internal quarrelling in Germany would excite a civil war in that country itself. Palmerston’s speeches continually strengthened this assurance; and when, at that time, the elections were held for the Danish General Council, the former Minister, Hall, and Monrad, the succeeding manager of state affairs, vied with each other in representing forcibly to the electors that Denmark would never renounce her union with Schleswig and would never permit a union of Schleswig with Holstein.

Soon after this it became evident how correctly Moltke had foretold the effect of the occupation of Jutland. Although this occupation actually affected for the first few weeks only a small portion of the country, yet it was clear that Copenhagen would soon lose all its revenues and recruits from Jutland. This was felt so strongly that the Danish Government deter­mined to secure the good-will of England by yielding a point—for the first time. Denmark declared herself ready to take part in a conference, upon the basis of the treaties of 1852. Lord John Russell had, indeed, in his eagerness to bring about a conference, several times said that for his part any conference would be acceptable, with or without a basis, with or without a truce. He now hastened to communicate Denmark’s proposal to Berlin and Vienna, with the observation, that if Germany did not wish to accept the treaties of 1852 as a basis of negotiations, they might perhaps be termed a starting-point.

As Bismarck, however, emphatically rejected this also, and Rechberg, in consideration of the public opinion of Germany, seconded him, Lord John made up his mind that Denmark or any other Power might be left to choose for herself any starting-point, but without thereby binding the others in any way. He concluded that the warring parties were ready for the conference, and proclaimed that the object of it was to seek means for restoring peace. Inasmuch as Russia and Sweden had long ago expressed their assent, he now repeated officially and urgently the frequently announced invitation to the only one that still remained aloof, the Emperor Napoleon, who at last complied, in the sure hope that this attempt at mediation would also fail. The invitation was also sent on the 25th of March to the German Confederation, which was certainly not to be left out in the proceedings of 1864, since its not having taken part in the London Protocol of 1852 had had such inconvenient consequences.

At other times the principle had, indeed, been recognized, that wherever Austria and Prussia had a voice in counsel, the Confederation was virtualiter, as it was called, represented and bound. But in this instance both Cabinets were of the opinion that the Confederate Diet must send a special representative to London, that the latter might be convinced with his own eyes of the impossibility of reaching his ideal, and that vice versa the Foreign Powers might be made to see the wild and threatening fermentation that was going on among the German people, and appreciate the moderation of the two Cabinets.

Therefore, in reply to England’s proposal, that the conference should be opened on the 12th of April, Bismarck replied that that day was as convenient for Prussia as any other, but that official assent could not be given until it should be learned (as was not yet the case) that the German Confederation had accepted the invitation to be represented. For without the German Confederation the results of the conference would not be legitimate; and in no case could Prussia and Austria consent to become the executors of the decisions of the spirits of the Confederate Diet into lively commotion. Since Prussia’s bold conduct in Holstein, the majority in the Taxis palace seemed to have had its wings cut. At the last Wurzburg conference Beust’s proposal of warlike preparations had not met with the least favor; the old determination had been persisted in, of advocating the summoning of the Holstein parliament, the re-enforcement of the troops in the Duchy, and the speedy recognition of Augustenburg. But even for the adoption of these measures there was no longer in Frankfort sufficient courage nor unity.

On the 11th of February the committees, on the basis of the memorial of Pfordten, had reported that the London Protocol was not binding upon the Confedera­tion, nor in point of fact practicable, and that conse­quently the Danish deputy, who had been sent on the ground of the same, should not be received; but the committee was to report further on the question of the succession. But on the 25th, the first point of the committee’s report was rejected, and the last two accepted with only nine votes against seven. When, on the 3d of March, the motion of the Great Powers, to place the Confederate troops also under the supreme command of Wrangel, and to establish a common civil administration for Schleswig-Holstein, was put to vote, it was a tie; so that the motion was consigned to the committees for a thorough examination.

Thus the majority were still strong enough to hinder, but not themselves to pass any positive decrees. Bavaria proposed the strengthening of the Confederate troops in Holstein with the continued independence of Hake; Hanover demanded the declaration of a Confed­erate war against Denmark, in which of course Wrangel should receive the supreme command; Saxony also would be contented with this; Darmstadt even wished to recognize the Field Marshal already as commander­in-chief, if only the question of the succession were kept open.

While all these proposals were being further dis­cussed in the committees, the Austrian Government sent the Archduke Albrecht to Munich, to represent to the Bavarian Court the motives and aims of the imperial policy and to urge in every way its acceptance. But the Bavarians persisted in considering the motives improper and the aims insufficient; and the Archduke was obliged to leave Munich without having accom­plished his task.

Immediately after this, on the 8th of March, King Max grew ill. In consequence of a very insignificant wound, the left side of his breast became inflamed with erysipelas, which disturbed the circulation of the blood and then induced blood-poisoning; so that at noon on the 10th, death ensued, much sooner than the physicians anticipated. The sorrow at the loss of this excellent Prince was universal in Munich and throughout the whole of Bavaria; and sincere sympathy was felt far beyond the boundaries of the kingdom. We may be allowed here to introduce a few remarks concerning the event, from the report of the Prussian ambassador.

“One cannot exactly say,” wrote Arnim, “that the King fell a victim to the excitement and mental pain caused by the recent political complications; but after the presumptuous Munich authorities had by their insolence, which has not been censured enough, in a measure forced his return to his home, and after that vainest of all conceited professors, Pfordten, had deceived him with regard to the actual state of things, and had by officious counsel caused him to compromise himself by an unfortunate communication: then the King had fallen into a situation from which perhaps it is no misfortune to have been freed. There had been a burden laid upon his soul which he could not bear. With no gradual transition he had at once come into contradiction with his traditions and inclinations. Between the obligations undertaken and the impossibility of fulfilling them he saw no satisfactory compromise. The mission of the Archduke Albrecht had aroused into redoubled liveliness all the doubts and anxieties which were natural under the circumstances. These inner struggles must have exerted the most injurious effect upon his bodily health, and have reduced his power of resisting the disease. His heart was full of generous feeling, and his spirit purified by earnest effort and by the intercourse, always sought for by him, with the noblest men of thought in his times. What was wanting in him was for the most part due to his ill-health.”

It will hardly be possible to believe that, in the case of his having lived longer, King Max would have been able to change materially the course of events, yet his death was for the Wurzburg Coalition also a serious loss.

His young son, Louis II., soon showed that he possessed, by the side of many idiosyncrasies in private life, an acute faculty for comprehending situations and for forming decisions quickly, as well as also a thoroughly independent will. But at this time he was hardly out of his boyhood’s years, during which he had been kept utterly in ignorance of business affairs, so that he had not the least knowledge of men and things connected with German politics. Consequently, he was obliged for a time to give the ministers of his father free course, and in so doing to lay upon them a doubly great responsibility.

This involved the impossibility of introducing any marked change into the policy hitherto pursued, or even of taking any decisive steps in the carrying out of that line of conduct adopted by King Max: the third German state hung for the time like a dead weight of lead upon the feet of Confederate politics. It is true that on the 12th of March, in accordance with the directions of the deceased King, Pfordten brought forward in Frankfort a formal motion to recognize Augustenburg, and succeeded in gaining for it a small majority, so that it was not at once buried by being relegated to the committees; but he himself did not dare, in the face of the threatened opposition of the Great Powers, to push it to the point of being voted upon as a decree.

It was under such circumstances as these that the Confederation on the 26th of March received the invi­tation from England to be represented in the conference to be opened in London on the 12th of April. Inas­much as Lord John in the invitation no longer men­tioned the treaties of 1852, there was no real reason why the Lesser States should on principle refuse to accept it. It was also agreed among the deputies that this time the Confederation was not to be represented by the Great Powers nor by a delegation from any one state, but by some one person chosen and instructed by the Confederation.

With this in mind Roggenbach and Schrenck tried with all their might to secure before the opening of the convention the recognition of Augustenburg by the Confederation, so that there would need to be in the conference a special representative of the new Duke. But Würtemberg retorted that that would mean so much as a refusal to join in the conference; and Beust, who gradually began to appreciate the hopelessness of his former wishes, now expressed himself emphatically against a premature recognition of Augus­tenburg and the consequent unavoidable break with the Great Powers.

This settled at once the personal question about the representative to the conference. Bismarck gained Austria’s vote for Beust, who for his part felt not a little flattered at this token of confidence from the Great Powers, while Schrenck in Munich made a wry face at the news that the prospects for the election of Pfordten by the Diet were doubtful. The instructions that the Confederation should give its representative formed a second subject of discussion. Rechberg demanded the recognition of the integrity of the Danish State; Schrenck and Roggenbach, on the contrary, insisted that the hereditary claim of the Augustenburgs should be represented.

Opinions were directly opposed to each other, until at last Bismarck, with an observation of sound common­sense, fixed upon a platform for common action. “We are all agreed,” he said, “in the wish to preserve, so far as can possibly be done, the rights of the Duchies; we differ only in our views as to the path that leads to this goal.” “Therefore,” he wrote to Sydow on the 8d of April, “ we must act upon the basis of those principles in regard to which we are agreed. The essential point of the instructions to be given to the ambassador must be, to work for the independence of the Duchies, to defend at all times and in all directions their rights and their interests, and to secure for the same every obtainable guaranty.” This was convincing, and on the 6th of April the committee brought forward the proper motion in the Confederate Diet. There was no doubt of its being passed; but just as certainly was Bismarck right in sending word to London, that it would be quite impossible in the order of business of the Diet to con­clude the matter, to choose the representative, and at any rate to insure the arrival of the latter in London before the 12th of April, and that consequently the first session of the conference would have to be put off at least a week.

This news was welcome in the headquarters at Düppel; for although it would not have been posi­tively impossible to finish the preparations for the siege before the 12th of April, yet the time was hardly sufficient Indeed, the French military plenipotentiary, Count Clermont-Tonnerre, who was present at head­quarters, repeatedly asserted that the Danish redoubts were so strong that it would take months to prepare properly for the storming of them.

Nevertheless, after the 3d of April, the Colonel of the Artillery, Colomier, and the Colonel of the Engineers, Mertens, displayed a systematic and effective energy in going ahead. The command of the opera­tions was then, on the 8th of April, intrusted to General von Hindersin. Along the whole line of the semicircle that surrounded the redoubts there continually arose new batteries, which covered the enemy’s works with immense masses of iron; and from the northern flank of the line, near Rackebull, the enemy’s batteries on the shore of Alsen were covered, as was also from Gammelmark the city of Sonderburg with its barracks and military magazines. Although this last circumstance had been announced to the Danes beforehand on the 2d of April, all the inhabitants had not yet left the city; so that a number of these, among them several women and children, were killed by the Prussian guns.

This fact seemed to the Danish sympathizers in Eng­land to offer an opportunity for reading a lecture to the detested Germans. Sir Andrew Buchanan sent a private note to Bismarck on the 6th of April, with the inquiry, whether it was true that Sonderburg had been bombarded without warning? whether women and children had perished? and whether the Prussian Government sanctioned such conduct? The Minister with proud composure replied that he had received no report about the matter; but that he was exceedingly surprised at being taken to task in that way by a friendly Government, and should answer only an official communication on the subject.

Thereupon, there followed a pouring torrent of indig­nant philanthropic sentiment and venomous wrath from the German-haters in both Houses of Parliament. Especially the pious Lord Shaftesbury fairly overflowed in furious protestations that after such monstrous deeds Prussia no longer deserved to be counted among the civilized nations. Lord Palmerston, mindful of the smarting rejoinder received the day before by Sir Andrew, contented himself with saying that one could not dictate to a Foreign Power the way in which she should carry on her wars, but it might be allowable to express one's opinion about the matter.

Bismarck took no further notice of these rhetorical exercises in phraseology than to have printed in the Berlin newspapers a long list of those Russian towns and fishing hamlets on the coast, which in the Crimean War the English fleets had with Christian humanity bombarded, plundered, and burned. Concerning the correctness of the cannonading of Sonderburg from a military point of view, a Danish authority shall presently also bear witness.

Those in command of the Prussian army had from the very start determined to direct the main action against the left southern wing of the enemy's position. After the taking of those redoubts the Prussians would be near the bridges leading to Sonderburg, the line of retreat for the Danes. Thus there would be a prospect of cutting off the garrisons of the northern redoubts.

Accordingly, the first parallel trench had been already laid out upon a line between the Wenningbund and the Flensburg highway, opposite the four southernmost redoubts of the enemy. On the night before the 8th of April a second one was dug three hundred feet in front of the first, and on the night of the 10th, still a third, two hundred and fifty feet in front of the second. The last was only five or six hundred feet from the Danish works. The number of heavy guns had now risen to eighty-eight, and their thunders filled the air by day and by night.

As to their effectiveness, the Danish Commander-in- Chief, General Gerlach, who was now in Lüttichau’s place, sent the following report on the 9th of April to Copenhagen: “I consider it my duty to express my convictions about the further defence of Düppel. Since the 7th of April the superiority of the Prussian artillery is undeniable. The Danish guns are weaker, and some of them antiquated. Very soon it will be neces­sary to abandon fighting from a distance and limit the defence to the preservation of a few guns in the redoubts, with which to repel with grape-shot an assault upon these. The redoubts are being demolished more and more; and the repairing of them by night is becom­ing more difficult The infantry keeps up very bravely; but their strength is naturally diminishing the faster by reason of the unfavorable effect upon them of the bo­bardment of Sonderburg and of the fact that their barracks are no longer secure. Thus the hope for a successful issue is sinking every day. There would be very little prospect of a safe retreat in the event of a victorious assault by the enemy; for they would cover the whole route with a sweeping fire from their fortifi­cations, and a fearful press would ensue upon the bridges. Hence, political considerations must decide whether the struggle to hold the position at Düppel shall continue, or whether this portion of the army shall be saved by a voluntary retreat.”

It is plain that Gerlach had the same conviction with regard to Düppel as De Meza two months before felt about the Dannevirke. But the ill-treatment which his predecessor had received on account of the same frightened Gerlach from acting quite so independently. Therefore he laid the matter before the Ministry, and at once received the reply by telegraph: that the position at Düppel must at all events be defended.

A few days later a despatch came from the Minister of War, Lundby, to the effect that the maintenance of this position was of supreme importance in view of the impending conference. This was, however, followed by the additional observation, that it was not the intention of the Ministerial Council to interfere in any way with the freedom of the General to act as he saw fit. That was an observation worthy of the demagogues that were then in power in Copenhagen!—an observation that was meant in any case to roll the responsibility from their shoulders and to throw it upon the unfortunate officer.

Meanwhile, the effectiveness of the Prussian batteries increased daily. By the 13th of April their guns numbered one hundred and eighteen. The redoubts had been levelled by the huge missiles to shapeless piles of earth. The embrasures and blinds had been demol­ished, and it was impossible to remain within the works. The Danes replied only with rare shots. The troops, with the exception of a few observation posts, had been withdrawn from the redoubts, and were concealed behind them in holes in the ground. The strength of the four regiments which had chiefly occupied this point sank in a few days from 6,400 to 4,200 men.

Already the Prussian commanders considered the storming of the town advisable; but in Berlin there were misgivings from the fear lest with a distance of six hundred feet between the foremost of the parallel trenches and the redoubts, the assaulting columns should suffer too great loss before reaching the foot of the enemy’s works. It was therefore decided to dig out a fourth parallel two hundred feet in advance of the third. This was done on the night of the 14th of April, after the enemy’s outposts had been chased back into the redoubts by a sudden attack.

Then Gerlach telegraphed to Lundby that the assault was expected every moment; if it came soon, an attempt must be made at resistance, since a few days more were necessary for rendering the island of Alsen safe; and that therefore he begged that the supreme command might have its hands free. Lundby replied that the General had carte blanche in military as also in political questions. Thereupon Gerlach sent the chief of his staff to Copenhagen, and received word from there by telegraph, that the Government persisted in its view of the political importance of holding on, even if that resulted in comparatively heavy losses. Then, on the 15th, General Gerlach planned to get some breathing space by a last desperate effort, in making a common sally in concert with the war-ships. This attempt, however, was given up, because the admiral of the fleet refused to run into the Wenningbund. The impending catastrophe was awaited in mute despair.

Prince Frederick Charles had meanwhile settled upon the 18th of April for the assault, and had given out the proper instructions. To begin with, the six southern­most redoubts were to be attacked, each by a column consisting of infantry, pioneers, and artillery, altogether of about 8,000 men. Each redoubt gained by the stormers was to be held by them; and everything else, the assault of a second line of fortifications behind the large works, as well as the capture of the tête-de-pont, was to be left to reserves kept in readiness.

General Gerlach had about 2,500 men in the six redoubts that were in immediate danger. In the whole position at Düppel were in round numbers 10,000 men, beside a brigade of somewhat more than 2,000 men kept as a reserve near Sonderburg, upon the island of Alsen. The rest of the troops that were at his disposal, about 7,000 men, were distributed in the different parts of the island to repulse any Prussian attempts to land.

On the 17th of April all the Prussian batteries kept up a murderous fire all day long, in the course of which the Danish soldiers, with the exception of those in the observation-posts, withdrew again behind the redoubts. After this firing had ceased late in the evening, the storming columns at about two o'clock in the night moved forward into the front parallel, while the reserves took up their position behind these. In the gray of the morning the batteries opened their fire again, which lasted for hours, so that the Danish officers believed the day would pass like the previous one without further signs of an attack, and allowed the bulk of their troops again to seek shelter behind the redoubts.

But suddenly, just as the clocks struck ten, the can­nonading ceased, and at the same moment the storming columns sprang out of the parallel and rushed forward. In a few minutes they were at and in the trenches of the enemy, demolished the obstructions,—it was here that the pioneer Klinke, in order to open the way between the palisades for his comrades without loss of time, instantly set fire to a sack of powder, blowing the pales and himself into atoms,—and scaled the breast­works, in some cases even before the Danes hastening from within had reached the summit Hardly a half hour had passed, before all six of the redoubts had been captured, their garrisons killed or taken prisoners, and the Prussian banners were floating everywhere above the works.

The triumphant enthusiasm with which the troops had executed the assault impelled them in many places still further, to attack the second line of the enemy’s fortifications; so that General Manstein ordered strong detachments from the reserves to go forward, partly to the support of the others and partly to make an attack upon the four northern redoubts. All this was finally successful after a fight of three hours, which was at various points a bloody struggle. The Danes suffered such heavy losses, and their power of resistance was so thoroughly broken, that General Gerlach no longer ventured to defend even the têtes-de-pont, but led the rest of his troops across to Alsen, and then threw down the bridges.

By three o’clock in the afternoon, every part of the Danish position at Düppel, and with it the entire mainland of the Duchy of Schleswig, was in the hands of the victors. This brilliant success cost Prussia, who had sent, all told, 16,000 men into the fight, the loss of a little more than 1,100 dead and wounded. On the Danish side about 11,000 men had taken part in the battle; and their loss was more than 1,100 dead and wounded, beside 3,600 uninjured prisoners, 118 cannon, and 4,000 guns that were captured by the enemy.

The news of this grand victory called forth great joy and enthusiasm in Berlin. The King received the tele­gram containing the information immediately after the close of a parade of some regiments of the Guard. He hastened back at once in order to announce to the troops the glorious message himself, and then sent to Prince Frederick Charles and to the brave army his royal thanks.

There was, indeed, reason for great satisfaction. The seriousness of the situation during the last few weeks had proved conclusively not only the vigor and the wisdom of the leaders, but also the superiority of the excellently trained troops over the valor of their ill- disciplined adversaries, and thus demonstrated anew the technical correctness of the King’s determination to insist unyieldingly upon the much-opposed extension of the time of military service.

So much the more anxious was the King to express to his brave soldiers in person his gratification: he set out immediately for Schleswig, in order to review on the 21st of April the battalions that had taken part in the storming of Düppel in the very uniforms which they had worn on the day of the fight. The inhabitants of the Duchy everywhere received the Monarch with grateful cordiality, and heard from his own lips the promise, which he had from the beginning meant in all earnestness, that they should always be protected against the unlawful arrogance of Denmark.

Without losing a single hour, it was at once decided at headquarters to take advantage of the success already won. The plan of crossing to the island of Alsen was again given up, from the conviction which was still held, that what might be gained by this move would not be in proportion to its possible cost. It was decided, instead of this, to occupy Jutland as completely as possible; and for this purpose were chosen, besides the Austrians, the Prussian division of the Guards, assisted by a newly arrived Silesian brigade, a battalion of Jager, and a few regiments of cavalry,—all under the command of General Vogel von Falckenstein. His place as Chief of the Staff at headquarters was now taken by Moltke himself.

Without meeting any great resistance, these hosts poured over all parts of Jutland as far as the Lijmfjord, behind whose protecting waters General Hegermann-Lindencrone for the second time retreated before the superior forces of the enemy. Wrangel was as zealous as ever to undertake the siege of Fridericia, although Moltke objected quite as decidedly and upon the same grounds as in his former opposition to the storming of Düppel.

Meanwhile, the adversary did his part in causing these differences of opinion to be neglected. In Copen­hagen, the loss of the position at Düppel had spread a feeling of oppressive discouragement in all classes of the population, yet without fully breaking the determined will of the ruling party: it appears that they therefore resolved no longer to make any useless sacrifices in trying to defend the mainland, but to employ the remaining strength of the troops in protecting the islands, and at first, Funen and Alsen. Accordingly, on the night of the 28th of April, the garrison of Fridericia was transported to Fünen, and the deserted place was abandoned to the Austrians without a struggle.

Moltke immediately urged preparations for a landing upon the poorly defended Funen, in order to deprive the enemy of their last resources, and to give the final blow to the stiff-necked obstinacy of the “ Eider-Danes.” General Gablenz at first seized upon the idea with soldier-like ardor, but then, as afterwards appeared, he entertained serious and well-founded doubts with regard to the views of his Government; and so the plan was for the present given up.

At this time Germany, victorious in Schleswig, offered in its own internal affairs a remarkable spec­tacle. The news of the success at Düppel called forth, it is true, a shout of patriotic exultation in all hearts. But soon this pure joy gave way to party-quarrelling. The great majority of the Prussian people still felt angry over the unconstitutional condition of things and an administration without a budget. This spoiled their enthusiasm at the brilliant victory of Prussian arms; for this was precisely what would lessen the prospect of a change in the evidently successful military system. This feeling was increased by the conduct of the feudal party, which greeted with great ado the fall of the Danish Düppel as the first step towards the storming of the domestic Düppel.

There were at this time in the country many virtuous men, to whom the Constitution and laws about the budget in Prussia as she was, seemed to be more important than the solution of the great national question ; or, to put it in another way, who with full confi­dence expected German Unity to come with the increase of popular freedom, and therefore to this end earnestly longed for the strengthening of parliamentary rights, but in spite of the experiences of 1850, would hear nothing of an extension of the Prussian military power.

These sentiments spread into the other German states. There the liberal parties looked upon a Ger­many led by Rechberg or by Bismarck as fatal to all rights and hopes of freedom. Their joy for Schleswig-Holstein at the defeat of the Danes was now equalled, as the time for the London conference drew near, by their redoubled agitation in favor of the complete independence of the Duchies under their Hereditary Prince; in spite of the blood shed at Düppel, and in spite of the King’s word pledged by himself in Schleswig, they still continued to feel the greatest hesitation at placing any reliance upon the Prussian policy. They still continued to cherish the childlike hope that, in the face of all Austrian traditions and Austrian armies, a German parliament and German Unity could be brought about by popular decrees and by milk-and-water resolutions passed in the Chambers.

Consequently it was not reasonable to demand from the Governments of the Lesser States any great enthusiasm for the glorious career of a policy which they had from the very first day most violently opposed, as being contrary to international and Confederate principles. To be sure, after the events of the last few months, the impulse to resist openly had, in the case of most of them, passed away: with reference to the conference, the Confederate Diet had on the 14th of April accepted, by a vote of ten to six, Bismarck’s proposition concerning the general instructions to be given to the representative, and had, in spite of all efforts on the part of Schrenck and Roggenbach, omitted in the instructions any mention of Augustenburg, sending accordingly as its representative to London, not Pfordten, but Beust. Yet the general feeling still remained discontented and bitter, and was directed just now especially against Austria, who only a few weeks before had, in a circular note to the neutral Powers, assured them of her devotion to the cause of preserving the integrity of the Danish nation, and represented as her only reason for taking part in the war, the desire to prevent in that way further extravagances on the part of the Lesser States.

And on the other hand, what could be expected from the arbitrary and violent Bismarck, who had just given his Austrian fellow-combatant the severest possible rebuff in the great quarrel over the Tariff-Union, and thus crossed the old and cherished longings of the Lesser States ? Could it be hoped that this hand would conduct the affairs of the Duchies to any result desired by Germany ? Indeed, what result was desired by Germany ? What would have at once been satisfactory in Dresden, in Berlin, and in Vienna ?

Among the Foreign Powers much simpler views began to be entertained.

“It would be utterly impossible,” said Count Clermont-Tonnerre in his report to the French Government, “to keep the Duchies connected with Denmark; even a personal union could no longer be forced upon them.” Not unlike this was the opinion of the correspondent of the Times, whom Bismarck in spite of Wrangel’s protest had admitted into headquarters. “ A union of the Duchies with Denmark in any form whatever,” he wrote, “ is no longer to be thought of.” The English ambassador in Paris, too, Lord Cowley, confessed to Count Goltz: “ Whatever one may say, the conviction is steadily gaining ground with us in England, that the people of Schleswig-Holstein wish to get free from Denmark, and that it would not be at all consistent with England's principles to force them back in spite of this under the dominion of the Danes.”

King Leopold of Belgium, when in London towards the end of March, expressed to Queen Victoria his belief that it would be quite as impossible to keep Denmark and the Duchies together as had once been the case with Belgium and Holland; and the Queen agreed with him entirely. The same sentiments gained supporters, too, in the Lower House. An influential member, Bernal Osborne, announced that he should soon bring forward a motion to the effect that it was unjust and unwise to force upon the Duchies against their will the succession to the throne determined by the London Protocol. This was re-echoed upon all sides, since it quite agreed with the general spirit of England's doctrines. Nevertheless, Palmerston and a large majority of the newspapers obstinately persisted in their tone of hatred to German}’.

More decidedly still, although with weightier underlying motives, did Napoleon at this time express himself on the side of Schleswig-Holstein; but we shall give a more detailed account of this later, in a special connection.

CHAPTER IV

THE LONDON CONFERENCE.

The sentiments aroused in the heart of the French Monarch, by the failure of his Polish schemes and of his plan for a great congress, became more and more augmented and confirmed by the succeeding events. Austria had thoroughly angered him by her decree of a state of siege in Galicia, which in the following months had effectually stamped out the last sparks of the Polish revolt. And this Austria, who had incited him to take sides against Russia, and then after empty demonstrations had left him in the lurch, had openly crossed over into the enemy’s camp.

Accordingly, it was with inner satisfaction that he sent on the 20th of March to London, and then to the German Courts, that despatch in which he proposed to leave the settlement of the Schleswig-Holstein difficulty to a popular vote of the inhabitants of the Duchy; knowing well, as he did, how irritating a remark of this nature would be to the Vienna Court more than all others. In fact, Rechberg declared on the spot that Austria would never countenance such a revolutionary proceeding; and he was pleased to find that the Rus­sian Cabinet also maintained the same correct political principles. The Prussian Minister, however, thought Recliberg’s arbitrary behavior was as impolite as it was unnecessary, and therefore exceedingly impolitic. The authorities in Berlin were quite as little inclined as those in Vienna to follow the new Paris fashion of founding one’s own state and government upon a plebiscitum; but the former saw no risk involved in a friendly will­ingness to discuss the question with their powerful and dangerous neighbor, and, as formerly in the matter of a congress, to show a desire to co-operate with him so far as possible.

“ Most assuredly,” said Bismarck in reply to Talleyrand’s first communication to him on the 31st of March, “ Prussia also considers that the wishes of the Duchies themselves ought to be taken into account in the conference, especially so far as these wishes rest upon definite rights and needs.” But at the same time he called the ambassador’s attention to the plan of a great canal between the North Sea and the Baltic, affirming that the advantage of such a canal to French commercial interests would be recognized first of all by the Emperor Napoleon, who had taken such a lively interest in the Suez Canal.

The French Minister, Drouyn de Lhuys, responded to this that it was all very well, but that it was a very indefinite sort of assent to Napoleon’s suggestion. He then explained to Count Goltz that France attached no special importance to the question whether the will of the Schleswig-Holstein people was to be expressed by a plebiscitum or by a vote of the Estates. Two further suggestions, that during the voting the troops of both  of the contending parties should be removed from the country, and that the raising of Rendsburg to a Con­federate fortress was not practicable, met with the decided disapproval of Goltz, and were therefore immediately withdrawn.

Bismarck then, on the 7th of April, expressed himself more exactly. “ Very justly,” said he, “ has the complaint been raised against former congresses, that they have dealt with the inhabitants of a country merely as objects of barter at the mercy of third parties. The conferences that gave rise to the London Protocol of 1852 were also not free from this censure. The pend­ing conference must not lay itself open to this charge. We are therefore glad that France has emphasized this important factor of the discussion, and thus insured its consideration by the conference. Yet, although a very important factor, it is not the only one that demands attention : the existing rights of the Duchies as states, the international treaties, and the convenience of the parties concerned.”

Nor was this an out-and-out seconding of Napoleon's proposal of a plebiscitum. But the Emperor could not help confessing that, as was the case with his proposal for a congress, Prussia showed herself more favorable to the French standpoint than any of all the other Powers. Therefore, in proportion as his hostility to Austria increased, so did his wish daily grow stronger to establish intimate relations with the Court of Berlin.

This was augmented by the grudge which he had borne in his heart against England ever since Novem- her. And this, too, was now renewed and aggravated by exceedingly disagreeable circumstances. At the beginning of the new year another conspiracy against the Emperor's life had been discovered in Paris. It was believed that Mazzini, who was then living in Eng­land, had had a hand in the conspiracy, and therefore judicial proceedings against this great demagogue were demanded in London by the French Government. This was done the more earnestly, since it was also suspected that Mazzini had been supported in the affair by one of England's highest government officials, the Lord of the Admiralty, Stansfield. But the English Government was unwilling, for want of evidence, to institute a legal process against Mazzini; and for the same reason the Lower House refused to pass against Stansfield a vote of distrust. Napoleon could take no exceptions to the legal grounds upon which this conduct was based; but that did not lessen his wrath at the protection of the murderous plot in which he was fully convinced these men had figured as accomplices.

Nor was this enough! On the 4th of April, General Garibaldi, that Italian who next to Mazzini was most hateful to Napoleon and his most zealous adversary in the Roman troubles, landed at Southampton on a visit to his English friends. This famous hero of national freedom was at once received with a tremendous outbreak of popular enthusiasm, in which all classes vied with one another in boisterous demonstrations. Wherever he showed himself, he was surrounded by shouting crowds. Lords and commoners pressed their way to him to offer their homage; and even the Prince of Wales very indiscreetly paid him a visit. For a moment, Garibaldi was the idol of the English people and the lion of English society. Napoleon took so little pains to conceal his vexation at these doings, that Lord Palmerston finally considered it advisable to recommend to his troublesome guest his return to Caprera.

Thus sorely irritated against England and filled with hostile plans against Austria, the Emperor was the more anxious to enter into closer relations with Prussia; and immediately after Garibaldi's appearance in London, Napoleon instructed his Minister to confer confidentially with Count Goltz about Schleswig-Holstein.

Drouyn de Lhuys accordingly invited the Count to a conference with him on the 9th of April. In his usual rather ostentatious and pedantic manner he disclosed to Goltz that England intended to bring forward for renewed confirmation in the conference the integrity of the Danish kingdom and the Protocol of 1852, and then to leave it to the contending Powers to agree among themselves about the position the Duchies were to hold within the monarchy. This seemed to him beyond the possibility of acceptance by Germany; and France, too, was ready to oppose such a programme, which would be pure mockery. Now the Emperor, he said, as Bismarck had correctly foreseen, had favored the general plan of a canal, and had in mind, though subject to further deliberation, a line connecting the Schley and Husum. Since the condition of things established in 1852 evi­dently could not be kept up, and the system of main­taining a personal union would after all satisfy neither party, the best move, in his opinion, would be the complete cession of Holstein and that part of Schleswig lying south of the proposed canal. The people were to be consulted, no matter whether through a plebiscitum or a vote of the Estates. If the people wished to form an independent state under the Augustenburg Prince, France would raise no objections, although she could only regret the founding of another small state. If, however, the vote should be in favor of uniting with Prussia, Napoleon would in the conference make their cause his own. Nor would he in return require for himself any, not even the least, cession of territory, but would be satisfied with the compensation afforded him in open and substantial support in other directions.

Drouyn de Lhuys showed further how few objections could be raised against such a system: the inherent grandeur of the idea, he said, must meet with irresistible success in the conference. He then begged the Count to observe the strictest secrecy, and remarked that towards the English Minister, Lord Clarendon, whose arrival was expected in a few days, he should be in every way uncommunicative and reserved, until he received from Berlin a reply to the information just imparted.

Thus the idea of the Prussian annexation of the Duchies, which was, as we have seen, already in the air, which without any doubt would have been the solu­tion of the problem most advantageous to the common interests of Germany, and which had been formerly mentioned in conversation by Napoleon himself, was now officially communicated from Paris to the Prussian Government.

The London conference was at hand: the decision must be made and publicly announced. How invaluable Napoleon's support might be for Prussia, if it were meant in earnest, needs no explanation. But could it be taken for earnest, considering the always unreliable nature of the Emperor? To be sure, he had, from the very beginning of his reign, always sought to oppose Prussia; and now, after the short Polish interruption, he seemed to have returned to his old inclinations. Yet, like his uncle, he was fond of having more than one string to his bow. It was well known, that in questions of alliance or of war he was in the habit of changing his front very quickly and very readily.

“Just now,” wrote Count Goltz, “it is true that he is seeking our friendship. He recommends to us the annexation of the Duchies, because that would ruin our relations with Austria and the Lesser States, and necessarily bind us closely to France.” On the other hand, King Leopold of Belgium had sent a serious warning to Berlin, saying that the agitation in London, inimical to Germany, was nourished by whisperings from a quarter where it would truly be a great pleasure to see England and Germany at war with each other, in order that this party might then stretch out its hand with sudden energy to secure its own interests. The King then urged Prussia to hold fast to Austria, and not to give ear to the friends of that Prince, Augustenburg, whom England hated.

So far as this Pretender was concerned, his unpopu­larity in Vienna also seemed to increase. The Privy Counsellor, Von Biegeleben, on his way to the London Conference made a short stay in Berlin, and there expressed his rejection of Augustenburg’s claims so emphatically that, according to his opinion, Austria seemed more likely to be willing to recognize an hereditary claim to the throne of the Duchies in a Prussian Prince than in Augustenburg.

King William, in whose personal favor the Hereditary Prince still stood, could not throw off these impressions entirely. He replied to King Leopold that he felt warm sympathy for the Prince, but still must ask himself whether it was Prussia’s duty, for his sake alone, to expose herself to a European war and perhaps to a defeat after the Olmütz fashion. What Bismarck thought of the matter, we already know. He had not yet fully decided to put aside the Prince; but insurmountable hinderances to his recognition remained fixed in the Minister’s mind.

After the King had weighed all these arguments and considerations, Bismarck sent on the 14th of April a reply to Goltz with the following content: —

“ Prussia could assent to the English proposition only on the condition that until negotiations shall be concluded with Denmark, Schleswig-Holstein shall be occupied and controlled by us. Inasmuch as this can scarcely be effected, the King expresses his concurrence with the general plan proposed by Drouyn de Lhuys, although he must require somewhat more favorable conditions for the German element of the Duchies, more especially a more northern situation of the canal or of the frontier. In this regard the requirement would be more moderate, if the second of the alternatives proposed by Drouyn should be decided upon, namely, the annexation to Prussia; but yet the consent of those concerned could not be gained, unless the first (the accession of Augustenburg) should prove to be impracticable. Nevertheless, this first plan would appear to Prussia allowable. We could be willing to see the Hereditary Prince upon the throne; but we should have no interest in waging a European war in his favor.

“Prussia will at all stages of the conference certainly insist upon consulting the will of the inhabitants, about which we are negotiating with Vienna, and upon the proposal of a canal, although Russia will not listen to it. Yet it will not be advisable to call upon the people to cast their votes at the very outset If the vote should be taken now, it would be in favor of Augustenburg, but against any division of Schleswig, and, consequently, not in accordance with Napoleon's wishes.

“Prussia therefore intends to bring forward at first in the conference the demands made hitherto: personal union with Denmark, admission of Schleswig into the German Confederation, and elevation of Rendsburg to the rank of a Confederate fortress, and of Kiel to a Confederate port. Denmark will surely reject these demands, and prefer rather the cession of Holstein and of a part of Schleswig. Then the people will see that there must be a division in any case, and they will make up their minds to it.

“ The same is true of the question, to whom the territory which is ceded shall belong ? Prussia, of course, would prefer the plan of annexation; but the people will not vote for that, until the other plan has proved itself to be hopeless, and the matter is reduced to the simple question: Prussian or Danish? Moreover, the postponement of the decision, so long as the occupation of the country continues, would not be prejudicial to Prussian interests.”

When Goltz, in conformity with these instructions, expressed to Drouyn the desire for a boundary line more favorable to Prussia, he learned anew that although the Minister had followed the dictation of his master, he was himself very little inclined to second the Prussian tendencies of Napoleon. Drouyn, indeed, would rather bring the boundary-line southward from the Schley to Eckernforde than to push it further to the north. On the other hand, after King William had witnessed in Schleswig the despair of the inhabitants at the thought of a possible return to Danish rule, he made the irrevocable resolve, never to yield again to Denmark any German territory, and accordingly to demand in the name of Germany and the German people all the country at least as far as Apenrade. Bismarck, in order to bring matters to a conclu­sion, would have been contented with less; but he was obliged to communicate to Goltz the distinct commands of the King.

Fortunately Napoleon showed himself more friendly than his Minister. Immediately after the news of the fall of Düppel he had sent, on the 19th of April, a congratulatory telegram to the King, and then affirmed that to him the question of race and the vote of the people seemed to be of chief importance; that he con­sidered the line connecting the Schley and Husum as a good one for a boundary, and if Prussia would be willing to accept this, if it should prove to be a last resort, he would hold himself bound to support Prussia’s further wishes; and that for his part he should raise no objections to any other boundary-line, provided Prussia gained the consent of the people to the same: on the contrary, he would do all in his power to secure its acceptance by the conference.

No less emphatically did he express his approval of Bismarck’s proposed plan of action in the conference; namely, first to demand the personal union, “that bastard institution of the Middle Ages,” as he called it, which would surely meet with opposition on all sides; then to propose the recognition of Augustenburg, which was the more certain to be rejected by the conference, the more territory and subjects were claimed for him; and finally, there would be nothing left but the division of Schleswig according to nationalities, and the annexa­tion of the German portion to Prussia.

That all this was to be kept strictly secret, goes with­out saying. It was no treaty that had been struck; it was a temporary understanding which actually bound neither of the two parties, and merely signified for the moment a mutual friendly sentiment. Only with the greatest reluctance did the King make up his mind not to reject once for all and under all circumstances the boundary line of the Schley. Goltz received instruc­tions to impress upon the mind of the Emperor as strongly as possible the feeling of the population as it had been observed by the King himself in Schleswig, and emphasize accordingly the need of their being consulted. This would bring, to be sure, the candidacy of Augustenburg more into the foreground. “ But we do not object to it,” wrote Bismarck, “ if acceptable terms for the German cause can be obtained thereby.”

While these interviews were being held in Paris, the time for the opening of the conference had arrived. However indefinite the understanding with Napoleon was, it seemed very weighty and useful compared with the sentiments entertained by the remaining members of the conference. Of course, in view of the evident justice of the case and the strength of the German army, no one had the boldness nor the inclination to exhibit open hostility to Germany. But everywhere the wish reigned to take as little as possible from the Danes, and to give as little as possible to the Germans.

Napoleon, himself, had repeatedly said to Count Goltz that there was in all France no soul that shared his sympathy with Germany; and several times during the conference Prussia felt the influence of this condition of things upon the votes of Prince Latour d’Auvergne. In St. Petersburg, Gortschakoff protested that the Emperor never would fall out with Prussia, and yet gave unreserved full powers in the conference to Baron Brunnow, who had been with Palmerston the author of the London Protocol of 1852. The English Govern­ment had intrusted its representation to Lord John Russell and to Lord Clarendon, who was known to harbor sentiments unfriendly to Germany since the Crimean War, and who had been but just now eagerly working in Paris against the interests of Germany. The Swedish representative, Count Wachtmeister, appeared with the simple instructions to support the Danes in every way with all his might. Denmark herself sent, it is true, the moderate Minister Quaade; but had appointed for his assistance, or rather to supervise him, her ambassador in London, Baron Bille, a zealous “ Eider-Dane,” and the counsellor Krieger, one of the promoters of the November Constitution.

In the face of all these opponents, Prussia had on her side the Confederate ally, Austria, who up to this time had taken no important step without fear of incurring England's displeasure, and had everywhere protested her devotion to the cause of preserving the integrity of Denmark. Nor was the personality of the representatives from Vienna very encouraging: the one, Count Apponyi, the imperial ambassador at the English Court, was by nature neither clear-headed nor energetic, and was constantly anxious not to spoil the pleasantness of his environments in London; the other, Herr von Biegeleben, was a prudent, earnest, zealously Catholic man, whose leading principle had always been: hostility to Prussia. Prussia, on her part, supported her ambas­sador, the always well-meaning, but only moderately gifted, Count Bemstorff, by sending to his aid her former representative in Copenhagen, Balan, considering him as more than all others a connoisseur in such affairs.

On the 20th of April, Lord John, moved by the fact that the English Parliament was also in session, made an attempt to open the Conference before the arrival of the representative from the Confederate Diet. But Bismarck remained immovable in the determination not to begin before Beust’s arrival; and Rechberg, although reluctantly, could not very well help seconding him. Biegeleben, too, talked over the whole matter in Berlin with Bismarck and Karolyi, and allowed the very slender instructions given to him at Vienna to be supple­mented by Bismarck with a long list of important demands, which should, in the event of the continuance of a personal union with Denmark, insure to the Duchies the necessary guaranties for the preservation of their rights.

Accordingly, the opening of the Conference took place on the 25th of April. The neutral Powers at once brought forward the motion for an armistice. The Germans announced that they wished to report on the matter to their Governments, and at once asserted as without question that in the case of an armistice, hostilities would cease on the water as well as on land,  especially signifying the blockade of the German ports. The Danes objected to this last point, and were unwilling to give up the blockade even during a truce. To the great surprise of the Germans, the Earl of Clarendon asserted his agreement with the position held by the Danes, since, as he said, a blockade was not to be reckoned among active hostilities.

The Conference adjourned until the arrival of those instructions from Vienna, Berlin, and Copenhagen, that were necessary with regard to the truce. The five German plenipotentiaries during the interval talked over among themselves the policy to be pursued later in the negotiations for peace; and in their discussions very marked differences of opinion came to light.

The Austrians desired to put their motion for pre­serving the integrity of Denmark so soon as possible, and thus hold as closely as they could to the principles of 1852. The Prussians were resolved to follow Bis­marck's directions and to let the enemy come on, but in any case to consent even to a personal union only under the most complete guaranty of the freedom of the Duchies from any oppression by the Danes. Beust contented himself with the remark th&t he should sup­port any motion favorable to the Duchies, with the reservation of the right to bring forward further propositions. Here, as at all stages of the war, Austria held back in reserve and played a subordinate rôle, so that the active work, and consequently the leading part, fell of its own accord to Prussia.

Just at this time, on the 26th of April, the first division of the Austrian fleet, two frigates and one gunboat under Captain Tegetthoff, appeared off Deal, in sight of the English coast. Thereupon, all the disaffection felt in England towards the German cause poured itself out in violent torrents of abuse. Newspaper articles and orators in both Houses of Parliament vied with each other. Lord Palmerston very ungraciously observed to Count Apponyi that the appearance of this squadron in English waters during a war which England had constantly declared to be unjustifiable was an insult to the English nation; and that if Tegetthoff sailed into the Baltic, the English Channel-fleet would follow him in order to protect Denmark, and a war between Austria and England would then be una­voidable.

The Danes exulted at this. They took fresh courage and hoped that the longed-for aid from Europe might come; and they determined to hold firmly to their “ Eider-Danish ” rights without showing any cowardly signs of yielding. In Vienna, too, Palmerston's words had their proper effect: Rechberg at once announced in Berlin, that to avoid greater evils the ships-of-war would not sail into the Baltic, and that for the same reason no attack upon Fiinen should be made before a fresh understanding had been arrived at between the two Courts.

With regard to the truce, Bismarck, in spite of French and Russian advice to show a conciliatory spirit, had declared upon the spot that the continuance of the blockade during the armistice would be insufferable and dishonorable for Germany, and that Prussia at any risk forbade it. Rechberg, too, felt that yielding to this condition was impossible, especially just after the expedition of the ships-of-war to break up the blockade; and so he seconded the Prussian proposition to offer, in return for the removal of the blockade, a discontinuance of the demand for war-contributions levied in Jutland, cash payments for the support of German troops, and the freedom of the Danish civil government in that province.

Then the second session of the Conference opened on the 4th of May, and the decision of the German Powers was announced as had been agreed. The Danes responded immediately that only the complete evacuation of Jutland by the German troops would induce them to remove the blockade. To this Bernstorff answered, that if the neutral Powers also wished the evacuation of Jutland, then Germany would consent, on the condition that Denmark on her part should give up the Schleswig islands hitherto occupied by her, and immediately release all German ships that had been captured. To this again the Danes would not listen. But in spite of their resistance, Lord John Russell made the following motion: “An armistice may be concluded under the conditions of removal of the blockade, evacuation of Jutland by the Germans, and evacuation of the Schleswig islands by the Danes. Before the next session, which is fixed for the 9th of May, the Conference expects to receive the answers of the Courts concerned.” France, Sweden, and Russia voted for this motion.

In Vienna and Berlin there was rejoicing at the possibility of concurring with the wishes of the neutral Powers by means of the simple acceptance of the English proposition. But it was different in Copenhagen. It was very clear that something must be done to prevent the trifling away, through stubborn obstinacy, of the good-will of the neutrals; but the Danes were on no account willing to give up the Schleswig islands, which they held to be wholly secure from every German attack, and they thought that if the first Prussian proposition was carried out, they would be able to draw unhindered, under the very eyes of the German army, not only revenue, but even recruits from Jutland.

Accordingly, Quaade surprised the Conference on the 9th of May with the announcement that Denmark must decline the English proposal, but was contented with the Prussian one, and under the conditions of the latter would be willing to accept a truce for a month, during which the blockade should be removed. Balan tried in vain to secure a longer time for the truce, for the sake of German commerce. Finally it was unanimously decided that the truce should be based upon the conditions mentioned, together with the stipulation that neither party should be allowed during the armistice to strengthen its military position or force. The truce was appointed to begin on the 12th of May.

On the very day upon which this agreement was arranged, a sharp sea-fight took place between two of Tegetthoff’s frigates and three Danish ships-of-war, a few miles to the east of Heligoland. The combat resulted in no definite victory, since a fire breaking out on Tegetthoffs flag-ship obliged the Captain to withdraw from the encounter. The cleverness and bravery with which he extricated himself from his dangerous situation, nevertheless, induced the Emperor Francis Joseph, immediately upon hearing the news, to raise him to the rank of Rear Admiral. Throughout all Germany, where indeed the people were not accustomed to naval triumphs, the praise of the brave seaman was sounded, and the glory of his having withstood with success the superior power of the Danes. Indeed, the national feeling had everywhere in Germany taken a new start in view of the London Conference and the conclusions which it was expected would be reached there. “Now is the time,” was the feeling in every quarter, “to show the officious foreign nations how firm and ready the German people are to make sacrifices for the holy cause of Schleswig-Holstein.”

Even before the opening of the Conference, the comittee of the thirty-six deputies in Frankfort had drawn up a document, with the intention of having it signed by as many members of German Chambers as possible, and of then sending it to Herr von Beust in London, to be laid by him before the Conference. It was a reiteration of the three old fundamental and cardinal principles of Schleswig-Holstein's freedom, and a solemn protest against the adoption of any decision about the Duchies without or against their will.

On the 18th of April the document was signed by all the members of the Lower Chamber in Dresden. It went then from country to country, until on the 8th of May, when it was sent to Beust, it had received thirteen hundred and fifty signatures of representatives of the German people, among whom were one hundred and eighty-three Prussians and forty-six Austrians. On the same day the Reform Association of entire Germany issued a manifesto in favor of the freedom of Schleswig-Holstein, and the succession of Augustenburg.

On the same day, too, there gathered at Rendsburg 40,000 men from the Duchies. They made similar resolutions to those passed in Germany, and declared their readiness to stake the last drop of their blood upon the maintenance of them. At the same time a movement spread among the people of the Duchies, to call upon the King of Prussia to unite Schleswig-Holstein to the Prussian-German Nation; and on the 11th of May one of the most prominent statesmen and distinguished men of Prussia, the former Minister, Count Arnim-Boytzenburg, circulated an address to the King requesting a complete separation of Schleswig-Holstein from Denmark, whether as an independent state under the protection of Prussia or as a part of the Prussian state itself. In a few days this petition, signed by more than 30,000 persons, was ready to be presented to the King.

However severely Bismarck may have formerly many times censured the interference of the popular voice in the work of statesmen, he now watched with pleasure the agitation which, as he hoped, would overawe the Conference and push Austria forwards. He commanded Zedlitz to let the agitation have free course throughout Schleswig, and, indeed, to favor it, even if it was directed towards demanding Augustenburg as ruler: this, too, he said, miglft be also propitious for Prussia’s interests. “We will let the whole pack bark!” he cried, in his drastic fashion. And what a noise they made! From countless assemblies and clubs, and from the Alps to the sea, resounded and re-echoed the shouts: “A German Schleswig-Holstein! Separation from Denmark!”

Bernstorff wrote from London at this time: “If we are obliged to demand the complete separation of Schleswig-Holstein from Denmark against or without Austria’s consent, then Austria’s influence in Germany is done with forever.”

Count Rechberg thought so too, and with a heavy heart. He therefore risked no open resistance to Bismarck’s well-considered and resolutely projected plan of operations. The first step, namely, the declaration that the treaties of 1852 were no longer binding, had been already sanctioned by Rechberg in the Vienna agreement of the 6th of March, and in the rejection of the basis demanded by Denmark for the deliberations of the Conference.

Consequently, in the session of the 12th of May, Count Bernstorff was at liberty to announce to the Conference, in the name of all the German Powers, that, since the treaties of 1852 had become void, Germany was ready to consider any new proposition that might lead to a firm and lasting peace without violating any acquired rights. Apponyi and Biegeleben were hardly willing to assent to this last clause; but Beust showed them that just such a reservation had been made in the decree for the federal execution in Holstein, to which Austria had agreed, and which did not in the least affect the result of negotiations. And as Bernstorff persisted in his standpoint, the Austrians finally yielded.

This announcement from Bernstorff kindled a lively discussion in the Conference; in which Clarendon with polemic acuteness and Brunnow with elegiac pathos emphasized the binding force of the London Protocol, and Krieger and Bille, in strange contrast to the spirit of countless “Eider-Danish” programmes, would hear of nothing but the glorious General Constitution of 1852. Bernstorff held fast, naturally, with the greatest composure, to his announcement; and in the next session, on the 17th of May, the Conference voted to listen to whatever new system the German Powers now had in mind to propose.

Bismarck was at first not inclined to compromise himself by responding to this request. “ Our aim,” he said, “is the establishment of judicial security in the Duchies. Since the experiment of 1852 has so signally failed, we are ready to consider any new proposal, but in no way are we obligated to invent such an expedient ourselves.”

Meanwhile Bernstorff reported on the 18th of May a private conversation that he had had with Lord John, in which he had told the English Minister that Prussia could in the next session demand nothing less than the complete independence of the Duchies, and that even a union in the person of the sovereign was out of the question until Christian IX. had proved by law his claim to the hereditary succession. After several impracticable suggestions, Lord John, according to Bernstorff’s report, declared that he very well saw that it would be impossible to hold together in one government the two discordant races; and that there was nothing left but their complete separation and the division of Schleswig according to the nationality of the inhabitants. He said, too, that he would propose this to the English Ministerial Council.

Palmerston had just now endeavored once more to arouse in Paris a common and violent demonstration against Prussia. But he received on the 14th of May the news that Napoleon refused to countenance such a movement as decidedly as formerly, and that, on the contrary, he had instructed Prince Latour to work in every way to bring about peace, but to avoid uttering any word hostile to Prussia, as that would not harmonize with the general tendency of French politics. This was the passing of the death-sentence upon the integrity of the Danish monarchy. Bernstorff’s only fear was lest Denmark might seek a last chance for salvation in Austria's favorite scheme of a personal union. “Every one,” he wrote on the 16th of May, “is ready to hear from us the most far-reaching demands. The least drawing back on our part might ruin everything.”

Even after receiving the report of the 18th, Bismarck had already no more misgivings about going ahead. On the 15th, in an order to Bernstorff, which was soon afterwards made public, he repeated the assertion that after the manifold violation of the treaties of 1852 by the Danes, the German Powers were also no longer bound by them; indeed, he even went so far as to mention the fact that the Law of Succession of 1853 had never been laid before the Estates of the Duchies, and consequently could not be regarded as having ever properly become a law.

This assertion was, as we know, historically incorrect, but had become through the Augustenburg agitation quite a common remark in every German's mouth. It is the more noticeable in the present connection, because of its being the only instance in which Bismarck in the whole course of this great question fell into even a temporary inconsistency. Yet of course it is clear that by such a passing remark of the Minister to his ambassador no harm could accrue to his own State nor any point be exposed to a third party.

Bismarck telegraphed on the same day: “The King has ordered me to inform you that our aim is, in truth, the complete separation of the two races from each other, while we reserve the question of the dynasty, which is of only secondary importance to us. But in order to gain this end without breaking our word to Austria, we must first pass through the stage of considering the plan of a personal union, and must not allow it to be accepted nor yet to appear to have been beaten by our opposition. So soon as it is recognized as impracticable, we shall try to obtain Austria’s consent to the arrangement of things talked over in your conversation with Lord John. The next step is to invite Austria to join us in demanding, in the session of the 17th, the political autonomy and independence of the Duchies as far as the Konigsau.”

Rechberg expressed his assent in reply to the inquiry sent to him on the same day. He favored as ever the removal of Danish influence in the Duchies, but, nevertheless, the confirmation of Christian IX as Duke of Schleswig-Holstein, and consequently the connection of the two parts of the Kingdom in the person of the Sovereign. Yet Rechberg himself had formerly protested against any express mention of the personal union in the motion itself, on account of its unpopularity in Germany;1 but the more earnest was he in wishing it distinctly understood. In London, Bernstorff had great difficulty in making his outline seem plausible to his Austrian colleagues, because in it not only was even any indirect reference to the personal union avoided, but it was the next thing to being in so many words excluded. It was not until after Beust came forward and announced his intention to propose several amendments to the motion, that Biegeleben yielded.

The session of the Conference held on the 17th of May was opened amid great suspense on the part of all the members. Upon the invitation of Lord John Russell, Bernstorff read the following declaration of Germany: “That peace can alone be lasting which assures to the Duchies a guaranty against foreign oppression, and to Germany a guaranty against the periodical return of the present disturbance; and such a guaranty is to be found alone in the complete political independence of the two Duchies which were bound together by common institutions”.

A pause of astonishment and expectancy followed. The chief point had not been touched. What was it, then, that Germany actually desired? The complete cession of Schleswig-Holstein, or the personal union? Finally Quaade asked: “What shall be the fashion of the union of the Duchies? And in what way shall they remain joined to the Danish crown?”

Bernstorff replied: The union shall be a complete one; and then the next thing to decide is, who is the legitimate sovereign of the Duchies.” This did not help the matter any. It acknowledged the possibility of the succession of Christian, but no more than of any one else. In short, Germany still held back in proclaiming her candidate.

What was the reason for this indefiniteness in the most important part of the motion? The thought flew through the ranks of the neutrals: Germany is silent, because her understanding with Austria, complete hitherto, does not cover this point; Prussia wants to annex the Duchies, and Austria wishes to prevent this annexation by the appointment of Christian IX.

Immediately was seen how much the co-operation of the two Powers had actually signified for the cause; at this first intimation of their falling out, the Englishmen and Brunnow fell back again with renewed emphasis upon the sacredness of the treaties of 1852. Latour and Wachtmeister joined with them in averring that the German declaration was no motion at all that could be discussed; for just the most essential point, the dynastic question, was left in the dark as much as ever and deferred to an uncertain future. In long discussions and debates the representatives quarrelled over this and that, over the functions of the German Confederation, over the constitutional treaties of 1852, and over the binding power of the London Protocol.

In all this confusion the courage of the Danes rose. It was they who finally put an end to all the uncertainty. They said they had come to London with the idea that the treaties of 1852 were to be taken as the basis of the Conference. Of course, said they, it was not in their hands to prevent other Powers from assuming other principles as the foundation for negotiations, but Bernstorff’s motion was so far from the Danish standpoint that they could not consider it as even a subject upon which to make a report to their Government. Quaade closed with the decisive words: “We must reject the motion, even in case it should be intended that the succession in the Duchies should fall to King Christian.”

By these words the personal union was discarded, once for all and irrevocably discarded, before it had been proposed, not to say before it had been seriously discussed in detail. Even Biegeleben, its most tenacious advocate, was obliged to confess that it had become necessary to invent some new arrangement.

With this in view the Conference adjourned to the 28th of May, in order to give the Cabinets time for further deliberation and agreement “As for England,” said Lord John to Count Bernstorff as early as the following day, “ the Cabinet Council has unanimously adopted the doctrine that the only possible thing now to do is to divide Schleswig according to her nationalities. England will bring forward this motion in the next session.”