I have now shown the House what was the real policy of the Government with respect to our relations with Denmark when Parliament was prorogued, and I have also shown that the speech of the noble lord the First Minister of the Crown was echoed by the Secretary of State to Austria and Prussia.  I have shown, therefore, that it was a sincere policy, as announced by the noble lord.  I will now show that it was a wise and a judicious policy.

Sir, the noble lord having made this statement to the House of Commons, the House was disbanded, the members went into the country with perfect tranquillity of mind respecting these affairs of Denmark and Germany.  The speech of the noble lord reassured the country, and gave them confidence that the noble lord knew what he was about.  And the noble lord knew that we had a right to be confident in the policy he had announced, because at that period the noble lord was aware that France was perfectly ready to co-operate with Her Majesty’s Government in any measure which they thought proper to adopt with respect to the vexed transactions between Denmark and Germany.  Nay, France was not only ready to co-operate, but she spontaneously offered to act with us in any way we desired.  The noble lord made his speech at the end of July—­I think July 23—­and it is very important to know what at that moment were our relations with France in reference to this subject.  I find in the correspondence on the table a dispatch from Lord Cowley, dated July 31.  The speech of the noble lord having been made on the 23rd, this is a dispatch written upon the same subject on the 31st.  Speaking of the affairs of Germany and Denmark, Lord Cowley writes: 

  M. Drouyn de Lhuys expressed himself as desirous of
  acting in concert with Her Majesty’s Government in this
  matter.

I have now placed before the House the real policy of the Government at the time Parliament was prorogued last year.  I have shown you that it was a sincere policy when expressed by the noble lord.  I have shown that it was a sound and judicious policy, because Her Majesty’s Government was then conscious that France was ready to co-operate with this country, France having expressed its desire to aid us in the settlement of this question.  Well, Sir, at the end of the summer of last year, and at the commencement of the autumn, after the speeches and dispatches of the First Minister and the Secretary of State, and after, at the end of July, that reassuring announcement from the French Government, there was great excitement in Germany.  The German people have been for some time painfully conscious that they do not exercise that influence in Europe which they believe is due to the merits, moral, intellectual, and physical, of forty millions of population, homogeneous and speaking the same language.  During the summer of last year this feeling was displayed in a remarkable manner, and it led to the meeting at Frankfort, which has not been hitherto mentioned in reference to these negotiations, but which was in reality a very significant affair.