I fear that I may weary the House with my narrative, but I will not abuse the privilege of reading extracts, which is generally very foreign to my desire.  Yet, on a question of this kind it is better to have the documents, and not lay oneself open to the charge of garbling.  Mr. Grey, writing to Lord Russell on September 18, 1863, says: 

The second mode of proceeding suggested by your lordship, namely, ’to remind Austria, Russia, and the German Diet, that any acts on their part tending to weaken the integrity and independence of Denmark would be at variance with the treaty of May 8, 1852,’ would be in a great measure analogous to the course pursued by Great Britain and France in the Polish question.  He had no inclination (and he frankly avowed that he should so speak to the Emperor) to place France in the same position with reference to Germany as she had been placed in with regard to Russia.  The formal notes addressed by the three Powers to Russia had received an answer which literally meant nothing, and the position in which those three great Powers were now placed was anything but dignified; and if England and France were to address such a reminder a that proposed to Austria, Prussia, and the German Confederation, they must be prepared to go further, and to adopt their course of action more in accordance with the dignity of two great Powers than they were now doing in the Polish question....  Unless Her Majesty’s Government was prepared to go further, if necessary, than the mere presentation of a note, and the receipt of an evasive reply, he was sure the Emperor would not consent to adopt your lordship’s suggestion. (No, 2, 131.)

Well, Sir, that was an intimation to the noble lord with respect to the change in the relations between England and France that was significant; I think it was one that the noble lord should have duly weighed—­and when he remembered the position which this country occupied with regard to Denmark—­that it was a position under the treaty which did not bind us to interfere more than France, itself—­conscious, at the same time, that any co-operation from Russia in the same cause could hardly be counted upon—­I should have said that a prudent Government would have well considered that position, and that they would not have taken any course which committed them too strongly to any decided line of action.  But so far as I can judge from the correspondence before us, that was not the tone taken by Her Majesty’s Government; because here we have extracts from the correspondence of the Secretary of State to the Swedish Minister, to the Diet at Frankfort, and a most important dispatch to Lord Bloomfield:  all in the fortnight that elapsed after the receipt of the dispatch of Mr. Grey that notified the change in the feeling of the French Government.  It is highly instructive that we should know what effect that produced in the system and policy of Her Majesty’s Government.  Immediately—­almost the day after the receipt of that dispatch—­the Secretary of State wrote to the Swedish Minister: