those who ought to have been its especial defenders. The Emperor's honour, I say, is compromised so long as we, to whom you are bound with so many ties, are left single-handed in this war; and do you think that so fair an opportunity will be passed over by those who, in their eagerness to calumniate him, have stooped to falsehood? The Emperor himself, I am well assured, would never have broken his faith and perilled his soul to gain the whole world. He is prudent. He may shrink from labour and expense which he may decline without dishonour; and so far none will blame him. But he is under an error, and the error is one for which men say that you are responsible. You will be charged with having broken an alliance between two honourable princes by your unworthy manœuvres. Bear with me. I do but tell you in private what others will proclaim in the streets. You came to us to learn our demands; and when you told us of the embarrassment of the Emperor, the King's Majesty was contented, for his friend's convenience, to relinquish many claims which in fairness he might have urged. Our conditions were detailed to you, and you were told that the Emperor might arrange his own; but we stipulated for adherence to the treaty. His Highness, you were directed to say, was not unwilling for a peace, but with conditions which you cannot deny. I require you, therefore, to say whether, in the face of a treaty which declares the satisfaction of the King's Majesty a preliminary of any peace which either of the contracting powers may enter, which prescribes special terms of satisfaction—although
