112 CAUSES INVOLVING FEANCE AND ENGLAND CHAP, far-distant Principalities ; and moreover, the evil, ' such as it was, was one which they could not dis- pel by any easy or simple application of force. Austria's It was in this condition of things that Austria k hostiU; suddenly conveyed to France, and through France summons to , . . . , . p -n i the Czar. to England, the intimation oi the 22d ot February. In conversation with Baron de Bourqueny, Count Buol said : ' If England and France will fix a day
- for the evacuation of the Principalities, the ex-
- piration of which shall be the signal for hostil-
' ities, the Cabinet of Vienna will support the ' summons.' * The telegraph conveyed the tenor of this intimation to London on the same day. Naturally, it was to be expected that Austria would join in a summons which she invited other Powers to send ; and to this hour it seems hardly possible to believe that the Emperor of Austria deliberately intended to ask France and England to fix a day for going to war without meaning to so to war himself at the same time. Lord Clar- endon, however, asked the question. Apparently he was not answered in terms corresponding with his question, but he was again told that Austria would ' support ' the summons. Then, all at once, and without stipulating for the concurrence of the Power which was pressing them into action, the Governments of France and England prepared the instruments which were to bring them into a state of war with Paissia. Austria at this period had plainly resolved to go to war if the Principalities should not be relin-
- ' Easteru Papers,' part vii. p. 53.
