This condition has never been fulfilled ; the plebiscite has
never been taken. Now the,question is being revived. Personally we should like to see the Duchies bodily restored to Denmark, but it would be useless to give Denmark more than she wants. In British comments upon the transactions of 1864 we read a good deal of abuse of Palmerston and Lord John Russell. No doubt the heroic course would have been for Palmerston and Lord John Russell to stand by the little country whose integrity Great Britain among others had guaranteed. If only those statesmen had been gifted viith prophetic insight and had foreseen how German policy would develop, they would no doubt have taken all the risks necessary to save the world. But that degree of foresight was not theirs, and it must also be remembered that when the orisis came France, who also had guaranteed the integrity of Denmark, did not care to move. Great Britain would have had to act alone. When we remember the strong German bias of Queen Victoria in those days—a bias shared by the majority of the British nation—we cannot wonder exceedingly that Great Britain refused to do so, however much we regret it to-day.
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