received his pamphlet, the title of which stands at the head of this Article, and we shall avail ourselves of his assistance to establish our case. Like ourselves, he holds the Russian declaration of the 31st October to be the most serious blow which public law has received in the course of modern history, and that it must be regarded as the starting-point of a new situation in politics.'

6

The first mention of the limitation of the naval forces of Russia in the Black Sea occurs in a despatch of M. Drouyn de Lhuys to the French Minister at Vienna, dated the 23rd July, 1854. In this despatch, after stating, amongst other things, that the privileged position of Russia on the Euxine 'Sea enabled her to create establishments on its coasts and to develope a maritime power on its waters, which in the total absence of any counteracting force are a permanent menace against the Ottoman Empire,' the French Minister went on to lay down the four conditions or points for which the Allies were contending. Of these the third was that the Treaty of the 13th July, 1841 (known as the Treaty of the Straits), 'should be revised by the high contracting parties in the in'terest of the European balance of power, and with a view to a limitation of the Russian power on the Black Sea.' It is remarkable that this despatch was written some time before the Allied fleets and armies had sailed for the Crimea. Throughout the war and the subsequent negotiations, these Four Points were steadily kept in view. The Western Powers never asked more and would never accept less; they were eventually incorporated in the treaty of peace, and marked the successful termination of the war. But of these points the third, providing for the limitation of Russian power in the Black Sea, was the most strenuously resisted by Russia and the most firmly insisted on by the British and French Governments.*

The Four Points proposed by France and adopted by England were communicated to Austria, and accepted by her as conditions and principles without which she declared that she would not negotiate. Prussia gave in her adhesion to them. They

The same idea had occurred to M. de Vergennes, Minister of Louis XVI., after the conquest of the Crimea by the Empress Catherine. On the 22nd August, 1783, this statesman proposed to the Cabinets of London and Vienna to make their recognition of this Russian conquest conditional, by demanding of the Empress to limit her forces in the Black Sea to a fixed number of small vessels, in order to protect Turkey against systematic aggression. But this proposal was not adopted. (L'Impasse orientale, p. 5.)

were communicated by the neutral Powers to the Court of St. Petersburgh as the fundamental conditions of peace; and the third point was incorporated in the following terms in the Memorandum of the 28th December, 1854, which was the basis of the Vienna Conference.

3. The revision of the Treaty of July 13, 1841, must have for its object to connect the existence of the Ottoman Empire more completely with the European equilibrium, and to put an end to the preponderance of Russia in the Black Sea. As to the arrangements to be made in this respect, they depend too directly on the events of the war for it to be possible at present to determine the basis; it is sufficient to point out the principle.'

The Vienna Conference, at which England was represented by Lord John Russell, and France by M. Drouyn de Lhuys, began its deliberations on the 15th of March, 1855. The siege of Sebastopol was then going on, and the allied armies had suffered severely during the winter. Passing over the discussions on the first two points, on which no serious difficulty arose, the Conference reached on the 19th of April the third point, and more especially the latter part of the clause. An adjournment of seventeen days had taken place in the interval to enable the Court of St. Petersburgh fully to consider it. Russia declined to take the initiative in making any proposal on the subject, though she professed to have accepted the Memorandum as the basis of negotiation. Austria recommended a system of naval equipoise-that is, that the two riverain Powers, Russia and Turkey, should bind themselves by treaty to maintain in the Black Sea a certain number of ships and no more. In this state of the question the discussion opened. M. Drouyn de Lhuys declared that the most natural and efficacious means of putting an end to the preponderance ' of Russia in the Black Sea consisted in the limitation of her 'maritime forces there.' He added that, in point of fact, 'the Black Sea was at that moment in the exclusive posses'sion of England, France, and Turkey, and would remain so as long as the war lasted. It was not therefore for those 'Powers to ask concessions of Russia, but to consider on what terms they will consent to put an end to her absolute exclu'sion from those waters.'

Lord John Russell concurred in these remarks and supported this proposition. He observed that the Black Sea was exceptional; that the principle of closing the Dardanelles had been adopted by the public law of Europe; that of the two Powers which alone command the shores of the Black Sea the one, already very strong, continually augments its forces, whilst

In this

the other is weakened by her contest with Russia. 'state of things England regards the excessive increase of the Russian fleet in the Black Sea as a perpetual menace hang'ing over the Bosphorus and Constantinople. To admit that the Ottoman Empire is an essential element of the European equilibrium, and to wish to maintain at the same time a per'petual menace directed against that Empire, is a flagrant in'consistency.'

The principle of limitation of naval forces was at that time formally rejected by Russia as incompatible with her dignity. But, on the other hand, Prince Gortschakoff submitted to the Conference a document (known as Annex A to Protocol 12) in which Russia rebutted the charge of abusing her preponderance in the Black Sea, and proposed on the contrary to open the Dardanelles and the Black Sea to the naval flags of all nations provided that as the fleets of other States would have the right to enter the Black Sea, so the fleet of Russia would have the right (with the consent of the Porte) to sail out of it. This proposition was absolutely negatived by Turkey, England, and France as totally incompatible with their policy and objects. It was, therefore, on this point that the negotiations broke off, and the hope of terminating the war at that stage came to an end. Lord John Russell and M. Drouyn de Lhuys rather inclined to accept the principle of equivalents which had been recommended by Austria; and those Ministers were in fact wrecked on that shoal. throughout the negotiation the British Government insisted with great energy that the limitation of the Russian fleet should be absolute, and not based on the system of counterpoise, for reasons which are fully stated in the published correspondence.

But

The history of this transaction was written with his usual ability by Lord Clarendon in a circular despatch addressed to the Queen's Representatives abroad, and the following observations deserve to be reproduced, because they are just as applicable to Prince Gortschakoff's Note of October 1870, as they were to Prince Gortschakoff's Project of April 1855. After referring to the earlier stages of the negotiation, Lord Clarendon goes on:

'Russia has asserted that a regard for her dignity precludes her from acceding to the terms proposed by the Allies on the third point. But the dignity of Russia cannot require that she should keep up in time of peace, and on the immediate threshold of her weaker neighbour, a force wholly unnecessary for purposes of self-defence, but enabling her at the shortest notice to subvert the independence of that neighbour,

and to change the territorial distribution of Europe. Yet such is the position which Russia has maintained in the Black Sea, and which she has even now publicly avowed her determination not to renounce.

'It is needless to dwell on the absence of any motive of self-preservation to justify this determination on the part of Russia. It would be a mockery to pretend that she has anything to fear from the hostility of Turkey; and while Turkey is at peace and free from threatened attack by Russia, and while the Straits between the Mediterranean and the Black Sea are closed except to a small and limited number of ships of war of the Western Powers, Russia has nothing to fear from the naval forces of England and France; while, on the other hand, the present state of things in the Black Sea demonstrates that when war exists between Russia and Turkey, and when the Straits are consequently open to all the naval forces of the Sultan's allies, England and France, if sufficient time be afforded them, can collect in the Euxine a naval armament strong enough to sweep from the waters of that sea every ship bearing the flag of Russia.

Russia has indeed alleged that the preponderance which she wishes to maintain in the Black Sea is essential for the security of the Turkish Empire against the aggressions of other Powers; but it is not from the hostility of the Western Powers, but from the traditional, and it is not too much to say avowed, policy of Russia, that the Turkish Empire has danger to apprehend. The present war has been undertaken to provide securities against those ambitious designs of Russia which menace the safety of Turkey and the future repose of Europe; and, in short, to quote the words of a recent Russian Proclamation, to prevent, as far as Turkey is concerned, the accomplishment of the wishes and the views of Peter, of Catherine, of Alexander, and of Nicholas.

'The Western Powers, in conjunction with Austria, have considered that this object would most effectually be secured by restricting within reasonable bounds the power of Russia in the Black Sea. Russia, however, has refused to subscribe to these reasonable proposals; and in their place she has offered two schemes of modification of the Treaty of 1841, the practical effect of which would be, that whichever of the two schemes the Western Powers might accept, those Powers would be obliged to keep up perpetually in the vicinity of the Dardanelles a large naval force prepared to act in any contingency which might occur. For, according to one scheme, Russia proposed that the Straits between the Mediterranean and the Black Sea should at all times be open to the ships of war of all nations, and therefore, of course, to her own Black Sea and Baltic fleets.

'The effect of this scheme would have been, that Constantinople would at all times have been exposed to all the dangers which might have arisen from the sudden appearance before that city of an overwhelming Russian armament; while the tranquillity of the Mediterranean, and all the great interests in that sea, would have been liable to disturbance by the action of a powerful Russian fleet, sallying forth at any moment from the Euxine.

'To guard against this double danger, the Governments of England and of France would have been compelled to maintain in the Mediter

ranean war establishments in time of peace, and permanently to station their armaments at a great distance from their arsenals and resources; so that a peace concluded on such conditions would have been nothing more than an armed truce divested of the security which is the essence of peace, and unaccompanied by that cessation of expenditure which ought to follow the termination of a war.'

In September, 1855, Sebastopol fell. The Allies, or at least England and Turkey, were preparing to carry on the war with vigour in the following spring; and the exhaustion of Russia was, as we have since learned, almost complete. A treaty had been concluded between the Western Powers and Sweden in November 1855, and that Power was prepared to assume the offensive in Finland had the war continued. Austria had also agreed, if necessary, to join the alliance. The King of Prussia earnestly adjured the Emperor Alexander to make peace.

At this stage Austria again tendered her good offices, and the Four Points were presented to the acceptance of Russia in a more detailed and precise form. The third point then assumed the following shape :—

Ouvertes à la ma

3. Mer Noire: La Mer Noire sera neutralisée. rine marchande de toutes les nations, ses eaux resteront interdites aux marines militaires. Par conséquent il n'y sera ni créé ni conservé d'arsenaux militaires maritimes. La protection des intérêts commerciaux et maritimes de toutes les nations sera assurée, dans les ports respectifs de la Mer Noire, par l'établissement d'institutions conformes au droit international et aux usages consacrés dans la matière. Les deux Puissances riveraines s'engageront mutuellement à n'y entretenir que le nombre de bâtimens légers d'une force déterminée, nécessaires au service de leurs côtes. La convention qui sera passée entre elles à cet effet sera, après avoir été préalablement agréée par les Puissances signataires du traité général, annexée au dit traité, et aura même force et valeur que si elle en faisait partie intégrante. Cette convention séparée ne pourra être ni annulée ni modifiée sans l'assentiment des Puissances signataires du traité général. La clôture des Détroits admettra l'exception applicable aux stationnaires mentionnée dans l'article précédent.'

This ultimatum, though presented to Russia by Austria, had previously been discussed with considerable animation by the Western Powers. France had already attempted to lower the terms demanded by the Allies. England had indignantly protested against this course, as an infraction of the alliance; and Lord Palmerston declared, in a letter to Count Persigny of the 21st November, that rather than subscribe to inadequate conditions, England would carry on the war alone with Turkey. On the 26th November, the British Government declared in