Page:The invasion of the Crimea vol. 1.djvu/438

30 G APPENDIX. ' Turkey when she becomes in her turn wilful and wrong- ' headed.' On the 4th of September Lord Aberdeen recorded his conviction that 'should the Emperor reject the modifica- ' tions, the Conference at Vienna must then endeavour to ' make such a joint proposition at Constantinople as will ' induce the Turks to accept the Note in its original form' — a clear indication of his own views and wishes. On the 12th of September the news arrived that the Emperor Nicholas had refused to accept the Turkish modifications, and at a meeting between Lord Aberdeen, Lord Clarendon, and Lord Palmerston on the 15th, it was agreed to urge the Vienna Conference to recommend the Porte to sigu the unmodified Austrian Note, the Powers giving to the Porte at the same time an assurance that it was understood by them in a similar sense to that which it would have more clearly borne had the modifications been inserted in its text. The proposal was at once despatched by telegraph to Vienna. On hearing this you wrote from Eoseneath, on the 19 th, to Lord Aberdeen : — ' The only hope I have is that Turkey may instantly re- ' ject such a proposal ; but even that will not wipe away ' the shame of having made it. . . . It is unwise and ' unfair to propose again a Note which his [the Sultan's] ' Ministers have declared they can none of them sign. All ' this makes me very uneasy, and if the Austrians agree to ' Clarendon's terms, and forward them to Constantinople, ' I do not sec how I can remain a member of your Govern 1 nient.' You expressed yourself in even stronger terms to Lord Clarendon ; and in writing again, two or three days later, to Lord Aberdeen, in amplification of the preceding letter, you say :— ' I had in view the Note of Reschid Pasha, as published