Mr. Yeaman to Mr. Seward.
Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your despatch, No. 15, of the 24th of May. Any later despatches may have been delayed by the interruption and detention of the mails in Hanover and other parts of Germany, caused by recent military operations there.
The contest in Germany is the subject which now excites most interest here. There seems to be a growing belief at this capital that in some way or other the rupture, its attending complications, and its final adjustment, will result in the restoration to Denmark of the north part of Schleswig. I do not know the definite grounds upon which this hope is based, but I take it to be a deduction from the generally admitted conclusions that Austria cannot hold either of the duchies nor any part of them, and that Prussia will necessarily come out of so heavy a combat very much fatigued; so that in the sequel Denmark may, by biding her time, be able to demand, or will have accorded to her by a general congress, all that part of the disputed territory which is purely or mainly Danish in language and feeling. Without speculating as to the probability of this result, certainly no friend of justice and political morality could complain if it should be accomplished.
The hesitation, division of opinion and feeling, and even preferences for Austria, shown by some of the free cities and smaller states of northern and western Germany, would seem to spring more from a dread of Prussia, and her supposed intention of territorial expansion and her near proximity, than from any positive affection or real preference for Austria. Some who have been quite enthusiastic in the advocacy of a “German nationality” as against Denmark now fear that at Berlin it is only another name for Prussian domination.
This estimate of the views and designs of Prussia has had its effect here, where there is a perceptible uneasiness as to the future and ultimate designs of that power upon the entire peninsula of Jutland. Thus, to a large degree, the preferences and sympathies of the smaller powers in the contest just opening have been determined by geographical situation, rather than by any political or moral preferences by them for Austria over Prussia. Judging by the temper and aims of the two powers in the past, and independently of the immediate aspects of the present strife, and the possible issues involved in it, one would find it difficult or impossible to account for the general preference shown in Germany for the government and the dynasty of the Hapsburgs.
Intelligent observers believe that the sentiment of Hamburg was really for Austria, by reason of the supposed designs of Prussia, and would have been so declared but for fear, on the other hand, of the signal discomfiture that might result from declaring against an armed power literally on every side of that great and prosperous city.
Some of my colleagues of the diplomatic corps commend Austria as having used every proper effort to avoid the war, while others believe that it was really inevitable on the part of Prussia, and that the demands of the people of Germany, more especially of the north and west, for German unity, and the necessity for nationality, seaports and a navy, would have brought war or revolution without the duchy question. The advocates of this view assert that in some of the smaller kingdoms, where government, as vested in royalty and nobility, has declared for Austria, the people are the other way. I have heard the opinion expressed by diplomats that, considering the energy of Prussia, the general tendency of the German mind, the embarrassed condition of Austrian finances, and the relations existing between the empire and its dominions in Venetia, Hungary and Poland, the war will result in the dismemberment and overthrow of Austria [Page 157] as a first-class power. But such important results, though within the range of possibility, can hardly as yet be called probable; and it was with some astonishment I heard those in the employment and the confidence of Crowns say that “such a result would be in harmony with the principles and the tendencies of this age.”
I have been led into these remarks about matters outside of this kingdom by reason of the paramount interest Denmark lately had in the avowed subject of dispute, and of the partial interests she may yet have in its results. Upon the whole it seems to me there has been no adequate cause for war; that its result can in no way be yet apprehended; that end as it may, the good will probably fall short of the ruin worked, and that counting the interests of religion, free thought and constitutional government, Germany and the world at large would probably suffer less in the triumph of Prussia than in the success of Austria.
I am, sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant,
Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary of State, Washington, D. C.