ABSTRACT
The Russians argued, and sometimes believed, that the advance of the allied fleet resembled their own occupation of the Principalities. The Russian note arrived on June 10, just after the Sultan Mahmud had granted farreaching concessions to his Orthodox subjects. The pride of the Russian Czar had led him into his difficulties. Clarendon and the British cabinet understood and wanted to make his retreat easy. Russia would occupy the Principalities unless she received satisfaction from Turkey within a week. ‘The Emperor of Russia seems to have invented a new course of proceeding to announce officially that he means to have war without declaring it. Russia’s peremptory demand had just been anticipated by Turkey’s spontaneous concession. Russia’s demands for the protection of the Orthodox in Turkey were needless, because two recent firmans of the Sultan had conceded every legitimate right.
