Telegram to the Earl of Clarendon

28th February 1856.

[Enclosure.]

Your letter has been considered by the Cabinet.

Russia should be told that she cannot recede from the conditions which she deliberately agreed to by a pur et simple acceptance at Petersburg, which she afterwards formally recorded in a protocol at Vienna, and which she has within a few days solemnly converted into preliminaries of peace.

Those engagements must be fulfilled, and those conditions must be carried into execution.

As to Kars, Austria, France, and Great Britain have undertaken to maintain the integrity of the Turkish Empire, and that integrity must be maintained.

Russia received no equivalent for giving up the principalities which she had occupied as a material pledge. She can receive none for giving up Kars.

If Russia determines to carry on the war, rather than give up Kars, things must take their course.