220 
 
DIPLOMATIC CORRESPONDENCE, 
 
mark, to settle the preliminaries and agree upon terms of peace. Hostilities

were suspended, and the blockade of the Prussian ports raised on the 20th
in- 
stant, to continue until the end of the month, by which time it is expected
that 
arrangements will have been made between Herr Von Bismarck, Count Rech- 
berg, and the Danish representative, Herr Von Quaade, for an armistice, with

an accepted basis for peace. So far as Prussia is concerned, Herr Von Bismarck

will agree to nothing short of a total and absolute surrender of the three
duchies, 
Schleswig, Holstein, and Lauenburg, by the Danish crown; and there is no

doubt that Austria will sustain that demand. Moreover, Prussia and Austria

will allow the federal Diet no share or participation in arranging the terms
and 
concluding peace. The duchies must be surrendered to them; and they will

remain in Schleswig until the question as to who shall be designated as ruler.

shall have been settled to their satisfaction. And so it may yet appear that
it 
was much easier to conquer and defeat Denmark than to agree upon a final
dis- 
position of the conquered territory among themselves. 
The public journals here lately reported that two confederate officers, by

special permission of the King, were at the Prussian headquarters in Jutland,

where they were receiving great attention.  I took upon myself to make in-

quiries into the truth of the report at the Foreign Office, and ascertained
that it 
was not so. The following broad denial has appeared in the official Staats

Anzeiger: 
"The Vossiche Zeitung, of the 12th instant, reports from Flensburg,
July 
10, that two officers of the confederate army were staying at the headquarters

of the allies at Apemade by permission of his Majesty the King. This report

is entirely unfounded. No officers of that army have arrived there. Nor could

an application for permission to remain at the headquarters of the allies
have 
received his Majesty's assent, since the confederate governments of the North

American Union have not been recognized br Prussia as independent states."

I am, sir, your obedient servant, 
H. KREISMANN. 
Hon. WILLIAM H. SEWARD, C., xc., &Cj. 
1r. Klreisrnann to M 1r. Seward. 
No. 23.]                               UNITED STATES LEGATION, 
Berlin, July 30, 1864. 
SIR: The suspension of hostilities between the German powers and Denmark,

which was to have terminated on the 31st instant, has been extended until
the 
3d of August next. The Danish plenipotentiaries are reported to have still
in- 
sisted on a division of Schleswig, and but for this extension the Vienna
conference, 
like that of London, would have ended in failure. Prussia very reluctantly

consented to the postponement, and the King of Denmark must yield to Herr

Von Bismarck's terms, or else the war after August 3 will break out anew.

Some excesses between Saxon and Hanoverian soldiers on the one side, and

Prussian on the other, having occurred at Rendsburg, orders were given by
the 
Prussian commander-in-chief for a brigade of Prussians, 6,000 strong, to
occupy 
that place. The federal commander, to avoid a conflict and bloodshed, with-

drew his troops under protest, and so the Prussians remain in possession
of the 
key to the entire duchy of Holstein. Of course, this coup de main has created

great excitement in all the smaller states of Germany, and the feeling of
hos- 
tility towards Prussia is intense. Austria, too, seems to have disapproved
of 
this proceeding of her ally, from the fact that Herr Von Bismarck has caused