In fact, the removal of anxiety about her open frontier on the east was now worth a quarter of a million of men to Prussia.
But the Czar's neutrality was in one matter distinctly friendly to his uncle, King William of Prussia.

It is an open secret that unmistakable hints went from St.Petersburg to Vienna to the effect that, if Austria drew the sword for Napoleon III.

she would have to reckon with an irruption of the Russians into her open Galician frontier.

Probably this accounts for the conduct of the Hapsburg Power, which otherwise is inexplicable.

A war of revenge against Prussia seemed to be the natural step to take.