Britain, London.
The news of France's surrender left Prince Albert both astonished and embarrassed.
There was no doubt that Prince Albert's wait-and-see strategy had failed again. The Hungarians had proved useless, and the Ottomans had sat on their hands.
But the most devastating blow was France's surrender. Now, unless Britain committed its full strength, any half-hearted action would not only fail to achieve its aims but also damage its prestige.
Although Austria and Britain had both halted further operations after preliminary negotiations, Prince Albert still considered it a bad deal. He wanted to wait until the situation favored Britain more before negotiating.
On top of that, the information provided by the Austrians alarmed Prince Albert. Austria was far stronger than the Intelligence Department had estimated, and Britain's two defeats in the war against Austria had confirmed as much.
Fortunately, the Austrian Navy had not continued its siege of Gibraltar, nor had it burst out of the Mediterranean to further threaten British interests.
Prince Albert chose to ignore the small-scale clashes between the two sides overseas, because even there, Britain was losing far more often than it was winning.
Most importantly, victories in the overseas colonies could not have a decisive impact on Austria itself.
Besides, the great powers bordering Austria's colonies all seemed to have good relations with Austria—quite the opposite of Britain's situation.
As a result, the British Army often had to contend not only with a great power like Austria but also with the local regional hegemon. As the war dragged on, signs of instability emerged both at home and abroad.
At that moment, the City of London was full of wailing. The banking and insurance industries were on the brink of collapse.
The railway tycoons and stock-market wizards from a year earlier were either utterly despondent or