Lord Clarendon found himself in an awkward situation; he disliked Palmerston's policy, but he was his colleague, and he disapproved of the attitude of his royal hosts.

In his opinion, they were "wrong in wishing that courtiers rather than Ministers should conduct the affairs of the country," and he thought that they "laboured under the curious mistake that the Foreign Office was their peculiar department, and that they had the right to control, if not to direct, the foreign policy of England." He, therefore, with extreme politeness, gave it to be understood that he would not commit himself in any way.

But Lord John, in reality, needed no pressure.

Attacked by his Sovereign, ignored by his Foreign Secretary, he led a miserable life.
With the advent of the dreadful Schleswig-Holstein question--the most complex in the whole diplomatic history of Europe--his position, crushed between the upper and the nether mill-stones, grew positively unbearable.

He became anxious above all things to get Palmerston out of the Foreign Office.