ICELANDIC REVOLUTION. 351 
learn. Certainly no public notice was ever taken 
of them. To prevent, however, future attacks 
upon the island from the owners of letters of 
marque who may be actuated by less honorable 
motives than those which urged Mr. Phelps to 
send his vessels thither, Sir Joseph Banks again 
stepped forward in behalf of his favorite Ice¬ 
landers, and through his kind and benevolent 
exertions an order in council was issued, strictly 
forbidding all acts of hostilities against the poor 
and defenceless colonies of the Danish dominions, 
and permitting them to trade with the parent 
country unmolested by British cruisers. Such 
conduct on our part could not but give ample 
satisfaction to Count Tramp, whose own words 
upon this subject are, “ the peculiar favor which 
Iceland and its concerns have met with here, 
“ and the manner in which His British Ma- 
“ jesty’s ministers have interested themselves, 
“ in its welfare, and above all the security ob- v 
“ tamed for the future, has entirely obliterated 
“ all bitterness from my heart.’ 9 In another 
letter to me he says, when speaking of the*pro¬ 
clamation declaring the island to be neutral and 
the inhabitants placed upon a footing with other 
friendly strangers, I apprehend that the people 
“ of Iceland with the greatest anxiousness expect 
u the news from England, which, being now so 
6C consoling and in every respect so comforting* 
