understand this. They feel expansive and
good natured at dinner time—they are ready
to listen to things adroitly dropped. After the
fish and Madeira, little angles and asperities
of character are apt to wear away. A cause
is sustained with more wit and heard
with more good nature. Things can be said,
which could not be hazarded in a formal
audience: I have known a matter which
had kept all the pens of the Foreign Office
at work for a long time, brought to a happy
issue in taking up the odd trick at whist.
What I complain of is, that our diplomatists
dine and make merry, and that nothing comes
of it. Lord Malmsbury indeed startled the
diplomatic world by saying, in one of his
remarkable speeches, that an ambassador
was merely an organ of his Government,
and nothing more. But I apprehend that
this was an idea of the true functions of a
foreign envoy, in which its profound originator
will preserve an exclusive right for
evermore.

No man at the head of our Foreign Office,
though as able and indefatigable as Lord
Palmerston, or as honest and laborious as
Lord Clarendon, can attend to the details of
all the business of all the countries in the
world. It is the duty of the envoy to relieve
him of this; to present him projects, already
formed, for approval or rejection. It is the
duty of every minister at a foreign court to
make himself specially acquainted with the
things relatings to that country. If he wait
for orders from the Foreign Office upon very
many important subjects, his mission is an
expensive folly or a deliberate imposition.
Diplomatists being really able men, I wonder
if International Postal Treaties would be such
clumsy things as they are! There is not a
merchant who could not suggest practical
improvements by the handful on this subject
alone. Consequently, I wish that English
diplomatists would mix more with the commercial
classes; and I would like to see a few
more hard-working hands sometimes at the
tables of ambassadors, and fewer stars of the
order of St. Somebody.

It may be urged that a great deal of the
business I have set down here is proper to
Consuls, and that the duties of Ambassadors
are altogether different. If so, I should be
infinitely obliged to any one who would have
the kindness to point out to me what the
duties of Ambassadors really are.

The plain truth is, our diplomatic service
has been allowed to run riot. Instead of
being a most important part of the machinery
of an enlightened and progressive state, alive
both to her own interests and the general advancement
of civilisation; it has been allowed
to become mere useless obsolete lumber—or,
worse than that, expensive and mischievous
lumber. On the other hand the Consular Service
has been remarkably well looked after.
Lord Palmerston's numerous regulations for
the guidance of consuls are models of language,
style, and proper feeling; and although
the circulars of his successors have
not always been so happily expressed, yet it
is easy to trace through them the, same
hearty English rightmindedness. Why is
this? The consuls are men who could be
told what they are required to do. It was
impossible to use the same freedom with
Lord Fiddlededee.

We should have no permanent Embassies.
The objects for which they were established
are gone by. When news was scarce, and
the intercourse between nations rare and
difficult, it might be all very well to have
the power and majesty of a great nation represented
by the quantity of lace on a man's
coat, and the servants in his suite. Now, all
the nations of the world know each other
too well to have need of such follies; and
a black coat and a walking stick are as potent
for all good, as a harlequin jacket and a baton.
For all ordinary everyday purposes, Chargés
d'affaires would be quite sufficient and more
useful. If on any special occasion we require
special Embassies, we can send them.
I would fix the salaries of the Chargés d'affaires
at the larger courts, at three thousand
pounds a year, exclusive of table money;
and at other courts, at from one thousand to
two thousand pounds, which is still more
than is given by foreign governments. If
Government thinks proper at any time to
choose a special man for special purposes,
and desires to invest him with peculiar splendour
and importance, then by all means let
him have the rank of ambassador, or any
other rank, and for salary, pay him what
such special services may be worth; now
three thousand pounds, and now ten thousand
pounds, if the right man cannot afford his
time for less. It is manifest that in all great
international questions this manner of acting
would be attended with advantage, and that
a negociator having special knowledge of the
business in hand, would.be much more likely
to bring it to a useful and satisfactory issue,
than a man who never gave five minutes' attention
to the subject in his life. It is a great
error to make diplomacy a close profession.

The mischief of the existing system is, that
high place is not, as it ought to be, the
reward of services rendered to the State, or
reward of ability; it has proved an inheritance
in certain families, and is considered as
a provision for their dependents.

Office, in England, is notoriously bartered
for political considerations or private friendship;
and fitness and the interest of the service
have rarely anything to do with the
chances of a candidate. We have men enough
in England whose recognised abilities, whose
writings, or whose speeches, show as plainly
as possible their aptitude for the public service.
But our ministers resolutely refuse to
know of their existence. Connection they persist
in holding as the first thing necessary;
and there is a joke on the subject, which has