Another day brought us to Vega, noted as the point where Columbus reared his standard above the wonderful interior valley of the island; and there we were welcomed, as usual, by the officials, and, among them, by a tall, ascetic- looking priest who spoke French. Returning his call next day, I was shown into his presence in a room utterly bare of all ornament save a large and beautiful photograph of the Cathedral of Tours. It had happened to me, just after my college days, to travel on foot through a large part of northern, western, and middle France, especially interesting myself in cathedral architecture; and as my eye caught this photograph I said, "Father, what a beautiful picture you have of the Church of St. Gatien!'' The countenance of the priest, who had at first received me very ceremoniously and coldly, was instantly changed; he looked at me for a moment, and then threw his arms about me. It was pathetic: of all who had ever entered his door I was probably the only one who had recognized the picture of the cathedral where he had been ordained; and, above all, by a curious inspiration which I cannot to this hour account for, I had recognized it by the name of the saint to whom it is dedicated. Why I did not speak of it simply as the Cathedral of Tours I know not; how I came to remember that it was dedicated to St. Gatien I know not— but this fact evidently loosened the cords of the father's heart, and during my stay at Vega he was devoted to me; giving me information of the greatest value regarding the people, their habits, their diseases, and the like, much of which, up to that moment, the commission and its subordinates had vainly endeavored to secure.

And here I recall one thing which struck me as significant. This ascetic French priest was very severe in condemnation of the old Spanish priesthood of the island. When I asked him regarding the morals of the people he answered, "How can you expect good morals in them when their pastors set such bad examples?'' It was evident that the church authorities at Rome were of his opinion; for in nearly every town I found not only a jolly, kindly, easy-going old Spanish padre, surrounded by "nephews'' and "nieces,'' but a more austere ecclesiastic recently arrived from France or Italy.

In the impressions made upon me by this long and tedious journey across the island, pleasure and pain were constantly mingled. On one hand was the wonderful beauty of the scenery, the luxuriance of the vegetation, and the bracing warmth of the climate, while the United States were going through a winter more than usually bitter.

But, on the other hand, the whole condition of the country seemed to indicate that the early Spanish rulers had left a curse upon it from which it had never recovered. Its inhabitants, in revolution after revolution, had destroyed all industry and industrial appliances, and had virtually eaten up each other; generation after generation had thus been almost entirely destroyed.

Finally, after nearly a fortnight of clambering over mountains, pushing through tropical thickets, fording streams, and negotiating in palm huts, we approached the sea; and suddenly, on the north side of the island, at the top of the mountain back of Puerto Plata, we looked far down upon its beautiful harbor, in the midst of which, like a fly upon a mirror, lay our trim little frigate Nantasket.

The vice-president of the republic, surrounded by the representatives of the city, having welcomed us with the usual speeches, we pushed forward to the vice-presidential villa, where I was to be lodged.

Having no other dress with me than my traveler's outfit, of which the main features were a flaming red flannel shirt, a poncho, and a sombrero, and having been invited to dine that evening at the house of my host, with the various consuls and other leaders of the place, I ordered two of my men to hurry down the mountain, and out to the frigate, to bring in my leather trunk containing a costume more worthy of the expected ceremony; and hardly were we comfortably established under the roof of the vice-president, when two sailors came in, bringing the precious burden.

Now came a catastrophe. Turning the key, I noticed that the brass fittings of the lock were covered with verdigris, and, as the trunk opened, I shrank back in horror. It was filled, apparently, with a mass of mossy white-and- green mold from which cockroaches of enormous size darted in all directions.

Hastily pulling down the cover, I called a council of war; the main personages in it being my private secretary, Professor Crane, since acting president of Cornell University, and sundry of the more important men in the expedition. To these I explained the situation. It seemed bad enough to lose all means of presenting a suitable appearance at the approaching festivity, but this was nothing compared with the idea that I had requited the hospitality of my host by spreading through his house this hideous entomological collection.

But as I exposed this latter feature of the situation, I noticed a smile coming over the faces of my Dominican attendants, and presently one of them remarked that the cockroaches I had brought would find plenty of companions; that the house was doubtless already full of them. This was a great relief to my conscience. The trunk was removed, and presently the clothing, in which I was to be arrayed for the evening, was brought in. It seemed in a fearful condition, but, curiously enough, while boots, shoes, and, above all, a package of white gloves carefully reserved for grand ceremonies, had been nearly devoured, the garments of various sorts had escaped fairly well.

The next thing in order being the preparation of my apparel for use, the men proceeded first to deluge it with carbolic acid; and then, after drying it on the balconies in front of the vice-president's house, to mitigate the invincible carbolic odor by copious drenchings of Florida water. All day long they were thus at work making ready for the evening ceremony. In due time it arrived; and, finally, after a sumptuous entertainment, I stood before the assembled consuls and other magnates. Probably no one of them remembers a word of my discourse; but doubtless every survivor will agree that no speaker, before or since, ever made to him an appeal of such pungency. I pervaded the whole atmosphere of the place; indeed, the town itself seemed to me, as long as I remained in it, to reek of that strange mixture of carbolic acid and Florida water; and as soon as possible after reaching the ship, the contents of the trunk were thrown overboard, and life became less a burden.

Having been duly escorted to the Nantasket, and received heartily by Commander McCook, I was assigned his own cabin, but soon thought it expedient to get out of it and sleep on deck. The fact was that the companions of my cockroaches had possession of the ship, and, to all appearance, their headquarters were in the captain's room. I therefore ordered my bed on deck; and, though it was February, passed two delightful nights in that balmy atmosphere of the tropical seas while we skirted the north side of the island until, at Port-au-Prince, I rejoined the other commissioners, who had come in the Tennessee along the southern coast.

At the Haitian capital our commission had interviews with the president, his cabinet, and others, and afterward we had time to look about us. Few things could be more dispiriting. The city had been burned again and again, and there had arisen a tangle of streets displaying every sort of cheap absurdity in architecture. The effects of the recent revolution—the latest in a long series of civic convulsions, cruel and sterile—were evident on all sides. On the slope above the city had stood the former residence of the French governor: it had been a beautiful palace, and, being so far from the sea, had, until the recent revolution, escaped unharmed; but during that last effort a squad of miscreants, howling the praises of liberty, having got possession of a small armed vessel in the harbor and found upon it a rifled cannon of long range, had exercised their monkeyish passion for destruction by wantonly firing upon this beautiful structure. It now lay in ruins. In its main staircase an iron ring was pointed out to us, and we were given the following chronicle.

During the recent revolution the fugitive President Salnave had been captured, a leathern thong had been rudely drawn through a gash in his hand, and, attached by this to a cavalryman, he had been dragged up the hill to the palace, through the crowd which had but recently hurrahed for him, but which now jeered and pelted him. Arriving upon the scene of his former glory, he was attached by the thong to this iron ring and shot.

Opposite the palace was the ruin of a mausoleum, and in the street were scattered fragments of marble sarcophagi beautifully sculptured: these had contained the bodies of former rulers, but the revolutionists of Haiti, imitating those of 1793 in France, as apes imitate men, had torn the corpses out of them and had then scattered these, with the fragments of their monuments, through the streets.

In the markets of the city we had ample experience of the advantage arising from unlimited paper money. Successive governments had kept themselves afloat by new issues of currency, until its purchasing power was reduced almost to nothing. Preposterous sums were demanded for the simplest articles: hundreds of dollars for a basket of fruit, and thousands of dollars for a straw hat.

With us as one of our secretaries was Frederick Douglass, the gifted son of an eminent Virginian and a slave woman,—one of the two or three most talented men of color I have ever known. Up to this time he had cherished many hopes that his race, if set free, would improve; but it was evident that this experience in Santo Domingo discouraged and depressed him. He said to one of us, "If this is the outcome of self-government by my race, Heaven help us!''

Another curious example bearing on the same subject was furnished us in Jamaica, whither we went after leav- ing Haiti. Our wish was to consult, on our way home, the former president of the Haitian republic, Geffrard,— who was then living in exile near Kingston. We found him in a beautiful apartment, elegantly furnished; and in every way he seemed superior to the officials whom we had met at Port-au-Prince. He was a light mulatto, intelligent, quiet, dignified, and able to state his views without undue emphasis. His wife was very agreeable, and his daughter, though clearly of a melancholic temperament, one of the most beautiful young women I have ever seen. The reason for her melancholy was evident to any one who knew her father's history. He had gone through many political storms before he had fled from Haiti, and in one of these his enemies had fired through the windows of his house and killed his other daughter.

He calmly discussed with us the condition of the island, and evidently believed that the only way to save it from utter barbarism was to put it under the control of some civilized power.

Interesting as were his opinions, he and his family, as we saw them in their daily life, were still more so. It was a revelation to us all of what the colored race might become in a land where it is under no social ban. For generations he and his had been the equals of the best people they had met in France and in Haiti; they had been guests at the dinners of ministers and at the soires of savants in the French capital; there was nothing about them of that deprecatory sort which one sees so constantly in men and women with African blood in their veins in lands where their race has recently been held in servitude.

And here I may again cite the case of President Baez— a man to whom it probably never occurred that he was not the equal socially of the best men he met, and who in any European country would be at once regarded as a man of mark, and welcomed at any gathering of notables.

Among our excursions, while in Jamaica, was one to Spanish Town, the residence of the British governor. In the drawing-room of His Excellency's wife there was shown us one rather curious detail. Not long before our visit, the legislature had been abolished and the island had been made a crown colony ruled by a royal governor and council; therefore it was that, there being no further use for it, the gorgeous chair of "Mr. Speaker,'' a huge construction apparently of carved oak, had been transferred to her ladyship's drawing-room, and we were informed that in this she received her guests.

From Kingston we came to Key West, and from that point to Charleston, where, as our frigate was too large to cross the bar, we were taken off, and thence reached Washington by rail.

One detail regarding those latter days of our commission is perhaps worthy of record as throwing light on a seamy side of American life. From first to last we had shown every possible civility to the representatives of the press who had accompanied us on the frigate, constantly taking them with us in Santo Domingo and elsewhere, and giving them every facility for collecting information. But from time to time things occurred which threw a new and somewhat unpleasant light on the way misinformation is liberally purveyed to the American public. One day one of these gentlemen, the representative of a leading New York daily, talking with me of the sort of news his paper required, said, "The managers of our paper don't care for serious information, such as particulars regarding the country we visit, its inhabitants, etc., etc.; what they want, above all, is something of a personal nature, such as a quarrel or squabble, and when one occurs they expect us to make the most of it.''

I thought no more of this until I arrived at Port-au- Prince, where I found that this gentleman had suddenly taken the mail-steamer for New York on the plea of urgent business. The real cause of his departure was soon apparent. His letters to the paper he served now began to come back to us, and it was found that he had exercised his imagination vigorously. He had presented a mass of sensational inventions, but his genius had been especially exercised in trumping up quarrels which had never taken place; his masterpiece being an account of a bitter struggle between Senator Wade and myself. As a matter of fact, there had never been between us the slightest ill-feeling; the old senator had been like a father to me from first to last.

The same sort of thing was done by sundry other press prostitutes, both during our stay in the West Indies and at Washington; but I am happy to say that several of the correspondents were men who took their duties seriously, and really rendered a service to the American public by giving information worth having.

Our journey from Charleston to Washington had one episode perhaps worthy of recording, as showing a peculiarity of local feeling at that time. Through all the long day we had little or nothing to eat, and looked forward ravenously to the dinner on board the Potomac steamer. But on reaching it and entering the dining-room, we found that our secretary, Mr. Frederick Douglass, was absolutely refused admittance. He, a man who had dined with the foremost statesmen and scholars of our Northern States and of Europe,—a man who by his dignity, ability, and elegant manners was fit to honor any company,—was, on account of his light tinge of African blood, not thought fit to sit at meat with the motley crowd on a Potomac steamer. This being the case, Dr. Howe and myself declined to dine, and so reached Washington, about midnight, almost starving, thus experiencing, at a low price, the pangs and glories of martyrdom.

One discovery made by the commission on its return ought to be mentioned here, for the truth of history. Mr. Sumner, in his speeches before the Senate, had made a strong point by contrasting the conduct of the United States with that of Spain toward Santo Domingo. He had insisted that the conduct of Spain had been far more honorable than that of the United States; that Spain had brought no pressure to bear upon the Dominican republic; that when Santo Domingo had accepted Spanish rule, some years before, it had done so of its own free will; and that "not a single Spanish vessel was then in its waters, nor a single Spanish sailor upon its soil.'' On the other hand, he insisted that the conduct of the United States had been the very opposite of this; that it had brought pressure to bear upon the little island republic; and that when the decision was made in favor of our country, there were American ships off the coast and American soldiers upon the island. To prove this statement, he read from a speech of the Spanish prime minister published in the official paper of the Spanish government at Madrid. To our great surprise, we found, on arriving at the island, that this statement was not correct; that when the action in favor of annexation to Spain took place, Spanish ships were upon the coast and Spanish soldiers upon the island; and that there had been far more appearance of pressure at that time than afterward, when the little republic sought admission to the American Union. One of our first efforts, therefore, on returning, was to find a copy of this official paper, for the purpose of discovering how it was that the leader of the Spanish ministry had uttered so grave an untruth. The Spanish newspaper was missing from the library of Congress; but at last Dr. Howe, the third commissioner, a life- long and deeply attached friend of Mr. Sumner, found it in the library of the senator. The passage which Mr. Sumner had quoted was carefully marked; it was simply to the effect that when the FIRST proceedings looking toward annexation to Spain were initiated, there were no Spanish ships in those waters, nor Spanish soldiers on shore. This was, however, equally true of the United States; for when proceedings were begun in Santo Domingo looking to annexation, there was not an American ship off the coast, nor an American soldier on the island.

But the painful thing in the matter was that, had Mr Sumner read the sentence immediately following that which he quoted, it would have shown simply and distinctly that his contention was unfounded; that, at the time when the annexation proceedings WERE formally initiated and accomplished, there were Spanish ships off those shores and Spanish soldiers on the island.

I recall vividly the deep regret expressed at the time by Dr. Howe that his friend Senator Sumner had been so bitter in his opposition to the administration that he had quoted the first part of the Spanish minister's speech and suppressed the second part. It was clear that if Mr. Sumner had read the whole passage to the Senate it would have shown that the conduct of the United States had not been less magnanimous than that of Spain in the matter, and that no argument whatever against the administration could be founded upon its action in sending ships and troops to the island.

In drawing up our report after our arrival, an amicable difference of opinion showed itself. Senator Wade, being a "manifest-destiny'' man, wished it expressly to recommend annexation; Dr. Howe, in his anxiety to raise the status of the colored race, took a similar view; but I pointed out to them the fact that Congress had asked, not for a recommendation, but for facts; that to give them advice under such circumstances was to expose ourselves to a snub, and could bring no good to any cause which any of us might wish to serve; and I stated that if the general report contained recommendations, I must be allowed to present one simply containing facts.

The result was that we united in the document presented, which is a simple statement of facts, and which, as I believe, remains to this day the best general account of the resources of Santo Domingo.

The result of our report was what I had expected. The Spanish part of that island is of great value from an agricultural and probably from a mining point of view. Its valleys being swept by the trade-winds, its mountain slopes offer to a white population summer retreats like those afforded by similar situations to the British occupants of India. In winter it might also serve as a valuable sanatorium. I remember well the answer made to me by a man from Maine, who had brought his family to the neighborhood of Samana Bay in order to escape the rigors of the New England winter. On my asking him about the diseases prevalent in his neighborhood, he said that his entire household had gone through a light acclimating fever, but he added: "We have all got through it without harm; and on looking the whole matter over, I am persuaded that, if you were to divide the people of any New England State into two halves, leaving one half at home and sending the other half here, there would in ten years be fewer deaths in the half sent here, from all the diseases of this country, than in the half left in New England, from consumption alone.''

A special element in the question of annexation was the value of the harbor of Samana in controlling one of the great passages from Europe to the Isthmus. It is large enough to hold any fleet, is protected by a mountain-range from the northern winds, is easily fortified, and is the natural outlet of the largest and most fertile valley in the islands. More than this, if the experiment of annexing an outlying possession was to be tried, that was, perhaps, the best of opportunities, since the resident population to be assimilated was exceedingly small.

But the people of the United States, greatly as they honored General Grant, and much as they respected his recommendations, could not take his view. They evidently felt that, with the new duties imposed upon them by the vast number of men recently set free and admitted to suffrage in the South, they had quite enough to do without assuming the responsibility of governing and developing this new region peopled by blacks and mulattos; and as a result of this very natural feeling the whole proposal was dropped, and will doubtless remain in abeyance until the experiments in dealing with Porto Rico and the Philippines shall have shown the people of the United States whether there is any place for such dependencies under our system.



CHAPTER XXIX

AS COMMISSIONER TO THE PARIS EXPOSITION OF 1878

My next experience was of a quasi-diplomatic sort, in connection with the Paris Exposition of 1878, and it needs some preface.

During the Centennial Exposition of 1876 at Philadelphia, I had been appointed upon the educational jury, and, as the main part of the work came during the university long vacation, had devoted myself to it, and had thus been brought into relations with some very interesting men.

Of these may be named, at the outset, the Emperor Dom Pedro of Brazil. I first saw him in a somewhat curious way. He had landed at New York in the morning, and early in the afternoon he appeared with the Empress and their gentlemen and ladies in waiting at Booth's Theater. The attraction was Shakspere's "Henry V,'' and no sooner was he seated in his box than he had his Shakspere open before him. Being in an orchestra stall, I naturally observed him from time to time, and at one passage light was thrown upon his idea of his duties as a monarch. The play was given finely, by the best American company of recent years, and he was deeply absorbed in it. But presently there came the words of King Henry—the noted passage:

"And what have kings, that privates have not too, Save ceremony, save general ceremony? And what art thou, thou idol ceremony?''

Whereupon the Emperor and Empress, evidently moved by the same impression, turned their heads from the stage, looked significantly at each other, and his majesty very earnestly nodded to his wife several times, as if thoroughly assenting.

The feeling thus betrayed was undoubtedly sincere. His real love was for science, literature, and art; but above all for science. Some years before, at the founding of Cornell University, Agassiz had shown me private letters from him revealing his knowledge of natural history, and the same thirst for knowledge which he showed then was evident now. From dawn till dusk he was hard at work, visiting places of interest and asking questions which, as various eminent authorities both in the United States and France have since assured me, showed that he kept himself well abreast of the most recent scientific investigations.

On the following morning he invited me to call upon him, and on my doing so, he saluted me with a multitude of questions regarding our schools, colleges, and universities, which I answered as best I could, though many of them really merited more time than could be given during a morning interview. His manner was both impressive and winning. He had clearly thought much on educational problems, and no man engaged in educational work could fail to be stimulated by his questions and comments. In his manner there was nothing domineering or assuming. I saw him at various times afterward, and remember especially his kindly and perfectly democratic manner at a supper given by the late Mr. Drexel of Philadelphia, when he came among us, moving from group to group, recognizing here one old friend and there another, and discussing with each some matter of value.

Republican as I am, it is clear to me that his constitutional sovereignty was a government far more free, liberal, and, indeed, republican, than the rule of the demagogue despots who afterward drove him from his throne ever has been or ever will be.

Another very interesting person was a Spanish officer, Don Juan Marin, who has since held high commands both in his own country and in the West Indies. We were upon the same jury, and I came to admire him much. One day, as we sat in our committee-room discussing various subjects brought before us, there appeared in the street leading to the main entrance of the grounds a large body of soldiers with loud drumming and fifing. On his asking what troops these were, I answered that they were the most noted of our American militia regiments—the New York Seventh; and on his expressing a wish to see them, we both walked out for that purpose. Presently the gates were thrown open, and in marched the regiment, trim and brisk, bearing aloft the flag of the United States and the standard of the State of New York.

At the moment when the standard and flag were abreast of us, Colonel Marin, who was in civil dress, drew himself up, removed his hat, and bowed low with simple dignity. The great crowd, including myself, were impressed by this action. It had never occurred to any one of the rest of us to show such a tribute to the flag under which so many good and true men had fought and died for us; and, as one of the crowd very justly remarked afterward, "The Spaniard cheapened the whole lot of us.'' With a single exception, it was the finest exhibition of manners I have ever seen.[11]

[11] See the chapter on my attachship in Russia.

Still another delegate was Professor Levasseur, of the College of France and the French Institute. His quickness in ascertaining what was of value in a politico-economical view, and his discussions of geographical matters, interested and instructed all who had to do with him.

With him was Rn Millet, an example of the most attractive qualities of a serious Frenchman—qualities which have since been recognized in his appointments as minister and ambassador to Sweden and to Tunis. Both these gentlemen afterward made me visits at Cornell which I greatly enjoyed.

At this time, too, I made a friendship which became precious to me—that of Gardner Hubbard, one of the best, truest, and most capable men, in whatever he undertook, that I have ever seen. The matter which interested him then has since interested the world. His son-in-law Mr. Alexander Graham Bell, was exhibiting what appeared to be a toy,—a toy which on one occasion he showed to Dom Pedro and to others of us, and which enabled us to hear in one of the buildings of the exposition a violin played in another building. It was regarded as an interesting plaything, and nothing more. A controlling right in its use might have been bought for a very moderate sum—yet it was the beginning of the telephone!

In connection with these and other interesting men, I had devoted myself to the educational exhibits of the exposition; and the result was that, during the following year, I was appointed by the Governor of the State of New York one of two honorary commissioners to the Paris Exposition; the other being Mr. Morton, afterward Minister to France, Vice-President of the United States, and Governor of the State of New York.

I was not inclined, at first, to take my appointment very seriously, but went to Paris simply to visit the exposition, hoping that my honorary function would give me good opportunities. But on arriving I found the commissioner- general of the United States, Governor McCormick, hard pressed by his duties, and looking about for help. A large number of regular commissioners had been appointed, but very few of them were of the slightest use. Hardly one of them could speak French, and very few of them really took any interest in the duties assigned them. The main exception, a very noble one, was my old friend President Barnard of Columbia College, and he had not yet arrived. Under these circumstances, I yielded to the earnest request of Governor McCormick and threw myself heartily into the work of making our part of the exposition a success.

The American representation at the Vienna Exposition a few years before had resulted in a scandal which had resounded through Europe, and this scandal had arisen from the fact that a subordinate, who had gained the confidence of our excellent commissioner-general at that post, had been charged, and to all appearance justly, with receiving money for assigning privileges to bar-keepers and caterers. The result was that the commissioner-general was cruelly wounded, and that finally he and his associates were ignominiously removed, and the American minister to Austria put in his place until a new commission could be formed. Of course every newspaper in Europe hostile to republican ideas, and they were very many, made the most of this catastrophe. One of them in Vienna was especially virulent; it called attention to the model of an American school-house in the exposition, and said that "it should be carefully observed as part of the machinery which trains up such mercenary wretches as have recently disgraced humanity at the exposition.''

To avoid scandals, to negotiate with the French commissioners on one side, and the crowd of exhibitors on the other, and especially to see that in all particulars the representatives of American industry were fully recognized, was a matter of much difficulty; but happily all turned out well.

Among the duties of my position was membership of the upper jury—that which, in behalf of the French Republic, awarded the highest prizes. Each day, at about nine in the morning, we met, and a remarkable body it was. At my right sat Meissonier, then the most eminent of French painters, and beyond him Quintana, the Spanish poet. Of the former of these two I possess a curious memento. He was very assiduous in attendance at our sessions, and the moment he took his seat he always began drawing, his materials being the block of letter-paper and the pencils, pens, and ink lying before him. No matter what was under discussion, he kept on with his drawing. While he listened, and even while he talked, his pencil or pen continued moving over the paper. He seemed to bring every morning a mass of new impressions caught during his walk to the exposition, which he made haste to trans- fer to paper. Sometimes he used a pencil, sometimes, a quill pen, and not infrequently he would plunge the feather end of the quill into his inkstand and rapidly put into his work broader and blacker strokes. As soon as he had finished a drawing he generally tore it into bits and threw them upon the floor, but occasionally he would fold the sketches carefully and put them into his pocket. This being the case, no one dared ask him for one of them.

But one morning his paper gave out, and for lack of it he took up a boxwood paper-knife lying near and began work on it. First he decorated the handle in a sort of rococo way, and then dashed off on the blade, with his pen, a very spirited head—a bourgeois physiognomy somewhat in Gavarni's manner. But as he could not tear the paper-knife into bits, and did not care to take it away, he left it upon the table. This was my chance. Immediately after the session I asked the director-general to allow me to carry it off as a souvenir; he assented heartily, and so I possess a picture which I saw begun, continued, and ended by one of the greatest of French painters.

At my left was Tresca, director of the French National Conservatory of Arts and Trades; and next him, the sphinx of the committee—the most silent man I ever saw the rector of the Portuguese University of Coimbra. During the three months of our session no one of us ever heard him utter a word. Opposite was Jules Simon, eminent as an orator, philosopher, scholar, and man of letters; an academician who had held positions in various cabinets, and had even been prime minister of the republic. On one side of him was Tullo Massarani, a senator of the Italian kingdom, eminent as a writer on the philosophy of art; on the other, Boussingault, one of the foremost chemists of the century; and near him, Wischniegradsky, director of the Imperial Technical Institute at Moscow, whom I afterward came to know as minister of finance at St. Petersburg. Each afternoon we devoted to examining the greater exhibits which were to come before us in competition for the grands prix on the following morning.

At one of our sessions a curious difficulty arose. The committee on the award of these foremost prizes for advanced work in electricity brought in their report, and, to my amazement, made no award to my compatriot Edison, who was then at the height of his reputation. Presently Tresca, who read the report, and who really lamented the omission, whispered to me the reason of it. Through the negligence of persons representing Edison, no proper exhibition of his inventions had been made to the committee. They had learned that his agent was employed in showing the phonograph in a distant hall on the boulevards to an audience who paid an admission fee; but, although they had tried two or three times to have his apparatus shown them, they had been unsuccessful, until at last, from a feeling of what was due their own self-respect, they passed the matter over entirely. Of course my duty was to do what was possible in rectifying this omission, and in as good French as I could muster I made a speech in Edison's behalf, describing his career, outlining his work, and saying that I should really be ashamed to return to America without some recognition of him and of his inventions. This was listened to most courteously, but my success was insured by a remark of a less serious character, which was that if Edison had not yet made a sufficient number of inventions to entitle him to a grand prize, he would certainly, at the rate he was going on, have done so before the close of the exposition. At this there was a laugh, and my amendment was unanimously carried.

Many features in my work interested me, but one had a melancholy tinge. One afternoon, having been summoned to pass upon certain competing works in sculpture, we finally stood before the great bronze entrance- doors of the Cathedral of Strasburg, which, having been designed before the Franco-Prussian War, had but just been finished. They were very beautiful; but I could see that my French associates felt deeply the changed situation of affairs which this exhibit brought to their minds.

In order to promote the social relations which go for so much at such times, I had taken the large apartment temporarily relinquished by our American minister, Governor Noyes of Ohio, in the Avenue Josephine; and there, at my own table, brought together from time to time a considerable number of noted men from various parts of Europe. Perhaps the most amusing occurrence during the series of dinners I then gave was the meeting between Story, the American sculptor at Rome, and Judge Brady of New York. For years each had been taken for the other, in various parts of the world, but they had never met. In fact, so common was it for people to mistake one for the other that both had, as a rule, ceased to explain the mistake. I was myself present with Story on one occasion when a gentleman came up to him, saluted him as Judge Brady, and asked him about their friends in New York: Story took no trouble to undeceive his interlocutor, but remarked that, so far as he knew, they were all well, and ended the interview with commonplaces.

These two Dromios evidently enjoyed meeting, and nothing could be more amusing than their accounts of various instances in which each had been mistaken for the other. Each had a rich vein of humor, and both presented the details of these occurrences with especial zest.

Another American, of foreign birth, was not quite so charming. He was a man of value in his profession; but his desire for promotion outran his discretion. Having served as juror at the Vienna Exposition, he had now been appointed to a similar place in Paris; and after one of my dinners he came up to a group in which there were two or three members of the French cabinet, and said: "Mr. Vite, I vish you vould joost dell dese zhentlemen vat I am doing vor Vrance. I vas on de dasting gommittee for vines und peers at Vien, and it 'most killed me; and now I am here doing de same duty, and my stomach has nearly gone pack on me. Tell dese zhentlemen dat de French Government zurely ought to gonfer ubon me de Legion of Honor.'' This was spoken with the utmost seriousness, and was embarrassing, since, of all subjects, that which a French minister least wishes to discuss publicly is the conferring of the red ribbon.

Embarrassing also was the jubilation of some of our American exhibitors at our celebration of the Fourth of July in the Bois de Boulogne. Doubtless they were excellent citizens, but never was there a better exemplification of Dr. Arnold's saying that "a traveller is a self-constituted outlaw.'' A generous buffet had been provided, after the French fashion, with a sufficiency of viands and whatever wine was needed. To my amazement, these men, who at home were most of them, probably, steady-going "temperance men,'' were so overcome with the idea that champagne was to be served ad libitum, that the whole thing came near degenerating into an orgy. A European of the same rank, accustomed to drinking wine moderately with his dinner, would have simply taken a glass or two and thought no more of it; but these gentlemen seemed to see in it the occasion of their lives. Bottles were seized and emptied, glass after glass, down the throats of my impulsive fellow-citizens: in many cases a bottle and more to a man. Then came the worst of it. It had been arranged that speeches should be made under a neighboring tent by leading members of the French cabinet who had accepted invitations to address us. But when they proceeded to do this difficulties arose. A number of our compatriots, unduly exhilarated, and understanding little that was said, first applauded on general principles, but at the wrong places, and finally broke out into apostrophes such as "Speak English, old boy!'' "Talk Yankee fashion!'' "Remember the glorious Fourth!'' "Give it to the British!'' "Make the eagle scream!'' and the like. The result was that we were obliged to make most earnest appeals to these gentlemen, begging them not to disgrace our country; and, finally, the proceedings were cut short.

Nor was this the end. As I came down the Champs lyses afterward, I met several groups of these patriots, who showed by their walk and conversation that they were decidedly the worse for their celebration of the day; and the whole thing led me to reflect seriously on the drink problem, and to ask whether our American solution of it is the best. I have been present at many large festive assemblages, in various parts of Europe, where wine was offered freely as a matter of course; but never have I seen anything to approach this performance of my countrymen. I have been one of four thousand people at the Htel de Ville in Paris on the occasion of a great ball, at other entertainments almost as large in other Continental countries, and at dinner parties innumerable in every European country; but never, save in one instance, were the festivities disturbed by any man on account of drink.

The most eminent of American temperance advocates during my young manhood, Mr. Delavan, insisted that he found Italy, where all people, men, women, and children, drink wine with their meals, if they can get it, the most temperate country he had ever seen; and, having made more than twelve different sojourns in Italy, I can confirm that opinion.

So, too, again and again, when traveling in the old days on the top of a diligence through village after village in France, where the people were commemorating the patron saint of their district, I have passed through crowds of men, women, and children seated by the roadside drinking wine, cider, and beer, and, so far as one could see, there was no drunkenness; certainly none of the squalid, brutal, swinish sort. It may indeed be said that, in spite of light stimulants, drunkenness has of late years increased in France, especially among artisans and day laborers. If this be so, it comes to strengthen my view. For the main reason will doubtless be found in the increased prices of light wines, due to vine diseases and the like, which have driven the poorer classes to seek far more noxious beverages.

So, too, in Germany. Like every resident in that country, I have seen great crowds drinking much beer, and, though I greatly dislike that sort of guzzling, I never saw anything of the beastly, crazy, drunken exhibitions which are so common on Independence Day and county- fair day in many American towns where total abstinence is loudly preached and ostensibly practised. Least of all do I admire the beer-swilling propensities of the German students, and still I must confess that I have never seen anything so wild, wicked, outrageous, and destructive to soul and body as the drinking of distilled liquors at bars which, in my student days, I saw among American students. But I make haste to say that within the last twenty or thirty years American students have improved immensely in this respect. Athletics and greater interest in study, caused by the substitution of the students' own aims and tastes for the old cast-iron curriculum, are doubtless the main reasons for this improvement.[12]

[12] Further reasons for this improvement I have endeavored to give more in detail elsewhere.

Yet, in spite of this redeeming thing, the fact remains that one of the greatest curses of American life is the dram-drinking of distilled liquors at bars; and one key of the whole misery is the American habit of "treating,''—a habit unknown in other countries. For example, in America, if Tom, Dick, and Harry happen to meet at a hotel, or in the street, to discuss politics or business, Tom invites Dick and Harry to drink with him, which, in accordance with the code existing among large classes of our fellow-citizens, Dick and Harry feel bound to do. After a little more talk Dick invites Harry and Tom to drink; they feel obliged to accept; and finally Harry invites Tom and Dick, with like result; so that these three men have poured down their throats several glasses of burning stimulants, perhaps in the morning, perhaps just before the midday meal, or at some other especially unsuitable time, with results more or less injurious to each of them, physically and morally.

The European, more sensible, takes with his dinner, as a rule, a glass or two of wine or beer, and is little, if at all, the worse for it. If he ever takes any distilled liquor, he sips a very small glass of it after his dinner, to aid digestion.

It is my earnest conviction, based upon wide observation in my own country as well as in many others during about half a century, that the American theory and practice as regards the drink question are generally more pernicious than those of any other civilized nation. I am not now speaking of TOTAL ABSTINENCE—of that, more presently. But the best TEMPERANCE workers among us that I know are the men who brew light, pure beer, and the vine-growers in California who raise and sell at a very low price wines pleasant and salutary, if any wines can be so.

As to those who have no self-restraint, beer and wine, like many other things, promote the "survival of the fittest,'' and are, like many other things, "fool-killers,'' aiding to free the next generation from men of vicious propensities and weak will.

I repeat it, the curse of American social life, among a very considerable class of our people, is "perpendicular drinking''—that is, the pouring down of glass after glass of distilled spirits, mostly adulterated, at all sorts of inopportune times, and largely under the system of "treating.''

The best cure for this, in my judgment, would be for States to authorize and local authorities to adopt the "Swedish system,'' which I found doing excellent service at Gothenburg in Sweden a few years since, and which I am sorry to see the fanatics there have recently wrecked. Under this plan the various towns allowed a company to open a certain number of clean, tidy drinking- places; obliged them to purchase pure liquors; forbade them, under penalties, to sell to any man who had already taken too much; made it also obligatory to sell something to eat at the same time with something to drink; and, best of all, restricted the profits of these establishments to a moderate percentage,—seven or eight per cent., if I re- member rightly,—all the surplus receipts going to public purposes, and especially to local charities. The main point was that the men appointed to dispense the drinks had no motive to sell adulterated drinks, or any more liquor than was consistent with the sobriety of the customer.

I may add that, in my opinion, the worst enemies of real temperance in America, as in other countries, have been the thoughtless screamers against intemperance, who have driven vast numbers of their fellow-citizens to drink in secret or at bars. Of course I shall have the honor of being railed at and denounced by every fanatic who reads these lines, but from my heart I believe them true.

I remember that some of these people bitterly attacked Governor Stanford of California for the endowment of Stanford University, in part, from the rent of his vineyards. People who had not a word to say against one theological seminary for accepting the Daniel Drew endowment, or against another for accepting the Jay Gould endowment, were horrified that the Stanford University should receive revenue from a vineyard. The vineyards of California, if their product were legally protected from adulteration, could be made one of the most potent influences against drunkenness that our country has seen. The California wines are practically the only pure wines accessible to Americans. They are so plentiful that there is no motive to adulterate them, and their use among those of us who are so unwise as to drink anything except water ought to be effectively advocated as supplanting the drinking of beer poisoned with strychnine, whisky poisoned with fusel-oil, and "French claret'' poisoned with salicylic acid and aniline.

The true way to supplant the "saloon'' and the barroom, as regards working-men who obey their social instincts by seeking something in the nature of a club, and therefore resorting to places where stimulants are sold, is to take the course so ably advocated by Bishop Potter: namely, to furnish places of refreshment and amusement which shall be free from all tendency to beastliness, and which, with cheerful open fireplaces, games of various sorts, good coffee and tea, and, if necessary, light beer and wine, shall be more attractive than the "saloons'' and "dives'' which are doing our country such vast harm.

My advice to all men is to drink nothing but water. That is certainly the wisest way for nine men out of ten —and probably for all ten. Indeed, one reason why the great body of our people accomplish so much more in a given time than those of any other country, and why the average American working-man "catches on'' and "gits thar'' more certainly and quickly than a man of the same sort in any other country (and careful comparison between various other countries and our own has shown that this is the case), is that a much larger proportion of our people do not stupefy themselves with stimulants.

In what I have said above I have had in view the problem as it really stands: namely, the existence of a very large number of people who WILL have stimulants of some kind. In such cases common sense would seem to dictate that, in the case of those who persist in using distilled liquors, something ought to be done to substitute those which are pure for those which are absolutely poisonous and maddening; and, in the case of those who merely seek a mild stimulant, to substitute for distilled liquors light fermented beverages; and, in the case of those who seek merely recreation after toil, to substitute for beverages which contain alcohol, light beverages like coffee, tea, and chocolate.

This is a long digression, but liberavi animam meam, and now I return to my main subject.

The American commissioners were treated with great kindness by the French authorities. There were exceedingly interesting receptions by various ministers, and at these one met the men best worth knowing in France: the men famous in science, literature, and art, who redeem France from the disgrace heaped upon her by the wretched creatures who most noisily represent her through sensational newspapers.

Of the men who impressed me most was Henri Martin, the eminent historian. He discussed with me the history of France in a way which aroused many new trains of thought. Jules Simon, eminent both as a scholar and a statesman, did much for me. On one occasion he took me about Paris, showing me places of special interest connected with the more striking scenes of the Revolutionary period; on another, he went with me to the distribution of prizes at the French Academy—a most striking scene; and on still another he piloted me through his beautiful library, pointing out various volumes in which were embedded bullets which the communards had fired through his windows from the roof of the Madeleine just opposite.

Another interesting experience was a breakfast with the eminent chemist Sainte-Claire Deville, at which I met Pasteur, who afterward took me through his laboratories, where he was then making some of his most important experiments. In one part of his domain there were cages containing dogs, and on my asking about them he said that he was beginning a course of experiments bearing on the causes and cure of hydrophobia. Nothing could be more simple and modest than this announcement of one of the most fruitful investigations ever made.

Visits to various institutions of learning interested me much, among these a second visit to the Agricultural College at Grignon and the wonderful Conservatoire des Arts et Mtiers, which gave me new ideas for the similar departments at Cornell, and a morning at the cole Normale, where I saw altogether the best teaching of a Latin classic that I have ever known. As I heard Professor Desjardins discussing with his class one of Cicero's letters in the light of modern monuments in the Louvre and of recent archaeological discoveries, I longed to be a boy again.

Among the statesmen whom I met at that time in France, a strong impression was made upon me by one who had played a leading part in the early days of Napoleon III, but who was at this time living in retirement, M. Drouyn de Lhuys. He had won distinction as minister of foreign affairs, but, having retired from politics, had given himself up in his old age to various good enterprises, among these, to the great Reform School at Mettray. This he urged me to visit, and, although it was at a considerable distance from Paris, I took his advice, and was much interested in it. The school seemed to me well deserving thorough study by all especially interested in the problem of crime in our own country.

There is in France a system under which, when any young man is evidently going all wrong,—squandering his patrimony and bringing his family into disgrace,—a family council can be called, with power to place the wayward youth under restraint; and here, in one part of the Mettray establishment, were rooms in which such youths were detained in accordance with the requests of family councils. It appeared that some had derived benefit from these detentions, for there were shown me one or two letters from them: one, indeed, written by a young man on the bottom of a drawer, and intended for the eye of his successor in the apartment, which was the most contrite yet manly appeal I have ever read.

Another man of great eminence whom I met in those days was Thiers. I was taken by an old admirer of his to his famous house in the Place St. Georges, and there found him, in the midst of his devotees, receiving homage.

He said but little, and that little was commonplace; but I was not especially disappointed: my opinion of him was made up long before, and time has but confirmed it. The more I have considered his doings as minister or parliamentarian, and the more I have read his works, whether his political pamphlet known as the "History of the French Revolution,'' which did so much to arouse sterile civil struggles, or his "History of the Consulate and of the Empire,'' which did so much to revive the Napoleonic legend, or his speeches under the constitutional monarchy of Louis Philippe, under the Republic, and under the Second Empire, which did so much to promote confusion and anarchy, the less I admire him. He seems to me eminently an architect of ruin.

It is true that when France was wallowing in the misery into which he and men like him had done so much to plunge her, he exerted himself wonderfully to accomplish her rescue; but when the history of that country during the last century shall be fairly written, his career, brilliant as it once appeared, will be admired by no thinking patriot.

I came to have far more respect for another statesman whom I then met—Duruy, the eminent historian of France and of Rome, who had labored so earnestly under the Second Empire, both as a historian and a minister of state, to develop a basis for rational liberty.

Seated next me at dinner, he made a remark which threw much light on one of the most serious faults of the French Republic. Said he, "Monsieur, I was minister of public instruction under the Empire for seven years; since my leaving that post six years have elapsed, and in that time I have had seven successors.''

On another occasion he discoursed with me about the special difficulties of France; and as I mentioned to him that I remembered his controversy with Cardinal de Bonnechose, in which the latter tried to drive him out of office because he did not fetter scientific teaching in the University of Paris, he spoke quite freely with me. Although not at all a radical, and evidently willing to act in concert with the church as far as possible, he gave me to understand that the demands made by ecclesiastics upon every French ministry were absolutely unendurable; that France never could yield to these demands; and that, sooner or later, a great break must come between the church and modern society. His prophecy now seems nearing fulfilment.

Among the various meetings which were held in connection with the exposition was a convention of literary men for the purpose of securing better international arrangements regarding copyright. Having been elected a member of this, I had the satisfaction of hearing most interesting speeches from Victor Hugo, Tourgueneff, and Edmond About. The latter made the best speech of all, and by his exquisite wit and pleasing humor fully showed his right to the name which his enemies had given him— "the Voltaire of the nineteenth century.''

The proceedings of this convention closed with a banquet over which Victor Hugo presided; and of all the trying things in my life, perhaps the most so was the speech which I then attempted in French, with Victor Hugo looking at me.

There were also various educational congresses at the Sorbonne, in which the discussions interested me much; but sundry receptions at the French Academy were far more attractive. Of all the exquisite literary performances I have ever known, the speeches made on those occasions by M. Charles Blanc, M. Gaston Boissier, and the members who received them were the most entertaining. To see these witty Frenchmen attacking each other in the most pointed way, yet still observing all the forms of politeness, and even covering their adversaries with compliments, gives one new conceptions of human ingenuity. But whether it is calculated to increase respect for the main actors is another question.

The formal closing of the exposition was a brilliant pageant. Various inventors and exhibitors received gifts and decorations from the hand of the President of the Republic, and, among them, Dr. Barnard, Story, and myself were given officers' crosses of the Legion of Honor which none of us has ever thought of wearing; but, alas! my Swiss-American friend who had pleaded so pathetically his heroic services in "Dasting de vines und peers'' for France did not receive even the chevalier's ribbon, and the expression of his disappointment was loud and long.

Nor was he the only disappointed visitor. It was my fortune one day at the American legation to observe one difficulty which at the western capitals of Europe has become very trying, and which may be mentioned to show that an American representative has sometimes to meet. As I was sitting with our minister, Governor Noyes of Ohio, there was shown into the room a lady, very stately, and dressed in the height of fashion. It was soon evident that she was on the war-path. She said, "Mr. Minister, I have come to ask you why it is that I do not receive any invitations to balls and receptions given by the cabinet ministers?'' Governor Noyes answered very politely, "Mrs. ——, we have placed your name on the list of those whom we would especially like to have invited, and have every hope that it will receive attention.'' She answered, "Why is it that you can do so much less than your predecessor did at the last exposition? THEN I received a large number of invitations; NOW I receive none.'' The minister answered, "I am very sorry indeed, madam; but there are perhaps twenty or thirty thousand Americans in Paris; the number of them invited on each occasion cannot exceed fifty or sixty; and the French authorities are just now giving preference to those who have come from the United States to take some special part in the exposition as commissioners or exhibitors.'' At this the lady was very indignant. She rose and said, "I will give you no more trouble, Mr. Minister; but I am going back to America, and shall tell Senator Conkling, who gave me my letter of introduction to you, that either he has very little influence with you, or you have very little influence with the French Government. Good morning!'' And she flounced out of the room.

This is simply an indication of what is perhaps the most vexatious plague which afflicts American representatives in the leading European capitals,—a multitude of people, more or less worthy, pressing to be presented at court or to be invited to official functions. The whole matter has a ridiculous look, and has been used by sundry demagogues as a text upon which to orate against the diplomatic service and to arouse popular prejudice against it. But I think that a patriotic American may well take the ground that while there is so much snobbery shown by a certain sort of Americans abroad, it is not an unwise thing to have in each capital a man who in the intervals of his more important duties, can keep this struggling mass of folly from becoming a scandal and a byword throughout Europe. No one can know, until he has seen the inner workings of our diplomatic service, how much duty of this kind is quietly done by our representatives, and how many things are thus avoided which would tend to bring scorn upon our country and upon republican institutions.



CHAPTER XXX

AS MINISTER TO GERMANY—1879-1881

In the spring of 1879 I was a third time brought into the diplomatic service, and in a way which surprised me. The President of the United States at that period was Mr. Hayes of Ohio. I had met him once at Cornell University, and had an interesting conversation with him, but never any other communication, directly or indirectly. Great, then, was my astonishment when, upon the death of Bayard Taylor just at the beginning of his career as minister to Germany, there came to me an offer of the post thus made vacant.

My first duty after accepting it was to visit Washington and receive instructions. Calling upon the Secretary of State, Mr. Evarts, and finding his rooms filled with people, I said: "Mr. Secretary, you are evidently very busy; I can come at any other time you may name.'' Thereupon he answered: "Come in, come in; there are just two rules at the State Department: one is that no business is ever done out of office hours; and the other is, that no business is ever done IN office hours.'' It was soon evident that this was a phrase to put me at ease, rather than an exact statement of fact; and, after my conference with him, several days were given to familiarizing myself with the correspondence of my immediate predecessors, and with the views of the department on questions then pending between the two countries.

Dining at the White House next day, I heard Mr. Evarts withstand the President on a question which has always interested me—the admission of cabinet ministers to take part in the debates of Congress. Mr. Hayes presented the case in favor of their admission cogently; but the Secretary of State overmatched his chief. This greatly pleased me; for I had been long convinced that next to the power given the Supreme Court, the best thing in the Constitution of the United States is that complete separation of the executive from the legislative power which prevents every Congressional session becoming a perpetual gladiatorial combat or, say, rather, a permanent game of foot-ball. Again and again I have heard European statesmen lament that their constitution- makers had adopted, in this respect, the British rather than the American system. What it is in France, with cabals organized to oust every new minister as soon as he is appointed, and to provide for a "new deal'' from the first instant of an old one, with an average of one or two changes of ministry every year as a result, we all know; and, with the exception of the German parliament, Continental legislatures generally are just about as bad; indeed, in some respects the Italian parliament is worse. The British system would have certainly excluded such admirable Secretaries of State as Thomas Jefferson and Hamilton Fish; possibly such as John Quincy Adams, Seward, and John Hay. In Great Britain, having been evolved in conformity with its environment, it is successful; but it is successful nowhere else. I have always looked back with great complacency upon such men as those above named in the State Department, and such as Hamilton, Gallatin, Chase, Stanton, and Gage in other departments, sitting quietly in their offices, giving calm thought to government business, and allowing the heathen to rage at their own sweet will in both houses of Congress. Under the other system, our Republic might perhaps have become almost as delectable as Venezuela with its hundred and four revolutions in seventy years[13]

[13] See Lord Lansdowne's speech, December, 1902.

On the day following I dined with the Secretary of State, and found him in his usual pleasant mood. Noting on his dinner-service the words, "Facta non verba,'' I called his attention to them as a singular motto for an eminent lawyer and orator; whereupon he said that, two old members of Congress dining with him recently, one of them asked the other what those words meant, to which the reply was given, "They mean, 'Victuals, not talk.' ''

On the way to my post, I stopped in London and was taken to various interesting places. At the house of my old friend and Yale classmate, George Washburn Smalley, I met a number of very interesting people, and among these was especially impressed by Mr. Meredith Townshend, whose knowledge of American affairs seemed amazingly extensive and preternaturally accurate. At the house of Sir William Harcourt I met Lord Ripon, about that time Viceroy of India, whose views on dealings with Orientals interested me much. At the Royal Institution an old acquaintance was renewed with Tyndall and Huxley; and during an evening with the eminent painter, Mr. Alma-Tadema, at his house in the suburbs, and especially when returning from it, I made a very pleasant acquaintance with the poet Browning. As his carriage did not arrive, I offered to take him home in mine; but hardly had we started when we found ourselves in a dense fog, and it shortly became evident that our driver had lost his way. As he wandered about for perhaps an hour, hoping to find some indication of it, Browning's conversation was very agreeable. It ran at first on current questions, then on travel, and finally on art,—all very simply and naturally, with not a trace of posing or paradox. Remembering the obscurity of his verse, I was surprised at the lucidity of his talk. But at last, both of us becoming somewhat anxious, we called a halt and questioned the driver, who confessed that he had no idea where he was. As good, or ill, luck would have it, there just then emerged from the fog an empty hansom-cab, and finding that its driver knew more than ours, I engaged him as pilot, first to Browning's house, and then to my own.

One old friend to whom I was especially indebted was Sir Charles Reed, who had been my fellow-commissioner at the Paris and Philadelphia expositions. Thanks to him, I was invited to the dinner of the lord mayor at the Guildhall. As we lingered in the library before going to the table, opportunity was given to study various eminent guests. First came Cairns, the lord chancellor, in all the glory of official robes and wig; then Lord Derby; then Lord Salisbury, who, if I remember rightly, was minister of foreign affairs; then, after several other distinguished personages, most interesting of all, Lord Beaconsfield, the prime minister. He was the last to arrive, and immediately after his coming he presented his arm to the lady mayoress, and the procession took its way toward the great hall. From my seat, which was but a little way from the high table, I had a good opportunity to observe these men and to hear their speeches.

All was magnificent. Nothing of its kind could be more splendid than the massive gold and silver plate piled upon the lord mayor's table and behind it, nothing more sumptuous than the dinner, nothing more quaint than the ceremonial. Near the lord mayor, who was arrayed in his robes, chain, and all the glories of his office, stood the toastmaster, who announced the toasts in a manner fit to make an American think himself dreaming,—something, in fact, after this sort, in a queer singsong way, with comical cadences, brought up at the end with a sharp snap: "Me lawds, la-a-a-dies and gentleme-e-e-n, by commawnd of the Right Honorable the Lawrd Marr, I cha-a-awrge you fill your glawse-e-e-s and drink to the health of the Right Honorable the Ur-r-rll of Beck'nsfield.''

A main feature of the ceremony was the loving-cup. Down each long table a large silver tankard containing a pleasing beverage, of which the foundation seemed to be claret, was passed; and, as it came, each of us in turn arose, and, having received it solemnly from his neighbor, who had drunk to his health, drank in return, and then, turning to his next neighbor, drank to him; the latter then received the cup, returned the compliment, and in the same way passed it on.

During the whole entertainment I had frequently turned my eyes toward the prime minister, and had been much impressed by his apparent stolidity. When he presented his arm to the lady mayoress, when he walked with her, and during all the time at table, he seemed much like a wooden image galvanized into temporary life. When he rose to speak, there was the same wooden stiffness and he went on in a kind of mechanical way until, suddenly, he darted out a brilliant statement regarding the policy of the government that aroused the whole audience; then, after more of the same wooden manner and mechanical procedure, another brilliant sentence; and so on to the end of the speech.

All the speeches were good and to the point. There were none of those despairing efforts to pump up fun which so frequently make American public dinners distressing. The speakers evidently bore in mind the fact that on the following day their statements would be pondered in the household of every well-to-do Englishman, would be telegraphed to foreign nations, and would be echoed back from friends and foes in all parts of the world.

After the regular speeches came a toast to the diplomatic corps, and the person selected to respond was our representative, the Honorable Edwards Pierpont. This he did exceedingly well, and in less than five minutes. Sundry American papers had indulged in diatribes against fulsome speeches at English banquets by some of Mr. Pierpont's predecessors, and he had evidently determined that no such charge should be established against him.

Much was added to my pleasure by my neighbors at the table—on one side, Sir Frederick Pollock, the eminent father of the present Sir Frederick; and on the other, Mr. Rolf, the "remembrancer'' of the City of London.

This suggests the remark that, in my experience among Englishmen, I have found very little of the coldness and stiffness which are sometimes complained of. On the contrary, whenever I have been thrown among them, whether in Great Britain or on the Continent, they have generally proved to be agreeable conversationists. One thing has seemed to me at times curious and even comical: they will frequently shut themselves up tightly from their compatriots,—even from those of their own station,—and yet be affable, and indeed expansive, to any American they chance to meet. The reason for this is, to an American, even more curious than the fact. I may discuss it later.

My arrival in Berlin took place just at the beginning of the golden-wedding festivities of the old Emperor William I. There was a wonderful series of pageants: historic costume balls, gala operas, and the like, at court; but most memorable to me was the kindly welcome extended to us by all in authority, from the Emperor and Empress down. The cordiality of the diplomatic corps was also very pleasing, and during the presentations to the ruling family of the empire I noticed one thing especially: the great care with which they all, from the monarch to the youngest prince, had prepared themselves to begin a conversation agreeable to the new-comer. One of these high personages started a discussion with me upon American shipping; another, on American art; another, on scenery in Colorado; another, on our railways and steamers; still another, on American dentists and dentistry; and, in case of a lack of other subjects, there was Niagara, which they could always fall back upon.

The duty of a prince of the house of Hohenzollern is by no means light; it involves toil. In my time, when the present emperor, then the young Prince William, brought his bride home, in addition to their other receptions of public bodies, day after day and hour after hour, they received the diplomatic corps, who were arranged at the palace in a great circle, the ladies forming one half and the gentlemen the other. The young princess, accompanied by her train, beginning with the ladies, and the young prince, with his train, beginning with the gentlemen, each walked slowly around the interior of the entire circle, stopping at each foreign representative and speaking to him, often in the language of his own country, regarding some subject which might be supposed to interest him. It was really a surprising feat, for which, no doubt, they had been carefully prepared, but which would be found difficult even by many a well-trained scholar.

An American representative, in presenting his letter of credence from the President of the United States to the ruler of the German Empire, has one advantage in the fact that he has an admirable topic ready to his hand, such as perhaps no other minister has. This boon was given us by Frederick the Great. He, among the first of Continental rulers, recognized the American States as an independent power; and therefore every American minister since, including myself, has found it convenient, on presenting the President's autograph letter to the King or Emperor, to recall this event and to build upon it such an oratorical edifice as circumstances may warrant. The fact that the great Frederick recognized the new American Republic, not from love of it, but on account of his detestation of England, provoked by her conduct during his desperate struggle against his Continental enemies, is, of course, on such occasions diplomatically kept in the background.

The great power in Germany at that time was the chancellor, Prince Bismarck. Nothing could be more friendly and simple than his greeting; and however stately his official entertainments to the diplomatic corps might be, simplicity reigned at his family dinners, when his conversation was apparently frank and certainly delightful.

To him I shall devote another chapter.

In those days an American minister at Berlin was likely to find his personal relations with the German minister of foreign affairs cordial, but his official relations continuous war. Hardly a day passed without some skirmish regarding the rights of "German-Americans'' in their Fatherland. The old story constantly recurred in new forms. Generally it was sprung by some man who had left Germany just at the age for entering the army, had remained in America just long enough to secure naturalization, and then, without a thought of discharging any of his American duties, had come back to claim exemption from his German duties, and to flaunt his American citizen papers in the face of the authorities of the province where he was born. This was very galling to these authorities, from the fact that such Americans were often inclined to glory over their old schoolmates and associates who had not taken this means of escaping military duty; and it was no wonder that these brand- new citizens, if their papers were not perfectly regular, were sometimes held for desertion until the American representative could intervene.

Still other cases were those where fines had been imposed upon men of this class for non-appearance when summoned to military duty, and an American minister was expected to secure their remission.

In simple justice to Germany, it ought to be said that there is no foreign matter of such importance so little understood in the United States as this. The average American, looking on the surface of things, cannot see why the young emigrant is not allowed to go and come as he pleases. The fact is that German policy in this respect has been evolved in obedience to the instinct of national self-preservation. The German Empire, the greatest Continental home of civilization, is an open camp, perpetually besieged. Speaking in a general way, it has no natural frontiers of any sort—neither mountains nor wide expanses of sea. Eastward are one hundred and thirty millions of people fanatically hostile as regards race, religion, and imaginary interests; westward is another great nation of forty millions, with a hatred on all these points intensified by desire for revenge; northward is a vigorous race estranged by old quarrels; and south is a power which is largely hostile on racial, religious, and historic grounds, and at best a very uncertain reliance. Under such circumstances, universal military service in Germany is a condition of its existence, and evasion of this is naturally looked upon as a sort of treason. The real wonder is that Germany has been so moderate in her dealing with this question. The yearly "budgets of military cases'' in the archives of the American Embassy bear ample testimony to her desire to be just and even lenient.

To understand the position of Germany, let us suppose that our Civil War had left our Union—as at one time seemed likely—embracing merely a small number of Middle States and covering a space about as large as Texas, with a Confederacy on our southern boundary bitterly hostile, another hostile nation extending from the west bank of the Mississippi to the Rocky Mountains; a Pacific confederation jealous and faultfinding; British dominions to the northward vexed by commercial and personal grievances; and New England a separate and doubtful factor in the whole situation. In that case we too would have established a military system akin to that of Germany; but whether we would have administered it as reasonably as Germany has done is very doubtful.

Fortunately for the United States and for me, there was in the ministry of foreign affairs, when I arrived, one of the most admirable men I have ever known in such a position: Baron von Blow. He came of an illustrious family, had great influence with the old Emperor William, with Parliament, and in society; was independent, large in his views, and sincerely devoted to maintaining the best relations between his country and ours. In cases such as those just referred to he was very broad-minded; and in one of the first which I had to present to him, when I perhaps showed some nervousness, he said, "Mr. Minister, don't allow cases of this kind to vex you; I had rather give the United States two hundred doubtful cases every year than have the slightest ill-feeling arise between us.'' This being the fact, it was comparatively easy to deal with him. Unfortunately, he died early during my stay, and some of the ministers who succeeded him had neither his independence nor his breadth of view.

It sometimes seemed to me, while doing duty at the German capital in those days as minister, and at a more recent period as ambassador, that I could not enter my office without meeting some vexatious case. One day it was an American who, having thought that patriotism required him, in a crowded railway carriage, roundly to denounce Germany, the German people, and the imperial government, had passed the night in a guard-house; another day, it was one who, feeling called upon, in a restaurant, to proclaim very loudly and grossly his unfavorable opinion of the Emperor, had been arrested; on still another occasion it was one of our fellow-citizens who, having thought that he ought to be married in Berlin as easily as in New York, had found himself entangled in a network of regulations, prescriptions, and prohibitions.

Of this latter sort there were in my time several curious cases. One morning a man came rushing into the legation in high excitement and exclaimed, "Mr. Minister, I am in the worst fix that any decent man was ever in; I want you to help me out of it.'' And he then went on with a bitter tirade against everybody and everything in the German Empire. When his wrath had effervesced somewhat, he stated his case as follows: "Last year, while traveling through Germany, I fell in love with a young German lady, and after my return to America became engaged to her. I have now come for my bride; the wedding is fixed for next Thursday; our steamer passages are taken a day or two later; and I find that the authorities will not allow me to marry unless I present a multitude of papers such as I never dreamed of; some of them it will take months to get, and some I can never get. My intended bride is in distress; her family evidently distrust me; the wedding is postponed indefinitely; and my business partner is cabling me to come back to America as soon as possible. I am asked for a baptismal certificate— a Taufschein. Now, so far as I know, I was never baptized. I am required to present a certificate showing the consent of my parents to my marriage—I, a man thirty years old and in a large business of my own! I am asked to give bonds for the payment of my debts in Germany. I owe no such debts; but I know no one who will give such a bond. I am notified that the banns must be published a certain number of times before the wedding. What kind of a country is this, anyhow?''

We did the best we could. In an interview with the minister of public worship I was able to secure a dispensation from the publishing of the banns; then a bond was drawn up which I signed and thus settled the question regarding possible debts in Germany. As to the baptismal certificate, I ordered inscribed, on the largest possible sheet of official paper, the gentleman's affidavit that, in the State of Ohio, where he was born, no Taufschein, or baptismal certificate, was required at the time of his birth, and to this was affixed the largest seal of the legation, with plenty of wax. The form of the affidavit may be judged peculiar; but it was thought best not to startle the authorities with the admission that the man had not been baptized at all. They could easily believe that a State like Ohio, which some of them doubtless regarded as still in the backwoods and mainly tenanted by the aborigines, might have omitted, in days gone by, to require a Taufschein; but that an unbaptized Christian should offer himself to be married in Germany would perhaps have so paralyzed their powers of belief that permission for the marriage could never have been secured.

In this and various other ways we overcame the difficulties, and, though the wedding did not take place upon the appointed day, and the return to America had to be deferred, the couple, at last, after marriage first before the public authorities, and then in church, were able to depart in peace.

Another case was typical. One morning a gentleman came into the legation in the greatest distress; and I soon learned that this, too, was a marriage case—but very different from the other. This gentleman, a naturalized German-American in excellent standing, had come over to claim his bride. He had gone through all the formalities perfectly, and, as his business permitted it, had decided to reside a year abroad in order that he might take the furniture of his apartment back to America free of duty. This apartment, a large and beautiful suite of rooms, he had already rented, had furnished it very fully, and then, for the few days intervening before his marriage, had put it under care of his married sister. But, alas! this sister's husband was a bankrupt, and hardly had she taken charge of the apartment when the furniture was seized by her husband's creditors, seals placed upon its doors by the authorities, "and,'' said the man, in his distress, "unless you do something it will take two years to reach the case on the calendar; meantime I must pay the rent of the apartment and lose the entire use of it as well as of the furniture.'' "But,'' said I, "what can be done?'' He answered, "My lawyer says that if you will ask it as a favor from the judge, he will grant an order bringing the case up immediately.'' To this I naturally replied that I could hardly interfere with a judge in any case before him; but his answer was pithy. Said he, "You are the American minister, and if you are not here to get Americans out of scrapes, I should like to know what you ARE here for.'' This was unanswerable, and in the afternoon I drove in state to the judge, left an official card upon him, and then wrote, stating the case carefully, and saying that, while I could not think of interfering in any case before him, still, that as this matter appeared to me one of especial hardship, if it could be reached at once the ends of justice would undoubtedly be furthered thereby. That my application was successful was shown by the fact that the man thus rescued never returned to thank his benefactor.

A more important part of a minister's duty is in connection with the commercial relations between the two nations. Each country was attempting, by means of its tariffs, to get all the advantage possible, and there resulted various German regulations bearing heavily on some American products. This started questions which had to be met with especial care, requiring many interviews with the foreign office and with various members of the imperial cabinet.

In looking after commercial relations, a general oversight of the consuls throughout the empire was no small part of the minister's duty. The consular body was good —remarkably good when one considers the radically vicious policy which prevails in the selection and retention of its members. But the more I saw of it, the stronger became my conviction that the first thing needed is that, when our government secures a thoroughly good man in a consular position, it should keep him there; and, moreover, that it should establish a full system of promotions for merit. Under the present system the rule is that, as soon as a man is fit for the duties, he is rotated out of office and supplanted by a man who has all his duties to learn. I am glad to say that of late years there have been many excellent exceptions to this rule; and one of my most earnest hopes, as a man loving my country and desirous of its high standing abroad, is that, more and more, the tendency, both as regards the consular and diplomatic service, may be in the direction of sending men carefully fitted for positions, and of retaining them without regard to changes in the home administration.

Still another part of the minister's duty was the careful collection of facts regarding important subjects, and the transmission of them to the State department. These were embodied in despatches. Such subjects as railway management, the organization and administration of city governments, the growth of various industries, the creation of new schools of instruction, the development of public libraries, and the like, as well as a multitude of other practical matters, were thus dwelt upon.

It was also a duty of the minister to keep a general oversight of the interests of Americans within his jurisdiction. There are always a certain number of Americans in distress,—real, pretended, or imaginary,—and these must be looked after; then there are American statesmen seeking introductions or information, American scholars in quest of similar things in a different field, American merchants and manufacturers seeking access to men and establishments which will enable them to build up their own interests and those of their country, and, most interesting of all, American students at the university and other advanced schools in Berlin and throughout Germany. To advise with these and note their progress formed a most pleasing relief from strictly official matters.

Least pleasing of all duties was looking after fugitives from justice or birds of prey evidently seeking new victims. On this latter point, I recall an experience which may throw some light on the German mode of watching doubtful persons. A young American had appeared in various public places wearing a naval uniform to which he was not entitled, declaring himself a son of the President of the United States, and apparently making ready for a career of scoundrelism. Consulting the minister of foreign affairs one day, I mentioned this case, asking him to give me such information as came to him. He answered, "Remind me at your next visit, and perhaps I can show you something.'' On my calling some days later, the minister handed me a paper on which was inscribed apparently not only every place the young man had visited, but virtually everything he had done and said during the past week, his conversations in the restaurants being noted with especial care; and while the man was evidently worthless, he was clearly rather a fool than a scoundrel. On my expressing surprise at the fullness of this information, the minister seemed quite as much surprised at my supposing it possible for any good government to exist without such complete surveillance of suspected persons.

Another curious matter which then came up was the selling of sham diplomas by a pretended American university. This was brought to my notice in sundry letters, and finally by calls from one or two young Germans who were considering the advisability of buying a doctorate from a man named Buchanan, who claimed to be president of the "University of Philadelphia.'' Although I demonstrated to them the worthlessness of such sham degrees of a non- existent institution, they evidently thought that to obtain one would aid them in their professions, and were inclined to make a purchase. From time to time there were slurs in the German papers upon all American institutions of learning, based upon advertisements of such diplomas; and finally my patriotic wrath was brought to a climax by a comedy at the Royal Theater, in which the rascal of the piece, having gone through a long career of scoundrelism, finally secures a diploma from the "University of PENNSYLVANIA''!

In view of this, I wrote not only despatches to the Secretary of State, but private letters to leading citizens of Philadelphia, calling their attention to the subject, and especially to the injury that this kind of thing was doing to the University of Pennsylvania, an institution of which every Philadelphian, and indeed every American, has a right to be proud. As a result, the whole thing was broken up, and, though it has been occasionally revived, it has not again inflicted such a stigma upon American education.

But perhaps the most annoying business of all arose from presentations at court. The mania of many of our fellow-citizens for mingling with birds of the finest feather has passed into a European proverb which is unjust to the great body of Americans; but at present there seems to be no help for it, the reputation of the many suffering for the bad taste of the few. Nothing could exceed the pertinacity shown in some cases. Different rules prevail at different courts, and at the imperial court of Germany the rule for some years has been that persons eminent in those walks of life that are especially honored will always be welcome, and that the proper authority, on being notified of their presence, will extend such invitations as may seem warranted. Unfortunately, while some of the most worthy visitors did not make themselves known, some persons far less desirable took too much pains to attract notice. A satirist would find rich material in the archives of our embassies and legations abroad. I have found nowhere more elements of true comedy and even broad farce than in some of the correspondence on this subject there embalmed.

But while this class of applicants is mainly made up of women, fairness compels me to say that there is a similar class of men. These are persons possessed of an insatiate and at times almost insane desire to be able, on their return, to say that they have talked with a crowned head.

Should the sovereign see one in ten of the persons from foreign nations who thus seek him, he would have no time for anything else. He therefore insists, like any private person in any country, on his right not to give his time to those who have no real claim upon him, and some very good fellow-citizens of ours have seemed almost inclined to make this feeling of his Majesty a casus belli.

On the other hand there are large numbers of Americans making demands, and often very serious demands, of time and labor on their diplomatic representative which it is an honor and pleasure to render. Of these are such as, having gained a right to do so by excellent work in their respective fields at home, come abroad, as legislators or educators or scientific investigators or engineers or scholars or managers of worthy business enterprises, to extend their knowledge for the benefit of their country. No work has been more satisfactory to my conscience than the aid which I have been able to render to men and women of this sort.

Still, one has to make discriminations. I remember especially a very charming young lady of, say, sixteen summers, who came to me saying that she had agreed to write some letters for a Western newspaper, and that she wished to visit all the leading prisons, reformatory institutions, and asylums of Germany. I looked into her pretty face, and soon showed her that the German Government would never think of allowing a young lady like herself to inspect such places as those she had named, and that in my opinion they were quite right; but I suggested a series of letters on a multitude of things which would certainly prove interesting and instructive, and which she might easily study in all parts of Germany. She took my advice, wrote many such letters, and the selection which she published proved to be delightful.

But at times zeal for improvements at home goes perilously far toward turning the activity of an ambassador or minister from its proper channels. Scores of people write regarding schools for their children, instructors in music, cheap boarding-houses, and I have had an excellent fellow-citizen ask me to send him a peck of turnips. But if the applications are really from worthy persons, they can generally be dealt with in ways which require no especial labor—many of them through our consuls, to whom they more properly belong.

Those who really ask too much, insisting that the embassy shall look after their private business, may be reminded that the rules of the diplomatic service forbid such investigations, in behalf of individuals, without previous instructions from the State Department.

Of the lesser troublesome people may be named, first, those who are looking up their genealogies. A typical letter made up from various epistles, as a "composite'' portrait is made out of different photographs, would run much as follows:

SIR: I have reason to suppose that I am descended from an old noble family in Germany. My grandfather's name was Max Schulze. He came, I think, from some part of Austria or Bavaria or Schleswig-Holstein. Please trace back my ancestry and let me know the result at your earliest convenience. Yours truly, MARY SMITH.

Another more troublesome class is that of people seeking inheritances. A typical letter, compounded as above, would run somewhat as follows:

SIR: I am assured that a fortune of several millions of marks left by one John Mller, who died in some part of Germany two or three centuries ago, is held at the imperial treasury awaiting heirs. My grandmother's name was Miller. Please look the matter up and inform me as to my rights. Yours truly, JOHN MYERS.

P.S. If you succeed in getting the money, I will be glad to pay you handsomely for your services.

Such letters as this are easily answered. During this first sojourn of mine at Berlin as minister, I caused a circular, going over the whole ground, to be carefully prepared and to be forwarded to applicants. In this occur the following words: "We have yearly, from various parts of the United States, a large number of applications for information or aid regarding great estates in Germany supposed to be awaiting heirs. They are all more or less indefinite, many sad, and some ludicrous. . . . There are in Germany no large estates, awaiting distribution to unknown heirs, in the hands of the government or of anybody, and all efforts to discover such estates that the legation has ever made or heard of have proved fruitless.''

Among the many odd applications received at that period, one revealed an American superstition by no means unusual. The circumstances which led to it were as follows: