It will be observed that the modern conception of the function of a diplomat makes him a resident of the country of his embassage during the time of his appointment. Moreover, that he is not sent on any stated errand, as for instance, the negotiation of a treaty, or as a member of an international congress. This latter, to be sure, is diplomatic business, but the agents employed are usually termed commissioners.
ORIGIN.
It was in this latter sense, however, that the term ambassador was originally used.
Just when it had its origin it would be hard to say, but it was so far back in antiquity that the sanctity of religion must needs be thrown about the persons of the officials to shield them from violence. In ancient times when an ambassador went to a foreign court he went with a special message, and having delivered it and received a reply, his business was ended and he returned homeward. His official dignity was but little inferior to that of the sovereign. Indeed he represented not only his country but the person of his sovereign, and he was accredited not to any foreign minister, but directly to the sovereign. Hence his visit, especially if friendly, was attended with an elaborate display of pomp and ceremony, the exchange of gifts and courtly compliments, and it would have been a royal sight to have beheld his journey through the
“lovely land ...
Whose loveliness was more resplendent made
By the mere passing of that cavalcade
With plumes and cloaks and housings, and the stir
Of jeweled bridle and of golden spur”.
When he began to stay abroad, some four or five hundred years ago, his purpose was mischievous. He stayed to act as a court spy and intriguer, to find out secrets while keeping his own. A certain diplomat of the seventeenth century is said to have written in praise of his occupation, diplomacy “causes sudden revolutions in great states. It excites hatreds, jealousies and seditions. It arms princes and whole nations against their own interests; it forms leagues and other treaties among sovereigns and peoples whose interests are quite opposed to one another; it destroys those leagues and snaps the closest ties asunder”. There is no doubt as to what this means. It is war—polite war, if you please, where the weapons are deception, hypocrisy, insinuation and innuendo—the meanest kind of war, where cowards may be greater than heroes.