“If they lie to you, lie still more to them”, was the naive instruction given by one sovereign to his ambassadors.
Not to multiply instances on a point where history is unfortunately too full, it is interesting to notice, as some one has pointed out, that with rapid communication by train and by telegraph, court intrigues have gradually died away; for now that the capitals of the world are within “whispering distance” of each other, as it were, ambassadors have assumed a position of secondary importance to the minister for foreign affairs (or in America the Secretary of State), an officer who resides at the home capital.
PRECEDENCE.
Naturally enough, one of the questions of greatest concern at a mediaeval court was that of precedence—who was the biggest man, and the next and so on. Talk about comic opera! In more than one historic instance the question of precedence among diplomats, or the consequent squabbles between their trains of attendants, fairly “out-Herods Herod” in farcicalness. “The Conferences of Ryswyk”, we are told, “were held in a house which seemed to have been built for the purpose, with three separate entrances and every convenience for preventing collisions; but it was found impossible from first to last to sit at the single table in the rooms assigned to the mediators, because no agreement could be come to about the order of sitting; in that room they could only stand; they sat in a circle in another room where there was no table. A Latin protocol, which had been preserved of the proceedings at Nymegen eighteen years before, was produced as a precedent, but in vain; it contained a plan of the room used at Nymegen, showing the arrangement of seats in it, together with the positions of the doors, windows and fireplace—for these things may be important in determining which is the top and which the bottom of a table. A round table was used at Cambray, Soissons and Aix la Chapelle; but even a round table loses its accommodating quality when it is discovered that the place of honor is that opposite the door, and that every place of honor has a right hand and a left.” A quarrel between two ambassadors’ wives has seriously interfered with international negotiations, and a coachman’s obstinacy has added thirty pages to the “Compleate History of the Treaty of Utrecht.”
MODERN DIPLOMACY—CHARACTER.
It is not to be supposed that modern diplomacy has so completely changed character as to lose all of its disagreeable features, for there is still more or less mediaevalism attaching to it—at least if the popular conception be true. And perhaps in some degree it must always be so; for the office is unique in its opportunities as well as its inducements to dissimulate, mislead and misrepresent. In the first place, the diplomat undertakes his mission under secret instructions. The public may know what are the duties of the consular service as fully as the consuls themselves; but not so with the diplomatic service, for to the public it is a closed door. Moreover, our diplomat may reason with himself that business of any kind involving competition is a kind of warfare; that diplomatic business is especially so because it is international, that there is no penalty for the breaking of an international law, and thus he may be led to conclude that “all’s fair in love and war”, especially war.
It may be necessary for some if not all of the members of a legation to maintain a “discreet inquisitiveness”; it certainly is necessary for all to know how to meet indiscreet questions with non-committal answers; yet the finesse of diplomatic intrigue is dangerous ground and British and American diplomats have, in the main, done well to avoid it. The chief of a legation especially should remember that his office is a noble one and should be kept above the stifling air of intrigue; that the dignity of a nation may easily be compromised by the mere suspicion of complicity therein, and that to those among whom he moves he both represents his country officially and typifies his countrymen personally. The American diplomat has gained something of a reputation for going straight at the mark—of leaving no doubt as to the attitude of his government and the policy he is to follow, and is not this the true diplomacy? The ruling purpose should not be to gain one’s point, but to preserve the national dignity while using all honorable means to gain the point.
So much depends upon the manner of a diplomat. Men ordinarily admire and covet a certain plainness and directness of speech which in business may amount even to bluntness. But frankness of speech which in any other occupation might prove only disadvantageous, in diplomacy amounts to a complete disqualification. In business a diplomat must be all ears and no tongue until the time comes for him to speak, then he must know exactly what to say and what not to say. He may feel that every man has a right to an opinion and to the expression of it, but being a diplomat he must remember that his opinion will be regarded as official whether or not he intends it so, and therefore it must be guarded religiously.
In society, somewhat to the contrary, there should be no outward indication of a studied reserve—nothing that would serve as a restraint upon his freedom of movement and conversation. He should be a man of engaging manners, of suave and polite address, and of affability and urbanity in conversation. He should not only be well trained in the usages of good society, but should also thoroughly acquaint himself with the traditional usages and customs, the etiquette of the court where he is to reside.