The age-herald., 1898-05-07
PAUNCEFOTE'S
 SUCCESSOR

Sir Julian Pauncefote to the post of am
 bassador at Washington will probably in-
 fluence the nomipation of his successor. Sir
 Thomas Sanderson. Sir Julian, who was
 permanent under secretary of state for for
 egn affairs. was unable to get along with
 any of the heads at the foreign office, Sir
 Philip Currie and Sir Thomas Sand rson
 being among those who took most objec-
 ton to his methods. and inasmueh as Sir
 Philip possessed great influence, not only
 with Lord Salisbury, but also with the
 marchioness, Sir Julian was, much to his
 own disgust, transferred from his under
 secretaryship to the post of envoy at wash
 ington, which was not even at that time an | embassy.
 The under secretaryship carries with 1t a
 salary of from SIP, coo to $15,OOO, and is re-
 garded as one of the blue ribbons of the
 civil service, carrying with it as 1t does all
 sorts of prerogatives and privileges, besides
 the possession of great power True, the
 mission at Washington is worth in the
 neighborhood of $s0,OOO a year, but. then,
 the expenses are three times as great in
 the national capitol of America. and man
 is infinitely better off in every sense, fnan-
 cially and in point of social prestige, as a l foreign uDuer secretary III l1oIuoH lhebh "ti
 ambassador at Washington.
 Sir Thomas Sanderson will be transferred
 to the post of British ambassador in the 1 United States mainly because he Is unable | to agree with MT. George Nathaniel Curzon,
 the parliamentary under secretary of the | foreign office who represents the depart ment in the house of commons, and Who
 has been endeavoring to run things to his | own way of thinking since Lord Salisbury | was forced by sickness to surrender the
 nominal control of the foreign policy of the
 empire to Arthur Balfour, first lord of the treasury
 | MT Curzon, who Is married to Miss Lei | ter, of Washington, is a very brilliant and clever young man, who, having travelled l in the far Orient and explored almost every | country the face of the globe, is able | to bring to bear upon the political prob- | lens now confronting the British govern l ment a degree of experience possessed by | no other member of the foreign office | staff or even of the cabinet.
 | Sir Thomas, on the other hand, has been | clerk of the foreign office for nearly | forty years, and is, therefore, imbued with | al the old-fashioned red-tape notions and | prejudices which naturally trammel and I hamper the action of so very progressive | young statesman as MT. Curzon Recently | relations have become so strained between | them that MT. Curzon, like Achilles of old, | retired sul1ing to his tent, declaring that l if was impossible to carry on the business | of the foreign office with Sir Thomas | raising obstacles in every direction on the | score of precedent and traditions, and he | absolutely declined to resume work unless | some changes were made.
 As Mir curzons knowledge at the pres | ent moment is indispensable to the govern | ment seeing that he has had in hand until now the direction of Englands policy, not | only in the far Orient but likewise in con- I nection with the Spanish-American conflict, l he carried the day and Sir Thomas Will l be shunted to Washington
 | How reluctant Sir Thomas must be to | make the change may be gathered rom the l fact that for the two score years ne mas | been conspicuous figure in London socle- 1 ty. a member of such ultra-eXcluslve ciups
 as the Travellers, and an inveterate olher- out. with all the iron-cast preJudices ana | cot babits of A confirmed bachelor of forty | years standing. To take such man as l this from London and from the Engish | foreign office and to suddenly transplant | him to Washington as ambassador IS | hold experiment If Sir Julian has been | a success at Washington it may be ascrlped
 to the fact tht he spent half his ofncial | career in the colonial service of the crown | at Hong Kong and elsewhere, his appoint l men to the foreign office being solely que l to his knowledge of international law. But | Sir Thomas Sanderson's whole official hfe | has been passed in the foreign office, and | under the circumstances he comes to the | United States terribly handicapped. True, | he has the advantage of Sir Julian in birth, | for he is a grandson of the first viscount or | Canterbury, who himself was son or the 1 third Duke of Rutland. The brother of Sir ] Thomas, I may add, is British consul gen. eral at New York.
 Sir Thomas, like Sir Julian, is not strictly speaking, a diplomatist by profession. In-
 deed, diplomacy is rather at discount at | Washington, the present French ambassa-
 dor being likewise entirely new to the du- ties of an envoy, his previous life having | been spent as a provisional prefect or gov | ernor in France, and more recently as gov-
 ernor general of Algeria In fact, it was | because M. Cambon had shown too much honest independence in resisting financial
 
 supporters of the government at Paris, that he has removed from his office of governor
 general and sent to Washington, very much like Sir Thomas Sanderson and Sir Julian
 Pauncefote, namely, to get him out of the I way.
 It is mainly due to its being regarded as
 a species of shunting ground that Washing
 ton has been described with some reason,
 as the, Botany Bay of diplomacy, this un-
 complimentary appellation being partly due to the great distance separating Europe from America, which causes men belonging
 to the line to prefer even minor missions
 nearer home than more lucrative and more important ones in the United States.
 The only European power, in fact. that
 seems to think it worth while to send to
 Washington diplomatists of acknowledged
 experience and of the highest rank is Rus
 sia, Count Cassini, who has won for the
 czar the whole of the Chinese province of l Manchuria, being worthy successor of the