Daily Kennebec journal., 1898-08-18
AasthSs cahlnsl ckaase.

suS Aourtn time since President
McAlnaey was inaugurated a change
is 70 occur in his cabinet. First Nc
kenna resigned to 60 upon the su-
preme bench; next Sherman was forced
by failing health to seek rest; and then
Gary gave way to Smith in the post
ONCE department. Now Judge Day.
who succeeded Mr.. Sherman as secre-
tary Of state Is to step out of that high
ONCE. to accept q place. It is said. upon
the peace commission. The country
mas heard with sincere regret the an
no9ncement that Judge Day was to
leave the cabinet. First as assistant
secretary and for several months as
secretary of state he has shown him.
self man Of statesmanlike mould,
broad and able. vigorous and keen. He
has honored the high position he has
held. and has left a name in the office
that will live. Those who doubted
President McKinley's wisdom in call
ing to so high an office a lawyer but
little trained in the craft of statesman
ship. have long since been silenced.
Judge Day has occupied the position in
a most trying time, with delicate mat
ters of vast Importance crowding upon
him for settlement. but he has not
made a single mistake. What he
lacked in knowledge OF the intricacies
of diplomatic art he more than made
upin anflonest straightforwardness and
an energetic Americanism which over
came all obstacles. He has been the
right hand man of President Mckinley
in formulating foreign policy that
gives our country a position of more
dignity and Importance than it ever
had before. Foreign diplomats have
learned to respect Judge Day, and if he
does his country as much service as
peace commissioner as he has as secre-
tary Of state he can retire to private
life with more laurels than many men
nave ever Wou Ill So SlOFt .tuIle
of public service.
If the whole art of government con-
sists, as has been said, in the faculty
of choosing the right man for the
right place" President Mckinley has
made a master stroke in appointing
Colonel John Hay the American am
bassador in Great Britain, to the office
of secretary of state in place of Judge
Day. If the men best qualified to judge
in America had been asked to name
the person whose fitness marked him
for the post, the greater number would,
no doubt. have mentioned Colonel Hay,
whose whole life has been prepara-
ton for the Importance duties of state
craft. The generous intellectual gifts
bestowed on him by nature, Colonel
Hay shass assisted by shs utmost dill
gence and most studious care, and his
varied and brilliant career as scholar,
author, editor, lawyer, soldier and
diplomat has produced well-rounded
and-eenaplsts- man of affairs.
Colonel Hay, after his Brown Uni
versity codfsa, studied law in the
office of Abraham Lincoln. whose
private secretary he afterward became.
Before the end of the war he served
as a staff officer under Generalst Hunter
and Gilmore, and after the war was
successfully Secretary of Legation at
Paris, Charge d'Affaires in Vienna, ana
Secretary of Legation at Madrid. From
1879 to 1881 he was first assistant sec
retary of state at Washington. and in
March last was appointed to the court
Of st. James. Colonel Hay has at
times acted as the editor of the New
York Tribune, and his literary produc-
tons are genuine contributions TO
American literature. The most strik-
ing characteristic Of the man Is his
versatility-his "many- -sidedness." His
'Castilian Days has the delicacy, the
charm, the lightness OF touch of liter
airy piayfulness; his Life of Lincoln, -
written in collaboration with John G.
Nicolay, is a work of monumental la
boriousness. which must serve as the
storehouses from. ,whichy future biog
raphers of Lincoln will draw their ma
terials, and his poems of.which Jim
Bludso" is type, have a rude strength
which breathes with a certain ele-
mental vigor and freshness. Heaia Q
sound, I. Constitutional. and ssintera
national lawyer, scholar, a
wit. a genial man. and as Sydney
Smith would say, he has Las much
sense as il he had no wit. and. as much
wit as if he had no sense"
1t is a fortunate circumstance that
such a man has been found to conduct
our foreign affairs at this period of our
history. We have entered o. new era
and our path will be beset by new
dangers and perplexities. Colonel Hay
is known and honored abroad, fand he
has a special hold upon the hearts of