are convinced that under Mr. Morier's system it would reappear with greater force than ever. The number of missions and first secretaryships are now fewer than when that difficulty became a serious grievance; the number of working juniors could not be diminished, and may, with the increase of business, have to be raised; the promotions would not be more numerous; the number of men who qualified for secretaryships, or who had reasonable hopes of qualifying, would soon surpass the vacancies; and the old state of things would ere long be reproduced with the very system of seniority which he is so anxious to get rid of. Do what we will, professional training or professional examinations must beget professional claims. It is a great difficulty when the means of satisfying them are inadequate, but there it is, and there it will remain.

Finding that it was impossible to remove the block,' the Committee wisely turned their attention to the relief of those who suffered most from its existence. Besides the payment for a knowledge of public law which is intended to benefit the third secretaries, and the allowance for languages which was meant to reward both second and third secretaries, they have secured to the second secretaries a slight increase of salary with an annual increment of 157. up to 450l. a year. This will be a great boon to the long-suffering second secretaries, and considering that most of them have arrived at the age at which the attractions of matrimony become irresistible, and that some of them have been twenty years in the Service, the allowance is certainly not extravagant. They will feel that they are making some progress in one of the main objects of all professions-gaining a livelihood; and as we believe that the qualifications for diplomacy are best acquired by experience, most of them will be improving themselves for the day of promotion. If to this plan for improving the position of the younger diplomatists the system of rewarding indisputable merit by promotion be added, we shall probably arrive at a compromise between conflicting difficulties as satisfactory as the conditions of an impossible problem will permit.

There remains, however, one great difficulty in the Service which seems never to have been considered with the attention it deserves. That problem is the removal of the inequalities caused by the advantages and disadvantages of the various posts. The subject appears to have been disposed of by the Committee in the two following questions and answers :

'Chairman. I was going to ask how you would get over the apparent hardship of banishing one set of gentlemen to the minor missions, say in South America or the East, some remote and unsatisfactory

portion of the globe, and sending the other and favoured set to the great missions?

'Hon. R. Lytton. Undoubtedly that would be a hardship, and I do not think you can get over it.'

Chairman. There must be some sort of compromise?'

'Hon. R. Lytton. Unquestionably.'

That is all. And yet this is the question which involves the emoluments, health, happiness, and prospects of the young diplomatists.

The subject of removals from one mission to another was fairly considered by the Committee, but it was considered only with reference to its educational advantages and its expense; and finding that there existed much difference of opinion as to the former and very general complaints against the latter, they recommended that the period of service at one post should be extended beyond two years; a suggestion which has not been adopted in the new Regulations. Let us look into the matter as the diplomatist has to look into it. We will take the case of a married man with a few young children. He is about to change his post, and he may be sent to any mission to which the Secretary of State may think fit to remove him; he therefore very naturally considers the relative advantages of the places in which he may have to reside. At the more agreeable European posts he would enjoy the following advantages. There would be no necessity for an expensive outfit. Furniture, clothes, &c. would be procurable on the spot, and need only be bought as they were required. The expenses of the journey would be moderate, and would not be such as to deter him from coming home once a year on leave, or from sending his family to England if circumstances required it. He would have much greater facility in availing himself of opportunities for leave of absence, and for attending to any family affairs which might call for his presence at home. He would have comparatively little difficulty or expense in engaging servants either in England or on the spot. He might calculate upon finding in his new place of abode all the necessaries and conveniences of civilised life to which he had been accustomed, and to which, as a father of a family, he must attach great importance. He would find a climate in which he could live without risk and in which he could bring up his children. A large diplomatic and official society to which he would at once have the entrée, with the probability of making many agreeable acquaintances beyond its limits. He would be within the circle of European politics, and would enjoy opportunities of improving his professional knowledge, whilst he would be

sufficiently near at hand to avail himself of the odd jobs' of diplomacy which suddenly present themselves, and which can only be offered to those who are easily accessible.

Now let us consider the opposite case. Our diplomatist is likely to be sent to a distant and unpleasant post. He finds that the expenses of taking out his family will absorb the greater part of his year's salary; he inquires of those who know the place what he ought to take out with him, and is told Everything that you are likely to want: you can neither 'get furniture nor clothes there, and you will find houses ruinously dear and very bad.' The man whom he is to replace has probably come home invalided in consequence of the effects of the climate, and he has to consider not only the risk to himself, but the much more certain danger to his children, which may have to be incurred. He is not likely, after the expense to which his journey and outfit have put him, to be able to take any leave of absence, and may probably have to bear not only the cost of sending home his wife and children, but also the misery of a separation from them. He will have endless difficulties about servants, and but little chance of agreeable society, he will endure all the miseries of social and domestic life, and his professional training and prospects will not be nearly as good as those of men who are enjoying all the advantages of an European post.

We gentlemen of England, who sit at home at ease,' may scoff at these things, and say, with great truth, that a man who chooses a diplomatic profession must take the rough and the smooth as they come, and that if he is worth anything he will be ready to go anywhere. But we must, at the same time, admit that health, wealth, and happiness are three of the most important considerations in life; and that so long as they are to be found at some posts and lost at others, every reasonable being must prefer residing at those places where they may probably be attained. Conceive the difference between going to Belgium and to Brazil! or between Paris and Pekin. Is it astonishing that diplomatists, with all their relations and friends, should besiege the Foreign Secretary with petitions for pleasant posts? The position of the Secretary of State, with such power for rendering good and evil to those under his command, is much to be pitied, and the Committee ought to have considered his case; they did nothing for him, however, and the only attempt which has been made to deal with the difficulty is to be found in the following new regulation :

'It is to be distinctly understood that in future all the members of

the Diplomatic Service will be expected to take their turn in whatever part of the world their services may be required; and that, except as regards Teheran and Peking, where no accommodation can be procured for married men, every secretary or attaché, whether married or unmarried, must be prepared to go to the post at which the requirements of the public service demand his presence, and to which he may be appointed.'

We need hardly say that this rule must be wholly inoperative, or, if carried out, most unequally harsh. To send a poor man to St. Petersburg would be to ruin him; to send a sickly one to Rio would be to kill him. We feel confident that no Secretary of State would allow his good nature to be fettered by the ferocity of his own rules, and that the poor and the sick will plead as earnestly and as successfully as heretofore for posts where life would be worth having.

The difficulty is, however, an urgent one: men must be found for the work of the most objectionable missions, and there is, we believe, only one way to find them—that is, to make it worth their while to go. Every man has his price.' At present an appointment to a distant post entails loss and discomfort of every kind; but if a local allowance, greater chances of promotion, and earlier prospects of a pension, by making service in it count double in point of time, were held out as baits, the poorer and more ambitious members of the profession would eagerly compete for places in missions that they now seek to avoid. The additional cost to the country would be very small, and a spirit of emulation and contentment would be infused into the Service which would do more for its improvement than all the other recommendations of the Committee put together. This one simple act of justice would, we believe, suffice to remove all the main grievances of the profession; its omission will make all other well-meant reforms of none effect.

There remains but one more of the recommendations of the Committee upon which we have to remark; it is as follows:

That a report be furnished by the chief of each mission annually to the Secretary of State as to the mode in which each second and third secretary and attaché in his mission has discharged his public duty; and that these reports should be duly considered before any promotion or increase of pay be accorded to the subject of them.'

This suggestion has been adopted in the new Regulations. We suppose that it was adopted because it was made, although that is not an entirely sufficient reason; but we have failed to discover in the Blue Books before us any good cause for its appearance in the Report. One ex-ambassador (Sir H. Bulwer)

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did, in his evidence, propose that the opinions of heads of missions should be taken as to the fitness of their subordinates for promotion. He considered that it would be a 'test of their capacity, and would give them a reason for endeavouring to be on good terms with their chief.' One exMinister also (Mr. W. D. Christie) stated that during the time that he was in the Service, which was fifteen years, quarrelling at embassies and missions was very frequent, and he went so far as to say that perfect harmony at any embassy or mis'sion was the exception rather than the rule.' As a remedy for this melancholy state of things, he proposed that heads of missions should be invested with greater authority over their subordinates. The misfortune which attended this gentleman throughout his diplomatic career appears, from the general tone of the evidence before us, to have been so singular and exceptional, that the Committee could hardly have intended, by their suggestion, to guard against its recurrence; and the insinuation of Lord Dalling, that secretaries should be supplied with an interested motive for keeping on good terms with their chiefs, is too much like a libel upon their sense of duty to permit us to suppose that it could have influenced the Committee in drawing up the report.

The only justification for the recommendation of confidential reports is probably to be found in two despatches by Lord Lyons and Lord Cowley treating of the duties and position of secretaries and attachés from a speculative point of view, and suggesting that in cases of inefficiency or insubordination heads of missions should be armed with greater authority than they now seemed to possess. With this object in view, Lord Cowley proposed the adoption of periodical reports. Both Lord Clarendon and Mr. Hammond were asked many questions upon the subject, and were referred to the opinions given by Lord Cowley and Lord Lyons. They both pointed out that the cases upon which these eminent authorities were arguing were purely hypothetical, and they both unhesitatingly condemned the proposed reports. Lord Clarendon said that from his own experience as head of a mission, there was no difficulty in maintaining proper discipline and efficiency, and that any shortcomings upon these points were, in his opinion, to be attributed rather to the head of the mission than to his subordinates. Mr. Hammond also spoke strongly against the proposed reports; he showed that they were unnecessary, and that their adoption would be likely to produce heart-burning, 'suspicion, and discontent,' and to cause an unpleasantness between the chief of a mission and his subordinates which