his suddenly clipping the thread of a foreign minister's tenure of office
in a fit of jealous anger is not at all surprising.

Thus finished Mr. Motley's long and successful diplomatic service at the
Court of Austria. He may have been judged hasty in resigning his place;
he may have committed himself in expressing his opinions too strongly
before strangers, whose true character as spies and eavesdroppers he was
too high-minded to suspect. But no caution could have protected him
against a slanderer who hated the place he came from, the company he
kept, the name he had made famous, to whom his very look and bearing--
such as belong to a gentleman of natural refinement and good breeding--
must have been a personal grievance and an unpardonable offence.

I will add, in illustration of what has been said, and as showing his
feeling with reference to the matter, an extract from a letter to me from
Vienna, dated the 12th of March, 1867.

. . . "As so many friends and so many strangers have said so much
that is gratifying to me in public and private on this very painful
subject, it would be like affectation, in writing to so old a friend
as you, not to touch upon it. I shall confine myself, however, to
one fact, which, so far as I know, may be new to you.

"Geo. W. M'Cracken is a man and a name utterly unknown to me.

"With the necessary qualification which every man who values truth
must make when asserting such a negation,--viz., to the very best of
my memory and belief,--I never set eyes on him nor heard of him
until now, in the whole course of my life. Not a member of my
family or of the legation has the faintest recollection of any such