Between sovereign states there are many kinds of treaty, the principal of which are treaties of peace, armistices, commercial treaties, and those which regulate alliances or guarantee neutrality. There are both public and secret treaties. There are even contingent treaties, so called because their success depends upon future events. When the ministers of two equal Powers sign a treaty they make two copies of it which are called a double instrument. In each copy the ambassador who draws it up places the name of his own prince at the head and signs his in order at the foot, thereby indicating that neither he nor his master relinquishes his claim to the first place in Europe. And since all new treaties are based upon the precedent of old ones, and probably refer to measures taken under previous treaties, they are always drawn up in the same form, and often in the same number of articles. Now in drawing up a treaty it is the duty of the enlightened diplomat to see that the statement of policy contained in the document in hand does not conflict with or injure some other enterprise of his government. He must also see that the conditions are laid down so clearly that they cannot be subject to diverse interpretations. It is obvious from this that the negotiator must be master of the language in which the negotiation is conducted, and especially that in which the treaty itself is written, otherwise he will find himself in endless difficulties and complications. The meaning of a treaty may easily turn on a single word, and unless the diplomatist is thoroughly at home in the language in question he will not be in a position to judge whether the words proposed to be used are suitable. Ignorance of foreign languages indeed is perhaps the most serious drawback with which diplomacy can be afflicted. Now though princes and sovereign states entrust negotiations to diplomatists armed with full powers, none the less they never conclude or sign treaties except upon their own explicit ratification given with their own hand and sealed with their own seal, and the treaties are never published until they have been ratified, and cannot take effect until they are published except in cases specially provided for, where certain articles and sometimes the whole treaty is deliberately kept secret. [Sidenote: _On Writing Despatches._]