There is nothing in General Wallace’s literary career to encourage hasty and careless workmanship. His methods have been, from the beginning, those of a conscientious artist, who strives for excellence and is capable of cheerfully casting aside the work of many days if, by additional labor, he can gain better results. He parleys with a sentence or debates with a synonym with a caution that is akin to Oriental diplomacy. He has probably never written even a social letter carelessly, and if his correspondence were to be collected, it would prove to be of the same quality as his best printed work. There has always been a dignity in his ambitions. Military leadership came to him naturally, and when he took up literature, it was in a serious way, with subjects that were new and daring. By making every stroke count, and paying no heed to changing literary fashions, he has, in the intervals of unusually varied and exacting employments, cultivated the literary art with enviable success. Heredity and environment explain nothing in General Wallace. He is an estray from the Orient, whom Occidental conditions have influenced little. This is proved by all his imaginative writing, by his military tastes, by many qualities of his personality, and by his appearance and bearing. He has never written of American life, and the attraction of Mexico as a field for fiction lay in the splendor and remoteness of the early civilization of the country, combined with the romance of its conquest by soldiers of Spain. In like manner, “Ben Hur” and “The Prince of India” are such subjects as would naturally appeal to him. His fancy has delighted always in the thought of pageantry, conquest, mystery, and mighty deeds; it has pleased him to contemplate the formal social life of the old heroic times. The beginning of his friendship with the Sultan illustrates a sympathy, native in him, with the Oriental character. General Wallace had reached Constantinople after his appointment as minister, but had not been formally received. On Friday, the Moslem Sunday, he went with the multitude to see the Sultan go to prayer. General Wallace was entitled, by act of Congress, to wear the uniform of a major-general in the United States army, and he was clad in all the regalia of the rank. Between the gate of the imperial park and the Mosque which the Sultan attended was a small house, with a platform in front of it, set apart to strangers, and there General Wallace viewed the procession. The dark man in the rich uniform attracted the attention of the Sultan as he passed, and from the Mosque he sent Osman Pasha, the hero of Plevna, then marshal of the palace, to learn the identity of the stranger. On finding that he was the new American minister awaiting audience, the Sultan sent an invitation to General Wallace to accompany him on his return to the palace, an honor never before accorded to a minister not yet received. A carriage was sent for the American, who returned in the brilliant