The gaucheries of the young diplomatists might be a theme for ridicule, but I refrain. On one important matter, nevertheless, a word may be said. It would be well if the British Ambassadorial staff were to abandon that hauteur which some of its members are apt to display towards those of their countrymen who visit Constantinople charged with important commercial interests. It is not necessary that a British Ambassador should imitate the policy of those who use their diplomatic position to champion the commercial interests of their country at the expense of higher trusts and higher standards; but it is advisable to avoid the other extreme of ignoring everything and ostentatiously snubbing everybody connected with commerce as beneath the dignity of diplomacy. Yet this has repeatedly been the line of conduct, as it has been that of inclination. For it was only in 1908 that our Embassy first took official notice of the British Chamber of Commerce at Constantinople and sent a representative to attend its sittings, who probably thought he was demeaning himself in being called upon to do so. This aloofness towards trade interests and their representatives is all the more inexplicable as many of these young men come of families which owe their worldly position to trade, either as bankers, brewers, meat contractors, or even less reputable connexions. Both the Anglo-Saxon and the Teuton take on a most necessary coat of social polish in Constantinople by rubbing against the more subtle and elusive elements of the Levant, the more graceful-mannered Italian or Spaniard and the well-bred Turk, from the “Excellency” down to the caikdji (boatman) of the Bosphorus. “Texas Jack” can go to school here, did go to school, and so profited by tuition received that on his return home he could not reconcile himself to the every-day rough-and-tumble uncouthness of Yankee-land. He had been favourably impressed by the Turks, and they liked him in return, for there was a touch of genuine unspoilt human nature about the man. One winter the Sultan sent and begged his acceptance of a fur coat to keep the cold out. Thereupon a howl went up in the American Press; accusations of graft, bribery, and corruption—not in New York, but in Constantinople! Altogether it may be said that the diplomatists the United States sends to Turkey, even if they may have been somewhat ignorant of diplomacy as a profession, are invariably men of sterling worth and value in themselves, not chosen on account of their family connexions or financial resources. And this is a matter of importance inasmuch as things are apt to vary according to the character of the representative of a country. The well-bred gentleman would naturally inculcate that urbanity of manner and that cultivation of heart and mind which, far more than any other accomplishments, form the true charm of the élite of European society. The Ambassador less happily constituted can hardly fail to leave his mark on his subordinates in a