ob at the
Foreign Office is easy because there is no real trouble between us,
and because Sir Edward Grey is pretty nearly an ideal man to get on
with. I think he likes me, too, because, of course, I'm
straightforward and frank with him, and he likes the things we
stand for. Outside this official part of the job, of course, we're
commonplace--a successful commonplace, I hope. But that's all. We
don't know how to try to be anything but what we naturally are. I
dare say we are laughed at here and there about this and that.
Sometimes I hear criticisms, now and then more or less serious
ones. Much of it comes of our greenness; some of it from the very
nature of the situation. Those who expect to find us brilliant are,
of course, disappointed. Nor are we smart, and the smart set (both
American and English) find us uninteresting. But we drive ahead and
keep a philosophical temper and simply do the best we can, and, you
may be sure, a good deal of it. It _is_ laborious. For instance,
I've made two trips lately to speak before important bodies, one at
Leeds, the other at Newcastle, at both of which, in different ways,
I have tried to explain the President's principle in dealing with
Central American turbulent states--and, incidentally, the American
ideals of government. The audiences see it, approve it, applaud it.
The newspaper editorial writers never quite go the length--it
involves a denial of the divine right of the British Empire; at
least they fear so. The fewest possible Englishmen really
understand our governmental aims and ideals. I have delivered
unnumbered and innumerable little speeches, directly or indirectly,
about them; and they seem to like them. But it would take an army
of oratorical ambassadors a lifetime to get the idea into the heads
of them all. In some ways they are incredibly far back in
mediaevalism--incredibly.

If I have to leave in the fall or in December, it will be said and
thought that I've failed, unless there be some reason that can be
made public. I should be perfectly willing to tell the reason--the
failure of the Government to make it financially possible. I've
nothing to conceal--only definite amounts. I'd never say what it
has cost--only that it costs more than I or anybody but a rich man
can afford. If then, or i