rformed his
duties--generally not very heavy, but always demanding tact and
prudence--of his position as minister. Menacing sounds, indeed, began
to be heard from across the ocean, when the Irish Fenians, who control
so much of the press of the United States, began to raise the cry that
Mr. Lowell sacrificed the interests of their dynamitard friends to a
brutal British government; but, as the Washington officials took no
notice, nobody here paid much attention to the matter. In social life,
the new minister began to be a power. He went everywhere--to the
houses of the great, to the houses of the men of letters, and to
places where such people most do congregate. His talk was excellent
give-and-take. He was neither a professional anecdotist, like another
famous American talker, Mr. Chauncey Depew, nor a man on the watch for
something to disagree with, like Mr. Blaine, nor even, as was his
admirable successor, Mr. Phelps, a man of long silences broken by
flashes of humor. Mr. Lowell seemed to know everything and have his
knowledge always to hand; he was quick in repartee; he mixed anecdote
with reflection in the happiest manner; he laughed at others' jests,
and they laughed at his. Still, one had to be a little careful with
him, for there were points on which he was extremely sensitive.
Nobody, for example, must talk in his presence of _Americanisms_, or
hint that the standard of language and literature observed in America
showed any deflection from the best standard of the race....

On one occasion Mr. Lowell was sorely tempted to make his permanent
home here. Just about the time of his ceasing to be minister, he was
seriously sounded as to his willingness to be nominated to the new
post of professor of English language and literature at Oxford. Had he
consented to stand, not even a board determined to sink literature in
philology could have passed over his claims. But he declined, for two
reasons. There were claims of family, over in Massachusetts, and,
greatly as he loved the mental atmosphere of England, he thought it
his duty not to accept a definitely English post. And the sense of
duty is strong in that old Puritan stock from which he sprang.

... But the distinguishing feature of Mr. Lowell was his adding to
these high literary gifts the strong practical side which made of him
a social power and a diplomatist. Naturally, such a man made a mark by
his speeches, and happy was the audience, at the unveiling of a
mo