oom is shown where Lady Lisle is said to have been seized.
The old tombstone over the grave of Leonard Hoar and his wife,
at the Quincy burial-ground, in Massachusetts, is almost an
exact copy of that over Lady Alice Lisle, at Ellerton near
Moyle's Court. They were doubtless selected by the same taste.
Mrs. Leonard Hoar, whose maiden name was Bridget Lisle, was
connected quite intimately with three of the great tragedies
in the history of English liberty. Her father, as has been
said, was murdered at Lausanne. Her mother was murdered under
the form of the mock judgment of Jeffries, at Winchester.
Her niece married Lord Henry Russell, son of the Duke of Bedford,
and brother of Lord William Russell, the story of whose tragic
death is familiar to every one who reads the noble history
of the struggle between liberty and tyranny which ended with
the Revolution of 1688.
Bridget Hoar married again after the death of her husband,
President Hoar. Her second husband was a Mr. Usher, who
seems to have been insane. She lived with him very unhappily,
then separated from him and went back to England, staying
there until he died. She then came back to Boston and died,
May 25, 1723. At her own request she was buried at the side
of her first husband. A great concourse of the clergy and
the principal citizens, including the Governor, attended her
funeral.
It was my good fortune to be instrumental, after this visit,
in correcting an evil which had caused great annoyance to
our representatives abroad for a good many years.
The Americans have never maintained their representatives
abroad with a dignity becoming a great power like the United
States. The American Minister is compelled by our rules to
wear a dress which exposes him to be mistaken for a waiter
at any festive gathering. Distinctions of rank are well established
in the diplomatic customs of civilized nations. It is well
understood that whether a representative of a county shall
be an Ambassador, a Minister Plenipotentiary, a Minister Resident,
or a Charge' d'affaires, depends on the sense of its rank
among the nations of the world of the country that sends him.
For many years all argument was lost on Congress. The United
States representative must not adopt the customs as to dress
of the effete monarchies of the old world. To send an Ambassador
instead of a Minister was to show a most undemocratic deference
to titles, abhorrent to every good republican.
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