ak also from my own observation of the
reputation which Motley left in the Austrian capital.
Notwithstanding the decision with which, under the direction of Mr.
Seward, he had addressed the minister of foreign affairs, Count
Mensdorff, afterwards the Prince Diedrickstein, protesting against
the departure of an Austrian force of one thousand volunteers, who
were about to embark for Mexico in aid of the ill-fated Maximilian,
--a protest which at the last moment arrested the project,--Mr.
Motley and his amiable family were always spoken of in terms of
cordial regard and respect by members of the imperial family and
those eminent statesmen, Count de Beust and Count Andrassy. His
death, I am sure, is mourned to-day by the representatives of the
historic names of Austria and Hungary, and by the surviving
diplomats then residing near the Court of Vienna, wherever they may
still be found, headed by their venerable Doyen, the Baron de
Heckeren."

The story of Mr. Motley's resignation of his office and its acceptance by
the government is this.

The President of the United States, Andrew Johnson, received a letter
professing to be written from the Hotel Meurice, Paris, dated October 23,
1866, and signed "George W. M'Crackin, of New York." This letter was
filled with accusations directed against various public agents,
ministers, and consuls, representing the United States in different
countries. Its language was coarse, its assertions were improbable, its
spirit that of the lowest of party scribblers. It was bitter against New
England, especially so against Massachusetts, and it singled out Motley
for the most particular abuse. I think it is still questioned whether
there was any such person as the one named,--at any rate, it bore the
characteristic marks of those vulgar anonymous communications which
rarely receive any attention unless they are important enough to have the
police set on the track of the writer to find his rathole, if possible. A
paragraph in the "Daily Advertiser" of June 7, 1869, quotes from a
Western paper a story to the effect that one William R. M'Crackin, who
had recently died at-----confessed to having written the M' Crackin
letter. Motley, he said, had snubbed him and refused to lend him money.
"He appears to have been a Bohemian of the lowest order." Between such
authorship and the anonymous there does not seem to be much to choose.
But the dying confession so