the meagreness of their pay. Here is a list of salaries for English and
American ministers and ambassadors:

City Salaries

American English

Paris $17,500 $45,000
Berlin 17,500 40,000
Vienna 12,000 40,000
Constantinople 10,000 40,000
St. Petersburg 17,500 39,000
Rome 12,000 35,000
Washington -- 32,500

Sir Julian Pauncefote, the English ambassador at Washington, has a very
fine house besides--at no damage to his salary.

English ambassadors pay no house rent; they live in palaces owned by
England. Our representatives pay house-rent out of their salaries. You
can judge by the above figures what kind of houses the United States
of America has been used to living in abroad, and what sort of
return-entertaining she has done. There is not a salary in our list
which would properly house the representative receiving it, and, in
addition, pay $3,000 toward his family's bacon and doughnuts--the
strange but economical and customary fare of the American ambassador's
household, except on Sundays, when petrified Boston crackers are added.

The ambassadors and ministers of foreign nations not only have generous
salaries, but their Governments provide them with money wherewith to pay
a considerable part of their hospitality bills. I believe our Government
pays no hospitality bills except those incurred by the navy. Through
this concession to the navy, that arm is able to do us credit in foreign
parts; and certainly that is well and politic. But why the Government
does not think it well and politic that our diplomats should be able
to do us like credit abroad is one of those mysterious inconsistencies
which have been puzzling me ever since I stopped trying to understand
baseball and took up statesmanship as a pastime.

To return to the matter of house-rent. Good houses, properly furnished,
in European capitals, are not to be had at small figures. Consequently,
our foreign representatives have been accustomed to live in
garrets--sometimes on the roof. Being poor men, it has been the best
they could do on the salary which the Government has paid them. How
could they adequately return the hospitalities shown them?