may never come to the eye of the generation which lived under the treaty, but remain hidden in the archives until historians bring the matter to light. When it is set free the correspondence may be published in part, the government reservating the right to decide which papers it is expedient to give to the I public. This procedure justifies itself in many cases, because the open discussion of persons and possibilities might awaken unnecessary antagonisms, yet it frequently happens that only a part of the real result is given. The most notorious examples are the secret articles which were entered into more frequently in former centuries than of late, and which sometimes almost nullified the public document. The question of the effect of the negotiation may therefore be lost to the investigator who does not find the secret article, or who is not aware of the reservations and understandings which otherwise accompany the document. tion. Diplomacy was so long looked upon as a kind of Diplomacy warfare in which any means might be employed to and Decepwin that the papers emanating from that source have a reputation for deception. There is evidence enough to show that prevarication was a common thing at times, and while the historian has no mission to vindicate the liars, the condition of the governmental conscience is an interesting matter which can be used in estimating the period. In attempting to get at the truth one should distinguish between the kinds of documents and be sure that he is acquainted with the processes of diplomatic negotiation. Diplomatic Diplomatic Ordinarily the government operates through ambassadors who are sent to the foreign country, either for a special purpose, or for a period of years. The envoy has two duties, one to make known the wishes of his government and the other to report back how things are going. Placing ourselves back in the eighteenth century, for example, it is safe to say that the judicious ambassador does not communicate to the foreign government all that he knows, but that his notes will contain only that part which will incline that power to accede to his wishes. Deception may enter at this point when the ambassador makes statements about the movements of his government which are not so, either to frighten or cajole the opponent into an agreement. In pursuing such a policy he may spread false information among the representatives of other nations at this court, so that their governments may be prevented from taking any action that would spoil his plans. In his reports to the home government the envoy will give the details of the negotiation and possibly ask for further instructions. He will tell what he knows about the machinations or the opinions of other ambassadors. It is through this channel that any false information of other governments gets carried to its destination. The ambassador will attempt also to give the state of public opinion on questions liable to affect his country; he will watch the progress of laws through the legislature, and endeavor as far as possible to forewarn his government of impending evil, or call attention to advan tages in sight. From the Venetian ambassadors of the sixteenth century there was a constant flow of reports which described in great detail not only the diplomatic affairs but also the public events and the manners and morals of the country to which they were accredited. The presumption in respect to these reports is in favor of the truth so far as the intentions of the author are concerned. There would be no good reason for him to deceive the home government unless one imagine the rare case of a treasonable plot in which an ambassador is involved. That it was possible to bribe an agent to influence his master to follow the wishes of the foreigner was true in certain periods, but the chances are against that view of the mass of diplomatic work. The inquiry should usually attempt to find whether the ambassador was well informed, and how far the personal capacity and opportunities of the writer permit him to speak with exactness. The official papers which record a diplomatic Order of Busitransaction are, in brief, the instructions of the home ness. government; any formal papers transmitted directly from government to government; letters formal and informal between the ambassador and the court to which he is accredited; and finally the reports to the home government. The papers of an event like the Congress of Vienna are theoretically of the same character, since the ambassador is sent to a group of powers at once, instead of a single court, and the public results are embodied in the minutes of the congress and in the treaty there signed. In the nature of things these papers have various relations to the truth, as we have seen. Furthermore, to get the complete history of a diplomatic incident it is often necessary to go outside of diplomatic papers. The private correspondence and memoirs of statesmen of the time, the records of legislative committees, and other documents of less formal character may be needed to show the true inwardness of the transaction. These are to be judged according to the class to which they belong. The strictly diplomatic papers require the investigator to keep in mind the double rôle demanded of departments of foreign affairs and their ambassadors. Without necessarily resorting to deception, they have been called upon to satisfy the demands of their own nation and at the same time allay the suspicions of others. In the writing of diplomatic history there has been a tendency to exaggerate the importance of small affairs. This is perhaps most conspicuous in the memoirs of those who have participated. Not every interview nor every word of even a great man is necessarily vital to the current of an episode. The history may easily degenerate into tittle-tattle, or into a purely pedestrian recital of connected occurrences, unless the writer has a vigorous conception of the perspective of his period, or of the principles of law and government involved in the issue. CHAPTER XVIII PRIVATE DOCUMENTS A VAST mass of material for many reasons interesting to the historian is to be found in the transactions which take place between men in their private capacity. Agreements, accounts, deeds, wills, inventories, and similar documents are relics of the actual life of their time, and bear testimony to many things which their makers were not consciously recording. To a certain degree a business agreement is a public document because the makers leave the record as a third witness to prove the nature of the transaction, but men do not ordinarily write their deeds or their wills as contributions to the social history of their epoch. They have a distinct practical end in view. They desire to have their property reach a certain destination and to the comments of later investigators they are completely indifferent. The conscious personality of the author is thus eliminated, although it was the word of a living being. We are able to treat the paper as a relic like the arrow-head, but as a relic more eloquent of human life. The inferences to be drawn from business trans- Inferences actions are in large part so obvious that a list of from Business their uses need not be attempted. In a research, however, it is well to consider carefully whether the Papers. |