Her Majesty’s Representatives On the Joint High Commission.

Washington, March 17, 1871.

To the modest suburban building temporarily occupied by the State Department the eye of the country is directed. A cozy suite of rooms are set apart in this same pile of brick and mortar, where a body of men called the joint high commission meet in order to discuss the little “unpleasantnesses” which have occurred from time to time between two governments which have both pretended to be united to each other by the most natural and fraternal ties. It is not the object of this letter to disclose any of the secrets that are caressed and embraced within those awful doors, vigilantly guarded by locks and keys, but some of the ceremonies and forms observed, as well as the dress and bearings of those in authority, may not come amiss to the general reader.

As early as 10 in the morning carriages are seen rapidly approaching the State Department. After depositing the distinguished human freight the carriages disappear. We have the joint high commission within the building. It may be thought that these men all enter the same room, consult and measure red tape together. Far from any such nonsense. The British commissioners go into a room by themselves; the American commissioners betake themselves to another; and each country talks to itself some two hours, more or less. Then the commissioners of both countries adjourn to a room in the same building, where a modest lunch of crackers and cheese is spread.

Then the joint high commission throat is deluged with the choicest wines that have outlived the perils of an ocean voyage. This performance safely over, the commissioners of both countries adjourn to the same room, where Earl de Grey discourses for the British lion, and Secretary Fish speaks in behalf of the American eagle, while the remainder of the joint high commissioners keep “whist” as hunters in search of the flying game. It will readily be seen that the English commissioners have simply their instructions to carry out. There is no free discussion between the members of both sides. Each side is heard through its mouthpiece, and it is safe to say that no fault can be found with the awful dignity of the joint high commission.

Somewhere between the hours of 4 and 5 in the afternoon this distinguished assembly adjourns, and every evening in the week a dinner party is waiting somewhere for the Englishmen. The writer heard Sir Stafford Northcote say that the “social duties of the commission were becoming the hardest part of the work.” Just as the Hon. Reverdy Johnson was wined and dined in England, the royal scions of nobility are treated here. One evening they are invited to General Sherman’s to see the Supreme Judges; another evening we have some other great and mighty man to show. Washington is determined to astonish these men, if excellent dinners will do it; besides it sounds well to point out to a morning visitor the very chair upon which some of the bluest blood of England has graciously reclined. Just as Queen Elizabeth used to select the right man for the right position, her Majesty’s Government has made choice of the right material for the right place. Like a wise woman, Victoria did not trouble herself about beauty, but chose her men as the mother advised her daughter when selecting a husband—for qualities that would wear. In the first place, she looked around for a great lawyer on international affairs, and selected her famous subject, Sir Montague Bernard, the present professor of international law at Oxford. Sir Montague Bernard has written a great many pamphlets on international law, besides a lecture on diplomacy, and the history of British neutrality during the late civil war. If by any sort of alchemy a man could be evolved from that immaterial something that goes to make English law, Mr. Bernard is the man. There seems to be just enough body about him to confine his international matter, with nothing left to love, hope, or die with. With a firm set mouth and peculiar voice! How one longs to lift up the lids of his mind and see the click and play of the awful machinery!

And now we come to the Earl de Gray, the spokesman of the commission. An editorial in The Press has already given the titles which the centuries had constructed for this bit of earthy matter when it should come along. The Earl has inherited four titles, two from his father and two from his uncle, with large estates attached to each. The reader is requested to study Dr. Mackenzie’s article for all useful information, with the exception that the Earl was not described as Knight of the Garter. It may be owing to Dr. Mackenzie’s extreme delicacy in the matter, which is certainly most creditable to his refined and sensitive sex; but when a member of the joint high commission and a man who is said to belong to one of the first families of England appears at the White House, at a dinner given in his honor, with a garter tied around his left leg in plain sight of the ladies present, without any effort on his part to conceal the same, in spite of Dr. Mackenzie’s diffidence, this matter should be carefully unwound. Earl de Gray wore to the President’s dinner breeches that came to his knees, and these were met by black silk stockings that, whilst they concealed, did not hide his finely shaped lower extremities that leave off where his feet begin. The stocking on his right leg kept its place apparently without exterior fastenings; but the left was confined by a striped garter in black and white, held together by a chaste and modest buckle. It is true one of the lady guests was heard to inquire of another if she supposed that his lordship had lost its mate, and when she was told that the noble Earl had received this from the hand of his gracious sovereign, because an English woman had dropped hers in the dance, and that he wore it in deference to this sublime act, tears filled the eyes of the inquirer and she could only talk of the Earl’s great tenderness the remainder of the evening. The Earl de Grey married his cousin, who is a late lady of the bed chamber to the Princess of Wales. His only living child, Lord Goderich, is a young man, 19 years of age, and he accompanies the commission to this country. There is nothing in the personal appearance of Earl de Grey to indicate that the root of the family has pierced the mould below the times of Henry the First. He is a small man, with a head so large that he is inclined to look top heavy, with features that would attract little or no attention if they belonged to a Congressman. If he possesses ancestral pride, he must have left it in bonnie England, for he is distinguished above his associates for republican simplicity of manners. Socially speaking, no words are equal to the situation, and according to the description of our late countryman, Earl de Grey must possess the elegant and dignified ways of Washington Irving. The English nobleman was formerly a member of Parliament, was afterwards appointed Under Secretary of War, in June, 1859, and Secretary of State for War, in 1863, and subsequently for India, and retired in 1866, where he has rested until he was resurrected to do duty with the joint commission.

The Right Hon. Sir Stafford Northcote, Henry of Hayne, County Devon, Privy Councillor, Knight of the Bath, Doctor of Civil Law, Member of Parliament from North Devon, Secretary of State for India, late president of the board of trade, is the eighth baronet of that name, and succeeded to his title the 17th of March, 1851. The book says, “the great antiquity and high respectability of this family are clearly proved, by an ancient and copious pedigree, preserved in the College of Arms, accompanied by a great number of family deeds, fines, wills, etc., to several of which are affixed their seals or arms, which pedigree is continued down to the visitation of 1620, in the reign of King James the First.” It will readily be seen that it is a great blessing to any humble mortal to be born an English nobleman. Earth, sky, and water interest themselves in his favor. Offices of emolument and power hang ripe on the tree, awaiting the time when he shall be old enough to shake gently the branches. Sir Stafford has titles enough to take one’s breath away, but this fact is gleaned from various sources of information. There is no danger for some time of the baronetcy becoming extinct, as Sir Stafford has seven sons. Sir Stafford represents the Tory element of England, and is devotedly attached to the Crown. He is a fine type of the pure Saxon, and with the exception of Sir Edward Thornton the handsomest man of the number, if his size could be increased; but it is noticeable in this commission that the older the family from which the man sprung the smaller the size, which proves that even dust will wear out.

Lord Tenterden, as near as can be ascertained, comes from a new family, his father being the first nobleman of the line. The name of Tenterden does not figure much in books of knight errantry, consequently the reader’s attention is directed elsewhere in order to study this important subject. My lord secretary to Her Majesty’s high commission is rather a fine looking man, with large eyes, and a beard which conceals the entire lower part of his face. He may have a mouth somewhere concealed in the jungle of his mustache, but there is no evidence, so far as we have seen, of any such aperture. He is said to have a thorough understanding of English yachts, and it is thought in Washington that he is on excellent terms with His Majesty the Prince of Wales. It is his duty to record the doings of the high commission, but as he brought along a man to do the work, his place may be considered quite as ornamental as useful. But when he comes to dinner parties the right man is found for the right place. With what open arms his dear American cousins have received him! How they have crammed him with shad and canvas-back! Alas! alas! he must feel like a fat turkey at Thanksgiving time.

Sir Edward Thornton is well known in this country as the English minister resident, and no man connected with the foreign legations is more respected and beloved by our people. He came here an untitled man, having served for many years in various diplomatic positions in different parts of the world. At the time Prince Arthur was in this country he came more immediately under the eye of his sovereign, and she was so pleased with the treatment of her son, and remembering at the same time her great obligations to him as a subject, that she knighted him, and now we have in the place of plain Mr. Thornton, “Sir Edward;” and well he becomes the title, not that he is any different from plain Mr. Thornton, for Nature made him a nobleman in the beginning, but the Queen, with her poor eyes, could not see it until a royal sprig was a guest under his hospitable roof. After all, the Queen only loaned him a title. It is buried when Sir Edward becomes ashes. His boy will be plain Mr. Thornton, and all the better for that. Minister Thornton, like the late Sir Frederick Bruce, has a most distinguished personal presence, owing to his majestic height and graceful manners. Then he retains that exquisite purity of complexion for which the English belles are celebrated, and our American climate, so conducive to parchment and wrinkles, labors upon his handsome face in vain.

Sir John A. MacDonald is another of Her Majesty’s commissioners whose title dies with the man. Sir John’s father was a merchant in Kingston, Canada, who came to America when this son was only 6 years of age. When only 15 years old the latter left school and began the study of law. When 21 years old he was admitted to the bar; soon after he turned his attention to politics, and in 1844 was elected member for Kingston in the second parliament of United Canada. When two years and a half in Parliament he was appointed a member of the cabinet. During the time of our civil war there was agitation in regard to the dismemberment of Canada. Sir John was one of the strongest advocates for the union of the provinces. He was also a leading participant in the secularization of the church property, which dissolved the connection of church and state in Canada, and in the adjustment of the troublesome seigniorial rights. In one of his addresses he said: “The fraternal conflict now unhappily raging in the United States shows us the superiority of our institutions, and of the principle on which they are based. Long may that principle—the monarchical principle—prevail in this land. Let there be no ‘looking to Washington,’ as was threatened by a leading member of the opposition last session; but let the cry with the moderate party be: ‘Canada united as one province and under one sovereign.’”

Sir John has received his title for his devotion to the interests of the Crown, as exemplified in the various delicate duties assigned to him. In person he is above the medium height, with a regular cast of features; and he has that frank, ingenuous manner not usually conceded to such polished men of the world. Sir John is the only member of the English part of the commission who brings his wife. He tarries in the shadow of the aristocratic Arlington, but the remainder of the commission are quartered at the superb Philip mansion on K street, opposite Franklin Square, where, with a large retinue of servants, dogs and horses, the fire of an English home is kept burning. This house is one of the largest and finest private residences in Washington. The extensive drawing room has a waxed floor, relieved in sundry places by exquisitely finished velvet rugs. Pictures of English landscapes look down from the lofty walls. “I didn’t know they had such comfortable houses in this country,” said one of the royal blood. “It must have been made expressly for our use,” chimed another. It is simply an elegant American home, planned by an English-born American citizen, who, out of deference to his late countrymen, resolved that they should carry away from his adopted country something sweet and savory in the shape of pleasant recollections.

Olivia.