Page:The National Geographic Magazine Vol 16 1905.djvu/83

At the very outset I shall throw myself on your kind indulgence, I hope you will not think me one of that rash company, more numerous in enrollment than polite in name, that rush in where angels fear to tread. Believe me, I know full well the difficulty and the delicacy of my venture, and have known it from the start. The only excuse that can be pleaded in extenuation of the hazard is that the persuasiveness of your committee, if not greater than the restraint of my warning good sense, was at least more potent than the firmness of my resolution.

Russia just now is at the best a tempting but perilous theme. Half a century hence it will be possible to look back through the clear perspective of years and measure the true relations of the events of today to a new career of progress and greatness. But in the present hour we see the portents without the promise, and Russia is shadowed by the gloom of the clouds without the gleam of the sun. The inherent difficulties of the subject are enhanced by the personal position of the speaker. There are phases on which it is becoming that I should speak with reserve—perhaps, to use an Hibernianism, with silence—on the principle, "the wisest word I ever said was the word that wasn't spoken." It is true that the diplomatic trust was laid down some years ago, and the easier, if not higher, diplomacy of American free speech was resumed; and you will permit me to amend the words of the poet and say:

But there are obvious proprieties which follow the minister even in retirement; yet while they should be respected, there is still large room for free expression. I did not hesitate to say in St Petersburg, looking out from the Foreign Office upon the broad Alexander Place, from the center of which rises the stately and splendid memorial shaft to the first Alexander, that there were things in Russia which we of the United States, in the best spirit of sincere friendship, could wish otherwise,