can case before the Tribunal. Its effect on that body may readily be understood.

Dr. White felt deeply chagrined at his failure to prevent the action of the Russian Government, and, while charging it with bad faith, attributed its course to the greater interest it felt in preserving good relations with European countries. He wrote me as follows: "I need hardly indicate to you a former Minister here and recently Secretary of State where the trouble lies. You know even better than I of how little account is an interest in the northern seas compared to a point gained or even helped in European or Asiatic questions just here before the world." The Secretary of State, Mr. Gresham, wearied with the tergiversations of the Russian Minister in Washington, wrote me: "I am convinced that for some reason Russia desires that we shall fail in our contention before the Arbitration Tribunal."

The Tribunal began its secret and confidential consideration of the case on July 10, and was not able to reach a conclusion until August 15, when the award was rendered in open session and handed to the American and British agents. It was against the United States on all points except as to the regulations adopted for the taking of the seals on the high seas. These prescribed a closed season from May 1 to July 31, and thereafter the seals might be taken in the water except in a prohibited zone of sixty miles about the Pribiloff Islands; the use of firearms in killing the seals was forbidden, and other restrictions were fixed.

It was undoubtedly the intention of the neutral arbitrators to protect the seals from destruction, and they supposed that the regulations adopted would be sufficient for that purpose. They were much more extensive as to the prohibited zone and severe in their restrictions than the terms of settlement proposed by Secretaries Bayard and Blaine, and in this respect a disposition was manifested to claim the result as a victory for the United States.

But in my study of the seal-herd and the preparation of the case, I reached the conclusion that no amount of pelagic sealing profitable to the vessels engaged in it could be permitted with safety to the herd, and I took the position that it was the duty of the Tribunal to prohibit all pelagic sealing. This position was adopted by the American counsel and urged by them upon that body. The utter futility of the regulations to protect the herd and the correctness of my position have been fully demonstrated by their operation. The United States suffered a technical defeat before the Tribunal, but time has shown that its essential claim was absolutely well founded, that the only safe and proper method of prosecuting the sealing industry is on the land, and that all pelagic sealing tends to its destruction and should be prohibited.

After the award had been rendered, I could not conclude my labors until the secretaries of the Tribunal had perfected the record. While this was being done, Mrs. Foster and I, accompanied by Mr. Carter, who had never before been on the Continent, spent a few weeks very pleasantly touring in Switzerland. On my return to Paris, my last duty to the arbitration was discharged, which had occupied me during eighteen months of very arduous labors. In acknowledging my last dispatch to the Department of State, Secretary Gresham said: "This official termination of your duties as agent of the United States before the Tribunal affords me opportunity to express my high appreciation of your protracted and earnest labors in connection with this important international arbitration. The ability and unflagging industry which you displayed in the performance of your arduous task have not escaped my observation. You retire with the satisfaction that you have the personal esteem and good wishes of all with whom you have been so long and intimately associated."

For a time following the adjournment of the Tribunal, international arbitration was unpopular in the United States,

just as it was in England after the Geneva Award. But the better and prevailing judgment of our country is that the course pursued by President Harrison in this matter was the correct one. It was far better that we should submit our rights and interests in the seal-herd to the arbitrament of an impartial tribunal than risk the horrors of a war between the two kindred peoples.

CHAPTER XXVIII

TOUR AROUND THE WORLD SYRIA AND EGYPT

It had long been a cherished plan of Mrs. Foster and myself to make a journey around the world, and the conclusion of my labors before the Bering Sea Arbitration Tribunal seemed to offer the fitting opportunity. When I became Secretary of State in 1892, I gave up all my professional engagements and withdrew from the practice of law in Washington. Hence there were no business obligations requiring my early return to the United States. We were already well on our way, at Paris, for a circuit of the globe, and we determined upon the journey.

In order that we might not make it alone, I invited a lifelong friend from Indiana and his two daughters to accompany us. The young ladies, whom we had known from childhood, were just out of college, accomplished, attractive, and quick to see everything beautiful and interesting in life. During the months of our travel, in sunshine and storm, in enjoyment and weariness, among friends and strangers, we proved a congenial company, and made the most out of the countries. through which we passed.

Our traveling companions joined us in Paris, which city we left on October 4, 1893, and for the sake of our companions, who had not been in Italy, we tarried a few days among the familiar but always interesting scenes of Nice, Rome, and Naples. We sailed from Brindisi for Alexandria on October 15. It had been our intention to go first to Athens and Constantinople, but a quarantine had only recently been established in those parts on account of the existence of cases of cholera in Italy, which changed our itinerary. I had once

before been foiled in my efforts to reach those ancient cities. After my residence in Spain, I left Paris in 1885 and made the long journey down to Brindisi, to be informed on my arrival that quarantine had been established in Greece that very day.

We spent only one day in Alexandria, as our connection was close for the steamer which was to take us to Jaffa and the Holy Land, but it was sufficient for a hasty view of the city. We found in port the United States cruiser Baltimore, and were very courteously received on board by the captain and other officers. This vessel had a special interest for me, as it was the crew of the Baltimore which were so cruelly attacked in the streets of Valparaiso, Chili, in 1891, and which caused such strained relations with the Government of that country as for a time to threaten a hostile termination. I was an active participant in the negotiations which brought about a peaceful settlement, and as Secretary of State I received from the Chilian Government seventy-five thousand dollars as an indemnity to the members of the crew who suffered from that attack.

I kept no diary of our journey from which I can draw for this narrative, but Mrs. Foster, who is a "ready writer," sent letters home to our daughters with great regularity, and as these have been preserved I shall take the liberty of quoting from them freely, as giving the freshest recollection of our experiences. From Beirut, Syria, she wrote, November 6, as follows:

MY DEAREST E: I have sent you letters from Jaffa and Jerusalem, giving you an account of our novel and very interesting experience at those places and in our excursions to Jericho, the Jordan, the Dead Sea, Bethlehem, and other places in the neighborhood of Jerusalem. We came away from the Holy Land feeling how much more interesting and real those places of which we have heard from childhood will