Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 32.djvu/139

103 JENS IVERSON WESTENGARD 103 mind, his profound sense of right, his capacity to see the other point of view, his masterly analysis of intricate problems, his capacity for multitudinous detail, won for hii^ an influence in the kingdom second only to that of the king, and a standing with the representatives of foreign governments such that a distinguished traveler visiting Siam once remarked that Mr. Westengard was the only European administrative he had encountered in the East of whom he had heard no unkind criticism. With the new king his influence was not less than with his father. If the relation was less intimate and affectionate, it was perhaps tecause the younger man regarded his adviser with the respect due an elder who had akeady arrived before he had come to take up the reins of power. Of an important 'change in the policy of the kingdom put in effect the first month of the new reign he writes, December 13, 1910: "Naturally I am not in a position to say whether my remarks have had anything to do with accompHshing the most desirable result. I shall never know, nor do I care to inquire, for if that be the case it is the highest good I have yet done here. However, as I suppose is most often the case with the really great things that are accom- plished, the world does not know who really brought them about. . . . Do not be surprised if, when I leave Siam, no great praise is given to my work. The best things I have done are not known — sometimes not even to myself. But this is the lot of most public men. It is particularly so here, because I honestly feel that I can do most good by retiring as far as possible from the appearance of driving the machine." Success and the government's increased confidence brought new tasks. From this time on every measure that did not originate there was referred to Westengard's office for revision. We find him negotiating treaties with Denmark and Italy, proposing ministers and ambassadors, bringing together for the coronation the greatest assemblage of European royal personages that had ever met in Asia, planning new water works, building and operating railroads, revising the kingdom's finances and system of internal revenues. He drafted a vast body of law, modified existing laws, and as judge of the San Dika, the Supreme Court of Appeal, inter- preted statutes. He wrote thus of his work September 29, 1910: "But you know the nature of the tenure on which (in my own