Page:The Practice of Diplomacy - Callières - Whyte - 1919.djvu/57

 secret service which will inform him of all that happens in the foreign country of his service. Yet despite the universal acknowledged truth of what I say, most negotiators will more readily spend vast sums on a great show of horses and carriages, on rows of useless flunkeys, than on the payment of a few well-chosen agents who could keep them supplied with news. In this matter we should learn a lesson from the Spaniards, who never neglect their secret agents—a fact which I am sure has contributed largely to the success of their ministers in many important negotiations. It is doubtless the success of Spanish agents which has led to the establishment of the wise custom of the Spanish Court to give Spanish ambassadors an extraordinary fund called Gastos Secretos.

The ambassador has sometimes been called an honourable spy because one of his principal occupations is to discover great secrets; and he fails in the discharge of his duty if he does not know how to lay out the necessary sums for this purpose. Therefore an ambassador should be a man born with a liberal hand ready to undertake willingly large expenses of this kind; and he must be even prepared to do it at his own charges when the emoluments of his master are insufficient. For as his principal aim must be to succeed, that interest should eclipse all others in any man truly devoted to