Hustler

"I have never been a diplomat. I have many faults, but somehow, I am sure you will put up with them, as have my own people."

Thus did Charles Gates Dawes, new-fledged Ambassador to the Court of St. James's, shrewd, Rooseveltian master of the art of self-projection, greet the British nation last week. The international air had suddenly become filled with clouds of incense and Anglo-American goodwill. Prime Minister MacDonald was planning to go and talk with President Hoover about naval disarmament. Astute Mr. Dawes made it clear that he would try to keep beatific sentiment from cloying by playing his role of hustling, plainspoken, rough-diamond American.

Even before he left the S. S. Olympic, he unhinged his famed underslung pipe and explained its mechanism to fascinated European journalists. Told of the intensive social obligations of an Ambassador, the heavy dinners he must endure, he replied: "I've been dining out in Washington for four years and have yet to remember gaining anything from it. I would as soon talk diplomacy with a man with a pipe in his mouth as any other way. My first two months in England will be reserved for my dear old friends of the British Army and the reparations dealings. I want to see General Sir Travers Clark [Wartime Chief of the British Supply Service] who saved the American Army during the first few months of the War."

An English newsman inquired if the British publi; were to enjoy the famed, picturesque Dawesian vocabulary. "Hell's bells, no!" said the discreetly indiscreet Ambassador. "I'm a diplomat now. I've got to don kid glove manners."

Ray Atherton, Charge d'Affaires of the U. S. Embassy in London, helped signalize the beginning of the Dawesian regime by saying he would name his newborn daughter Helen Maria, after the most widely publicized expletive.

The new Ambassador hustled to London, hustled to his desk at No. 4 Grosvenor Gardens, Mrs. Dawes and daughter Virginia sped to the Ambassadorial home in Prince's Gate (once J. Pierpont Morgan's), began unpacking furniture. Early the next day Mr. Dawes decked himself in a morning coat, clapped a silk hat on his head, hustled to Paddington Station, where British Foreign Secretary Arthur Henderson stood stiffly awaiting. Mr. Dawes grabbed his hand, said something to make him smile, hustled into a train for Windsor to present his credentials to the King. No predecessor had ever done this so soon after his arrival.

At Windsor there were carriages, footmen in scarlet, outriders on stamping white horses. The Dawes topper gleamed in the sun. The Dawes smile flashed at jolly Britons. Soon King George was holding his first audience with a foreign diplomat in seven months. Queen Mary showed Mrs. Dawes the castle.

After a half-hour, out hustled Ambassador Dawes. He flung a few words to the newsmen: "I found King George delightful. I do not know what the usual ceremony is. I merely presented my credentials and stopped at his invitation for a chat. His Majesty was looking very well."

That night the Dawes baggage was hustled aboard a train for Scotland. Next morning the Ambassador was gazing happily at heaths and highlands. Well-primed, Hustler Dawes quoted Macbeth at the newsmen:

. . . What are these

So wither'd and so wild in their attire?

The meeting with Mr. MacDonald followed, at Forres on Moray Firth. Two days later the Ambassador was to speak before royalty at the Pilgrims Society dinner in London. The same day, the Prime Minister was to address the dour fisherfolk of nearby Lossiemouth, his birthplace. They agreed to have both speeches touch on all-important naval reduction, and issued a joint communique to the effect that their speeches, when delivered, should be regarded as the starting point of a new disarmament movement in which "other naval powers are expected to co-operate."

To round off his diplomatic debut, Hustler Dawes added this final fillip: "I consider that the time of old-fashioned diplomats is over and that people like myself, who are not careerists, have an opportunity for settling the affairs of the world."