FAMED FOREIGN SECRETARIES

Robert Stewart, Viscount Castlereagh (1769-1822) was an unstable Ulster aristocrat whose favorite costume (pink hunting coat and riding boots) made him a figure in Parliament. Foreign Secretary from 1812 to 1822, he stiffened the Grand Alliance that defeated Napoleon. At the Congress of Vienna, which laid the foundations for a hundred years of Pax Britannica, he put on a classic display of balance-of-power diplomacy: to counter the threat of Russo-Prussian hegemony in Europe, Castlereagh threw Britain's weight on the side of the former enemy, France. Britons blamed Castlereagh for the economic distress following the Napoleonic wars, the neglected veterans of Waterloo and the martyrs of Peterloo (hundreds of hungry English weavers shot down by the militia for protesting their working conditions). Shelley wrote: "I Met Murder on the way--He had a Mask like Castlereagh." In 1822, in a fit of depression, Castlereagh slit his throat with a penknife.

George Canning (1770-1827) was perhaps the most brilliant of Anthony Eden's predecessors. John Quincy Adams called him the "implacable and rancorous enemy of the U.S." Canning was rich, a brilliant orator, wrote poetry, and was trusted by almost no one. First named Secretary at 37, he was unable to work in harmony with Castlereagh, then Secretary for War. Castlereagh challenged him to a duel in which Canning was shot in the thigh; both then resigned. He did not return to office until Castlereagh's suicide, 13 years later. Canning encouraged liberal movements in Europe, used British naval power to keep France and Spain out of Latin America. He proposed a pact with the U.S.; President James Monroe instead unilaterally proclaimed a Monroe Doctrine. Later Canning made a famous boast: "I called the New World into existence to redress the balance of the Old."

Henry John Temple, Viscount Palmerston (1784-1865), great practitioner of cruiser diplomacy, bulldozed British prestige to its highest level since Waterloo. Three times in office (for a total of 16 years), he was disliked by underlings, whom he bullied, but was popular with the public, to whom he was "Old Pam." Under Old Pam a belligerent Britain invaded the Crimea to keep the Russians out of Turkey, annexed Hong Kong, elbowed the French away from Egypt. He disliked everything un-British; the Americans were "swaggering bullies."

Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoyne-Cecil, Marquess of Salisbury (1830-1903), was first named by Disraeli, headed the Foreign Office four times (15 years). He shrewdly played Russia, Turkey and the Balkan countries off against one another, kept peace in Europe. After Bismarck's retirement (1890), Salisbury was the most influential statesman in Europe. He made the French drop their claim to Egypt, and (as Prime Minister) brought the Boer War to an end. Salisbury was an intellectual, a wit, a student of theology and science, and a tolerant Conservative: "There is much," he said, "which it is highly undesirable to conserve."

Viscount Grey of Fallodon (1862-1933) preferred birdwatching to diplomacy; his friendship with Theodore Roosevelt began in their mutual interest in birds. A Liberal, Grey worked desperately to maintain peace in Europe. Once convinced of Germany's warlike ambitions, he promoted the Anglo-French-Russian Entente, fought for a British declaration of war (the invasion of Belgium swung British sentiment to his side). He made the secret treaty which brought Italy in with the Allies. It was Grey who looked out of his Foreign Office window at lighting-up time on, Aug. 4, 1914, and said with melancholy prescience: "The lamps are going out all over Europe; we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime." Two years later he retired to his birds--which he could no longer see. Overwork had ruined his eyes.

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