DISCOURS DE M. VAN DE WEYER A LA SOCIÉTÉ ROYALE DES ANTIQUAIRES
In rising, as the senior member of the corps diplomatique, to return, in behalf of my colleagues and of my-self, our most sincère thanks to you, my Lord, for the honour you hâve conferred upon us in proposing our healths in such flattering terms, to you, Gentlemen, for the manner with which you bave been pleased to receive that toast, I cannot forbear both as a foreign minister and as a member of the Royal
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society of Antiquaries, expressing the wish that some future fcllow op this Sociely may one day take for subjecl of a Icarned dissertation, the position held at différent periods in England by ambassadors and foreign ministers as comparée! wilh the one they enjoyed in the 19"' century.
There was a lime when Ihose agents werelooked upon with a jealous and dislrustful cye, when the Lord mayor of Lonclon thought himself, on certain occasions, aulhorised to refuse their being adraitted in tlie precincts of the city ; when the greal duc de Sully himself remarked, in finding to his utter astonishment, a collation prepared for him at Greenwich, that it was an established custom in England not to ireat ambassadors, and not even to ofler them a glass of water. There was a time when, in order to pave their way to a belter welcome, they provided themselves with gloves, hawks'hoods, leather for jerkins, a perfumer, and ail sort of delicacies which they bestowed aniongst Lords and Ladies, and when the Nelherlands ambassador accredited during the two short period of our first atlempt at indépendance from Spain, did not venlure to présent his credentials wilhout having a cargo of good flemish cheese for distribution among the court Ladies. Notwithslanding those précautions they scldom associaled wilh the inhabitants on a footing of friendly inlimacy ; and their présence at a mask or a dinuer at court, became an important state aiïair, and oflen a source of international difficultés.
Now a days, Gentlemen, there is no national or civic e'nteilainment, no literary or scientific anniversary, no agricullural or industrial meeting; no sociely for the study of the past, no private assembly for the social and intelleclual enjoyment of the présent where the foreign ministers are not
mm
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received with the kindest feelings, the most noble hospitality. The future antiquary , in reading thèse facts of the 19 lh cenlury, will probably make some observations of his own on the subject. Such, will lie probably say, was upon those foreign ministers, the effect of the kind and desinlerested attentions bestowed upon thtm, that they idenlified themselves with ail our pursuits ; that they showed the deepestinterestin the progressof ail our national institutions, and were often admitted as fellow labourers: and that they found themselves so much athome in this our hospitable country, that many of them took unto thcm English wives, and (hat in our public meetings, inslead of claiming the privilège of speaking the Ianguage of their country, or a barbarous sort of latin in which they dealt formerly, they actually were so far emboldened as toaddress us in our own Ianguage, regardless of the dangers of murdm'ng the Quecn's English, and perfectly certain of not even raisinga smile al their doing so. I hope, Gentlemen, that our future antiquary will add, that if we were rathcr inadéquate to the last lask, there was in us no lack of that deep l'elt gratitude of which I again beg you will accept the sincère expression.
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(Page M 7.)
