Edward L. Pierce, Memoir and letters of Charles Sumner: volume 4

The relations of the President and of the senator were, up to the time of the San Domingo controversy, altogether agreeable. An associate of the senator on the committee on foreign relations states that the chairman, as well as other members, chafed at times under nominations for foreign posts which seemed below the correct standard;¹ but anxious to preserve harmony, they approved most of them. Fish and Sumner were naturally in accord as to the attainments and character required of our representatives abroad; but the former, from facility of nature, was not disclosed to stand in the way of the President's inclinations.

Mr. Motley was nominated, April 12, as minister to England.² The selection was the President's, without pressure from any quarter, and it was very agreeable to Mr. Fish. Motley, returning from Europe in the summer of 1868, made an address in the campaign, which with brilliant rhetoric maintained the Republican cause, and described the qualities and achievements of General Grant. Naturally this praise was grateful to the general, coming from the Historian who had set forth the character of William the Silent.³ In the early part of the winter Motley delivered an historical address in New York, when he was introduced to the audience by Mr. Fish with a very complimentary tribute. During the month preceding the inauguration he was in Washington, where he frequently met in society the President elect, and after dinner there were genial smokes and talks. The address he had made in the campaign, of which the President was well informed, their agreeable intercourse in Washington, the general feeling that injustice was done to him by the last Administration, as well as his accomplishments,—all these put him in the foreground as a candidate for the English mission.⁴ Sumner altogether approved the appointment, but his part in making it was a minor one; and so far as appearances go, it