In this article Margareta Bowen relates the negotiations preceding the Treaty of Paris, which ended the Spanish-American war (April 25 1898-August 12 1898). Although French is generally assumed to have been the lingua franca of diplomacy before World War I, the treaty was signed in both English and Spanish. Bowen states that these negotiations serve as one of the better documented examples of diplomatic interpreting in the nineteenth century, and provide an insight into the nature of language services for diplomatic negotiations in instances where French was not the lingua franca. The main source is the diary of Whitelaw Read, the leader of the American delegation, which provides a user’s viewpoint rather than an interpreter’s memoir. Bowen’s article describes the contents of the treaty, the participants and the interpreter and the working conditions.