“ After spending some years in a hussar regiment, in 1854 he entered the diplomatic service without giving up his connexion with the army, in which he reached the rank of general in 1879. He was for the ten years 1860 to 1870 secretary of embassy at London, and then, after serving at Rome and Copenhagen, was in 1880 appointed ambassador at St Petersburg. His success in Russia procured for him, on the death of Baron v. Haymerle in 1881, the appointment of minister of foreign affairs for Austria-Hungary, a post which he held for fourteen years. ”

“ In 1885 he interfered after the battle of Slivnitza to arrest the advance of the Bulgarians on Belgrade, but he lost influence in Servia after the abdication of King Milan. Though he kept aloof from the Clerical party, Kalnóky was a strong Catholic ”