UNITED NATIONS – After the apprehension preceding Monday’s recess appointment of John Bolton and Capitol Hill’s tension over his nomination during the last five months, America’s new ambassador to the United Nations started his new job yesterday with hushed diplomacy, keeping a low profile.

Arriving a few minutes early and with a small entourage for his scheduled 11:30 a.m. appointment with Secretary-General Annan, Mr. Bolton smiled broadly at the throng of cameras awaiting him, but without saying a word, walked quickly past reporters into the elevator, and up to Mr. Annan’s 38th-floor office, where the American presented his credentials – a time-honored ritual meant to turn humble envoys into full-blown Turtle Bay permanent representatives.

“Good to see you. I’m glad to be here,” the ambassador told Mr. Annan, shaking his free right hand. Mr. Annan’s left arm is in a sling following to a July 15 rotator cuff operation in a New York-area hospital to mend damage from a ski accident last winter. After a quick exchange of pleasantries and a short talk about U.N. reform, Mr. Bolton was out of the building.

“Now that Ambassador Bolton is here, and we are in the middle of major reform of the U.N., and [it] is a topic that has seized all the members of the organization, I hope that he will join these discussions, and work with me and the other ambassadors to reform the U.N.,” Mr. Annan later told a small group of reporters, according to the Mexican news agency Notimex. “Obviously being the [American permanent representative] with the support of the president, he will have an important voice, but, as I have indicated, to be an important voice amongst members. And I trust he will work with the others for us to achieve our cause.”

The protracted saga of Mr. Bolton’s Senate confirmation hearing seemed remote at the United Nations – even to representatives of democratic member states. “Fortunately or unfortunately, we do not have in our system a well-established confirmation hearing process,” Japan’s U.N. ambassador, Kenzo Oshima, told The New York Sun when asked if he had to go through such a process himself. “It is part of the American democracy and we understand it,” he added.

Mr. Oshima, who yesterday assumed this month’s rotating presidency of the U.N. Security Council, was one of several diplomats Mr. Bolton visited yesterday afternoon after his time with Mr. Annan. Mr. Bolton also had one-on-one meetings with the ambassadors of the permanent council members, Russia, Britain, France, and China – all members of a small and powerful diplomatic fraternity.

“He asked to see me,” China’s ambassador, Wang Guangya, told the Sun. “I’ve known him for many years.”

Despite portrayals of Mr. Bolton by his detractors as a gruff and vindictive manager, American diplomats said that they were happy to finally have him as their leader in New York. “Ann Patterson has done an excellent job representing her country and participating in the activities going on here,” Mr. Annan said. But Ms Patterson, who has acted as caretaker heading the mission since Ambassador John Danforth left, has readily admitted she was short-staffed, overworked, and her temporary status limited her pull at the world body.

The normal staff of five senior officials at the mission has dwindled to only two ambassador-ranked diplomats lately: Ms. Patterson and Sichan Siv. To make matters worse, Mr. Siv was recently injured in a horseback-riding accident, limiting his workload to three hours a day.

“Sure, we’re happy,” Ms. Patterson told the Sun yesterday after escorting Mr. Bolton into the building. “We’re glad to have him.”