Thursday.
August 1888.
[DEAR DICK:]
Your letter has just come and we are all delighted. Well
done for old St. Nicholas! I thought they meant to wait
till the story was published. It took me back to the day when
I got $50. for "Life in the Iron Mills." I carried the letter
half a day before opening it, being so sure that it was a
refusal.
I had a great mind to read the letter to Davis and Cecile
who were on the porch but was afraid you would not like it.
I did read them an extremely impertinent enclosure which
was so like the letter I sent yesterday. That I think you got
it before writing this.
. . . Well I am glad about that cheque! Have you done
anything on Gallagher? That is by far the best work you've
done — oh, by far — Send that to Gilder. In old times The
Century would not print the word "brandy." But those days
are over.
Two more days — dear boy —
Your MOTHER.
In addition to his work on The Press, Richard also
found time to assist his friend, Morton McMichael, 3d, in the
editing of a weekly publication called The
Stage. In fact with the exception of the services of an
office boy, McMichael and Richard were
The Stage. Between
them they wrote the editorials, criticisms, the London and
Paris special correspondence, solicited the advertisements,
and frequently assisted in the wrapping and mailing of the
copies sent to their extremely limited list of subscribers.
During this time, however, Richard was establishing himself as
a star reporter on
The Press, and was already known as a
clever news — gatherer and interviewer. It was in reply to a
letter that Richard wrote to Robert Louis Stevenson enclosing
an interview he had had with Walt Whitman, that Stevenson
wrote the following letter — which my brother always regarded
as one of his greatest treasures:
Why, thank you so much for your frank, agreeable and
natural letter. It is certainly very pleasant that all you
young fellows should enjoy my work and get some good out of it
and it was very kind in you to write and tell me so. The tale
of the suicide is excellently droll, and your letter, you may
be sure, will be preserved. If you are to escape unhurt out
of your present business you must be very careful, and you
must find in your heart much constancy. The swiftly done work
of the journalist and the cheap finish and ready made methods
to which it leads, you must try to counteract in private by
writing with the most considerate slowness and on the most
ambitious models. And when I say "writing" — O, believe me, it
is rewriting that I have chiefly in mind. If you will do this
I hope to hear of you some day.
Please excuse this sermon from
Your obliged
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
In the spring of 1889 Richard as the correspondent of the
Philadelphia Telegraph, accompanied a team of Philadelphia
cricketers on a tour of Ireland and England, but as it was
necessary for him to spend most of his time reporting the
matches played in small university towns, he saw only enough
of London to give him a great longing to return as soon as the
chance offered. Late that summer he resumed his work on The
Press, but Richard was not at all satisfied with his
journalistic progress, and for long his eyes had been turned
toward New York. There he knew that there was not only a
broader field for such talent as he might possess, but that
the chance for adventure was much greater, and it was this
hope and love of adventure that kept Richard moving on all of
his life.
On a morning late in September, 1889, he started for New
York to look for a position as reporter on one of the
metropolitan newspapers. I do not know whether he carried
with him any letters or that he had any acquaintances in the
journalistic world on whose influence he counted, but, in any
case, he visited a number of offices without any success
whatever. Indeed, he had given up the day as wasted, and was
on his way to take the train back to Philadelphia. Tired and
discouraged, he sat down on a bench in City Hall Park, and
mentally shook his fist at the newspaper offices on Park Row
that had given him so cold a reception. At this all-important
moment along came Arthur Brisbane, whom Richard had met in
London when the former was the English correspondent of The
Sun. Brisbane had recently been appointed editor of The
Evening Sun, and had already met with a rather spectacular
success. On hearing the object of Richard's visit to New
York, he promptly offered
him a position on his staff and Richard as promptly accepted.
I remember that the joyous telegram he sent to my mother,
telling of his success, and demanding that the fatted calf be
killed for dinner that night was not received with unalloyed
happiness. To my mother and father it meant that their
first-born was leaving home to seek his fortune, and that
without Richard's love and sympathy the home could never be
quite the same. But the fatted calf was killed, every one
pretended to be just as elated as Richard was over his good
fortune, and in two days he left us for his first adventure.
The following note to his mother Richard scribbled off in
pencil at the railway-station on his way to New York:
I am not surprised that you were sad if you thought I was
going away for good. I could not think of it myself. I am
only going to make a little reputation and to learn enough of
the business to enable me to live at home in the centre of the
universe with you. That is truth. God bless you.
DICK.
