KEY WEST — January 1, 1897.
[DEAR MOTHER:]
As you will know by my telegram we are either off on a
safe sea going boat or waiting for one. There is no turning
back from here and the only reason I
thought of doing so was the knowledge of the way you would
suffer and worry. I argued it out that it was selfish in me
to weigh my getting laughed at and paragraphed as the war
correspondent that always Turned Back against a month of
uneasiness for you, but later I saw I could not do it much as
I love you for the element of danger to me is non-existent; it
is merely an exciting adventure and you will have to believe
me and not worry but be a Spartan mother. I would not count
being laughed at and the loss of my own self respect if I
really thought there was great danger, but I do not. You will
not lose me and if I go now I can sit still next time and say
"I have done better things than that." If I had not gone it
would have meant that I would have had to have done just that
much harder a stunt next time to make people forget that I had
failed in this one. Now do cheer up and believe in the luck
of Richard Harding Davis and the British Army. We have carte
blanche from
The Journal to buy or lease any boat on the
coast and I rocked them for $1000 in advance payment because
of the delay over the
Vamoose.
I am so happy at thinking I am going, I could not have
faced anyone had I not, although we had nothing to do with the
failure, we tried to cross fairly in the damn tub and it was
her captain who put back. I lay out on the deck and cried
when he refused to go ahead, we had waited so long. The
Cubans and Remington and Michelson had put on all their riding
things but fortunately I had not and so was spared that
humiliation. What I don't know about the Fine Art of
Filibustering now is unnecessary. I find many friends of my
Captain Boynton or "Capt. Burke." Tonight the officers of the
Raleigh give me a grand
dinner at which I wear a dress suit and make speeches — they
are the best chaps I ever met in the Navy. Lots of love and
best wishes to Dad and to Nora for a happy, happy New Year.
You know me and you know my conscience but it would not let me
go back in order to save you anxiety so you wont think me
selfish. God bless you.
DICK.
