Adventures and Letters of Richard Harding Davis Part 29

I do not want a camera.

I have one, and those fancy cameras I don't understand.

The letters you forwarded were wonderfully well selected. I mean, those from other people. One of them was from Senator Root telling me Bryan is going to reward our three heroic officers who jumped into the ocean. I know you will be glad. There are NO mosquitoes! Haven't met up with but three and THEY are not COMING BACK.

I send you a picture of my room from the outside. From the inside the view is so "pretty." Across the square is the cathedral and the trees are filled with birds that sing all night, and statues, and pretty globes. The band plays every night and when it plays "h.e.l.lo, Winter Time," I CRY for you. I paid the band-master $20 to play it, and it is WORTH IT. I sit on the balcony and think of you and know just what you are doing, for there is only an hour and a half difference. That is, when with you it is ten o'clock with me it is eight-thirty. So when you and Louise are at dinner you can know I am just coming in from my horseback ride to bathe and "nap." And when at eight-thirty you are playing the Victor, I am drinking a c.o.c.ktail to you, and shooing away the Colonels and Admirals who interfere with my ceremony of drinking to my dear wife.

VERA CRUZ, May 20th, 1914.

DEAREST WIFE:

I got SUCH a bully letter yesterday from you, written long ago from the Webster. It said you missed me, and it said you loved me, and there were funny pictures of you reading the war and peace news each with a different expression, and you told me about Padrigh and how he runs down the road. It made me very sad and homesick, but very glad to feel I was so missed. Also you told me cheerful falsehoods about my Tribune stories. I know they are no good, and as they are no good, the shorter the better, but I like to be told they are good. Anyway, I sat down at once and wrote a long screed on Vera Cruz and the sleepy people that five here.

We all live on the sidewalk under the stone porch. Every night a table is reserved and by my orders ALL chairs, except mine, are removed. So no one can sit down and bore me while I am dining. Another trick I have to be left alone is to carry a big roll of cable blanks, and I pretend to write out cables if anyone tries to talk. Then I beckon the messenger (he always sits in the plaza) and say "File that!" and he goes once around the block and reports back that it is "filed." If the bore renews the attack I write another cable, and the unhappy messenger makes another tour. The band plays from seven to eight every night.

There are five bands, and I saw no reason why there should not be music every evening. After a day in this dirty hotel or dirty city a lively band helps. Funston agreed, but forgot, until after three nights with no band, I wrote him a letter. It was signed by fake names, asking if he couldn't get nineteen German musicians into a bandstand how could he hope to get ten thousand soldiers into Mexico City. So now we have a band each night. That is all my day. After dinner I sit at table and the men bring up chairs, or else I go to some other table. There are some d.a.m.n fool women here who are a nuisance, and they now have dancing in the hotel adjoining, but I don't know them, except to bow, and I approve of the tango parties because it keeps them away from the sidewalk. They ire "refugees," the sort of folks you meet at Ocean Grove, or rather DON'T meet! All love to you, and give Patrigh a pat from his Uncle Richard for looking after you and looking for me, and remember me to Louise and Shu and everything at home. I love you so.

RICHARD.

VERA CRUZ, May 28, 1914.

I want to be home to see the daisy field with you. That knee you nearly busted tobogganing when the daisy field was an iceberg is now recovered.

The one and all came this morning and as I expected it was all full of love from you. I DID get happiness out of the thought you put in it.

And all done in an hour. The underclothes made me weep. I could get none here. Not because Mexicans are not as large as I am, but because no Mexican of any size would wear 'em. So I've had to wash the few that the washer-woman didn't destroy myself. And when I saw the lot you sent! It was like a white sale! Also the quinine which I tasted just for luck, and the soap in the little violet wrapper made me quite homesick. Especially was I glad to get socks and pongee suits, and s.h.i.+rts. I really was getting desperate. G.o.d knows what I would have done without them.

I want to see you so much, and I want to see you in the same setting of other days, I want to walk with you in the daisy field, and in the laurel blossoms, and clip roses. But to be with you I'd be willing to walk on broken gla.s.s. Not you, too. Just me.

RICHARD.

VERA CRUZ--June 4, 1914.

DEAR OLD MAN:

I am awfully sorry for your sake, you could not get away. Of course for myself I am glad that I am to see you and Dai. At least, I hope I am. G.o.d alone knows when we will get out of here. I am sick of it.

Next time I go to war both armies must fight for two months before I will believe they mean it, and BEFORE I WILL BUDGE.

It is true I am getting good money, but also there is absolutely NOTHING to write about. Bryan doesn't know that unless he talks by code every radio on sixteen s.h.i.+ps can read every message he sends to these waters. And the State Department saying it could not understand the Hyranga giving up her cargo is a d.a.m.n silly lie. No one is so foolish as to think the Chester and Tacomah let her land those arms under their guns unless they had been told to submit to it. And yet today, we get papers of the 29th in which Bryan says he has twice cabled Badger for information, when for a week Badger has been reading Bryan's orders to consuls to let the arms be landed. Can you beat that? This is an awful place, and if I don't write it is because I hate to harrow your feelings. It is a town of flies, filth and heat.

John McCutcheon is the only friend I have seen, and he sensibly lives on a wars.h.i.+p. I can't do that, as cables come all the time suggesting specials, and I am not paid to loaf. John is here on a vacation, and can do as he pleases. But I ride around like any cub reporter. And there is no news. Since I left home I have not talked five minutes to a woman "or mean to!" The Mexican women are a cross between apes and squaws. Of all I have seen here nothing has impressed me so as the hideousness of the women, girls, children, widows, grandmothers. And the refugees, as Collier would say it, are "terrible!" I live a very lonely existence. I find it works out that way best. And at the same time all the correspondents are good friends, and I don't find that there is one of them who does not go out of his way to SHOW he is friendly. What I CAN'T understand is why no one at home never guesses I might like to read some of my own stories... .

d.i.c.k.

Of these days in Vera Cruz John T. McCutcheon wrote the following shortly after Richard's death:

"Davis was a conspicuous figure in Vera Cruz, as he inevitably had been in all such situations. Wherever he went, he was pointed out. His distinction of appearance, together with a distinction in dress, which, whether from habit or policy, was a valuable a.s.set in his work, made him a marked man. He dressed and looked the 'war correspondent,' such a one as he would describe in one of his stories. He fulfilled the popular ideal of what a member of that fascinating profession should look like. His code of life and habits was as fixed as that of the Briton who takes his habits and customs and games and tea wherever he goes, no matter how benighted or remote the spot may be.

"He was just as loyal to his code as is the Briton. He carried his bath-tub, his immaculate linen, his evening clothes, his war equipment--in which he had the pride of a connoisseur--wherever he went, and, what is more, he had the courage to use the evening clothes at times when their use was conspicuous. He was the only man who wore a dinner coat in Vera Cruz, and each night, at his particular table in the crowded 'Portales,' at the Hotel Diligencia, he was to be seen, as fresh and clean as though he were in a New York or London restaurant.

Each day he was up early to take the train out to the 'gap,' across which came arrivals from Mexico City. Sometimes a good 'story' would come down, as when the long-heralded and long-expected arrival of Consul Silliman gave a first-page 'feature' to all the American papers.

"In the afternoon he would play water polo over at the navy aviation camp, and always at a certain time of the day his 'striker' would bring him his horse and for an hour or more he would ride out along the beach roads within the American lines."

On June 15 Richard sailed on the Utah for New York, arriving there on the 22d. For a few weeks after his return he remained at Mount Kisco completing his articles on the Mexican situation but at the outbreak of the Great War he at once started for Europe, sailing with his wife on August 4, the day war was declared between England and Germany.

On Lusitania--August 8, 1914.

DEAR CHAS:

We got off in a great rush, as the Cunard people received orders to sail so soon after the Government had told them to cancel all pa.s.sengers, that no one expected to leave by her, and had secured pa.s.sage on the Lorraine and St. Paul.

They gave me a "regal" suite which at other times costs $1,000 and it is so darned regal that I hate to leave it. I get sleepy walking from one end of it to the other; and we have open fires in each of the three rooms. Generally when one goes to war it is in a transport or a troop train and the person of the least importance is the correspondent. So, this way of going to war I like. We now are a cruiser and are slowly being painted grey, and as soon as they got word England was at war all lights were put out and to find your way you light matches. You can imagine the effect of this Ritz Carlton idea of a s.h.i.+p wrapped in darkness. Gerald Morgan is on board, he is also accredited to The Tribune, and Frederick Palmer. I do not expect to be allowed to see anything but will try to join a French army. I will leave Bessie near London with Louise at some quiet place like Oxford or a village on the Thames. We can "take" wireless, but not send it, so as no one is sending and as we don't care to expose our position, we get no news.

We are running far North and it is bitterly cold. I think Peary will sue us for infringing his copyrights.

I will try to get in touch with Nora. I am worried lest she cannot get at her money. As British subjects no other thing should upset them.

Address me American Emba.s.sy, London. I send such love to you both.

G.o.d bless you.

d.i.c.k.

Richard arrived in Liverpool August 13, and made arrangements for his wife to remain in London. Unable to obtain credentials from the English authorities, he started for Brussels and arrived there in time to see the entry of the German troops, which he afterward described so graphically. Indeed this article is considered by many to be one of the finest pieces of descriptive writing the Great War has produced.

For several days after Brussels had come under the control of the Germans Richard remained there and then decided to go to Paris as the siege of the French capital at the time seemed imminent. He and his friend Gerald Morgan, who was acting as the correspondent of the London Daily Telegraph, decided to drive to Hal and from there to continue on foot until they had reached the English or French armies where they knew they would be among friends. At Hal they were stopped by the German officials and Morgan wisely returned to Brussels. However, Richard having decided to continue on his way, was promptly seized by the Germans and held as an English spy. For a few days he had a most exciting series of adventures with the German military authorities and his life was frequently in danger. It was finally due to my brother's own strategy and the prompt action of our Amba.s.sador to Belgium, Brand Whitlock, that he was returned to Brussels and received his official release.

On August 27, Richard left Brussels for Paris on a train carrying English prisoners and German wounded, and en route saw much of the burning and destruction of Louvain.

BRUSSELS, August 17, 1914.

DEAREST:

Write me soon and often! All is well here so long as I know you are all right, so do not fail to tell me all, and keep me in touch. If _I_ do not write much it is because letters do not get through always, and are read. But you know I love you, and you know twice each day I pray for you and wish for you all the time. I feel as though I had been gone a month. Gerald Morgan and I got in last night; this is a splendid new hotel; for $2.50 I get a room and bath like yours on the "royal suite," only bigger. This morning the minister did everything he could for us. There are about twenty Americans who want credentials. They say they will take no Americans, but to our minister they said they would make exception in favor of three, so I guess the three will be John McCutcheon, Palmer and myself. John and I, if anyone gets a pa.s.s, are sure. With the pa.s.ses we had, Gerald and I started out in a yellow motor, covered with flags of the Allies, and saw a great deal. How I wished you were with me, you would so have loved it. The country is absolutely beautiful. We were stopped every quarter mile to show our pa.s.ses and we got a working idea of how it will be. Tonight I dined with Mr. Whitlock, the minister, and John McCutcheon came in and Irving Cobb. John and I will get together and go out. All you need is a motor car and you can go pretty much everywhere, EXCEPT near where there is fighting. So what I am to do to earn my wages I don't know. I am now going to bed and I send my darlin' all love. Today I sent you a wire. If it got to you let me know. Take such good care of yourself. Remember me to Louise, and, WRITE ME. All love, DEAR, DEAR one. My wife and my sweetheart.

Your husband,

RICHARD.

The following is the last letter that got through.