DENVER
The Great Divide Publishing Company
1894
Copyrighted 1894, by Cy Warman,
Denver, Colorado.
THE SILVER QUEEN.
I.
Denver, March 15, 1892.
My Dear Mr. Warman:—I notice by the papers that you are getting ready to start a daily in Creede. Your courage is worthy of all astonishment. Don’t you know the gamblers there will shoot you full of holes, and perhaps spoil the only suit you’ve got fit to be buried in, before your paper reaches the tenth number? Whatever you do, wear your old clothes and keep your Sunday suit nice for emergencies. The boys will all chip in and give you a big funeral, but we haven’t any of us got a spare coat fit to bury you in; so take care of your Prince Albert and wear your corduroys till the question is settled one way or the other, for if anything should happen, it would mortify the boys to have to bury in his shirt-sleeves the only poet Colorado has produced.
Well, you are in for it, I suppose, and nothing will stop you, and being in, there is nothing for it now but to “bear thyself so thine enemy may beware thee,” or in other words, heel yourself and face the music like a man. Whatever else you do, don’t show the white feather, for the honor of the press is in your keeping, and if you will immolate yourself, we expect you to die game and not with a bullet in your back. Don’t worry one minute about the obituary notices. That will be all right. The boys will all see you through in good shape and the papers here will all turn rules and celebrate your virtues in such halting meter as can be mustered.
But, seriously, what evil genius tempted you into the project of a daily in Creede, and whose money are you blowing in?