Walter Hines Page to Woodrow Wilson

I have full and most grateful appreciation of the great honor you do me and of the trust you put in me; and I welcome the opportunity to do my best to be of some wider service to you personally and to the country — if the Senate and the British Government consent.
I have had serious misgivings; but now I must use them only as a spur to diligence and to my utmost effort. Your confidence in me greatly sustains me. If I declined so flattering a command I should have to acknowledge to myself that all the spirit of high adventure had gone out of me; and, since you so rouse me to this high opportunity, I am not willing to make such a confession.
Thus even things never dreamed of come true — in this glad year.
I was surprised yesterday morning to receive telegrams from every part of the United States and even from Europe indicating that information of your offer to me had been given out at Washington. I said nothing till it became evident that it was already published all over the world. Then I saw no frank way of denying it. Of course I said only that it is true and that I await the Senate’s action and your instructions