Det Forenede Dampskibs-Selskab
Aktieselskab
Skandinavien-Amerika Linien
S/S United States, June 18
Honey dear: -
This is Monday and we sailed Saturday - on the most gorgeous day I ever fared forth. I'll go back to Friday. The journey to N.Y. had no excitements. Elizabeth McKee met me for lunch - her house is done, not one to live in all along as I thought, but a week-ender, about an hour and a half out of the city. She is very thin and is to have a longer vacation in consequence, coming in one day a week.
The real excitement of the afternoon was in the Harvey exhibition at the N.Y. Academy of Med. a delightful new building, with the exhibition open for the first time. So much, I wanted to take full notes, but it was closing time very soon, so I must hope the descriptive pamphlet will be good! I have the address of the librarian to whom to write for it. One story I must not forget, a newspaper clipping giving a tale which has come down in an English family intimately associated with Harvey's, of the way in which he regarded witchcraft. A certain woman was reported to be a witch and to have a familiar spirit in a toad. At a time when there were speculation of witches, she was likely to be doomed - unjustly, Harvey thought. He went to see her and in conversation she claimed that it was the spirit of her father in the toad. She coaxed the beast out from under a table and fed it milk, which it drank. (There's some allusion here I don't get.) Harvey asked her to get something for him and the moment her back was turned, caught the toad, slit it open and the milk gusted out. When she came back, she "flew at me like a Tigris," and claimed her spirit was lost. But Harvey told her who he was the physician to the King & that it was a perfectly ordinary toad.
There were so many pictures of places Charlotte and I saw, it was fun.
It was easy to meet Alice and Jane. We found the husband, a nice private school English master, at the Alice Foote Macdougall restaurant where we had a sumptuous dinner, and then drove in N.Y. evening traffic up to 253rd St - Riverdale! It took 1 3/4 hours and was no joke. I should have been happier with one who seemed to have a greater genius for driving, but we arrived safely; had a peaceful night, with birds singing in the morning and set out at 7:30 for the boat. Got there a bit after nine by a lovely route down the Jersey shore.
It was a most simple start. Our trunks were in our room and we got men to take our luggage. Then things arrived - your prunes are lovely and I thank you so much for them and the dear note. Alice had four huge boxes of flowers and a big basket of fruit. I have ginger, 2 nuts, and an awful trunk of candy &c from two of the girls! Quite a few letters, mainly from my class-mates, which was sweet of them.
It's a little boat, but rather more comfortable than the Stockholm, and an amazingly steady craft. As I thought, the folks are mostly Danes, and there aren't any "parties" up here - there may be one or two in tourist third. The route around is short for walking, but the thing isn't as bristling with humanity as many I've seen. We've met a few interesting folks - a boy next me is on his way to join his uncle for a yachting trip around Scandinavian waters. Two down the line are to climb high mountains in Norway and the French Alps - the one beyond Alice knows a lot about Germany - one woman at table has lived in China, Cal, N.Y. and has a son in a Danish school - she helps us in Danish manners! It is not as gay as the Stockholm, but things have a good style. The baths are fine!
Wonderful days so far - this is the third. Today there have been white-caps and a roll and half the deck population is missing, but Alice and I are still eating prunes! They came in the sweetest tin box, red, pretty design on top, exactly the right size to carry all summer.
My back is getting on all right - it will be better when I land than when I started, and it really does begin this summer better than last. Alice has various books and we read and walk - I sleep and she knits!
Oh, there's a band! 6 pieces, brass - nothing great, but helpful. One concert for the tourist third in the forenoon, one for the real third in the p.m. - music for our dinner. We hang over the rails and get 'em all.
June 21 or 22
At the moment I've lost track of the days! After the first spell of grand weather, smooth and warm, we suddenly entered polar seas and had a day really rough, though clear. I ate on deck, rather sparingly! But survived as usual. Next day it gradually smoothed out and I saw rails on the table for the first time - I've always gotten out before they appeared heretofore. Today has a big pitch, long and imprssive - not to my liking, though I've not yet eaten on deck. The colors in the water have been so varied. We've had following winds almost all the time, and I think we may perhaps see the Hebrides by tomorrow night. One day, the rough one, there were whales and porpoises, but not enough to be exciting. And the course was three days straight out to avoid the icebergs, so we saw none.
'Tis a pleasant group of people - only cabin passengers - and largely Danes. Ruth Sanderson, Mt. H - '13 is on board, with uncle Mr. Whitford, an official of the Harvard Trust Co. in Camb. They go over much the same route Ann & I took two years ago, and 'tis fun to talk about it. Table companions of no particular interest, a certain Mrs. Forum from N.Y. formerly Shanghai, husband a Dane, is eally quite charming. The two Emery boys are dears - one perhaps a grad. student, the other still in college. Otherwise there are two rather uninteresting women who speak too little English for us to connect with. There is in the Tourist third - where I rejoice not to be - a big party of Danish-Americans going home to some religious jamboree, most uninteresting. The real third has life and dances more than any other place. The young here are better behaved than on the Stockholm but much less diverting. We gradually accumulate the scandal! I bet we'll like this better than the "Lapland." Food good, but all the dinky little messes seem to me not as attractive as the Swedish! I'm still loyal to Sweden!
I'm wondering how the garden looks, and whether you sit on my porch at night and how many rides you've been on and all that. I hope you've been having a nice time. The laundry - sheets &c - is on my closet shelf in one of the boxes, also towels in lowest big bureau drawer. I forgot to tell you that. Use anything you want for Miss Henderson or anybody. I do hope you'll use those rooms, for they're better summer ones than yours. And I certainly was sorry to have you do so much for me those last days. I should have managed better somehow. I can't yet allow for the time my back takes out - and my gracious, I still hope I'll not have to always!
This will be mailed at Christiansand, in south Norway, our first port. We don't land there, just let off a few folks. My love to such folks as you think might like it - some will be gone when it reaches So. Hadley - I don't know who'll be there. The prunes went today! We liked 'em much. Alice has a box of them, not so good, but still pleasant. My second Ingersoll did not arrive. It should get to South Hadley. I shall send a note to the firm to this effect. The one I have is absolutely n.g. Either it is like an auto and has to have its engines get to running smoothly or else it's a bum specimen. Here one doesn't mind - the time is marked by bells and bugles, but on shore I shall have to buy something, perhaps another Ingersoll?
After this, would you mind sending on my letters to Jessee? I think she might like them. I'll ask her to keep them and send them back to me sometime, as I'll keep no other record. Don't send her this one - I'm writing her a little note.
June 25 - Monday. We're in the middle of the North Sea, and if you please, it is still gorgeously sunshiny, though you'd not like the roll that has developed with the afternoon. I don't myself - but I've been sorting things down in the stateroom and for a long period. You recall that my packing left something to be desired! It has been a wonderful voyage - not a rainy day, though we had a heavy shower last night just when we were passing the first big lighthouse, the one on the Lewis, up at the north end of the Hebrides. It was a revolving light, first shining clear, then blurred and dim as the heavy rain came on, but yet penetrating sturdily to us, maybe a mile or more away. This morning we rose at five (!!) to see the sunny passage through Pentland Firth. Two years ago it was all grey twilight, this a gorgeous morning and a dancing sea. The enthusiasts were abroad, including two wrinkled women from Philadelphia, aged about 75, tall, one spidery, one distinguised looking with grey bobbed hair, waved back, queer clothes, gentle and eager. They are Danes and the older came over when three years old and hasn't been home since. I guess we'd better keep on travelling a little longer. One has lumbago, too, and rests by spells with a hot water bottle. The boat is full of real folks!
Mr. Peter Bock should not be omitted - a gentle German who teaches in San Salvador and says his subject is philology, face round, stature short and plump. He loves his native land. There is also a neighbor on deck, Professor Adolf Busse, German, Hunter College, aggressive and loud of voice, always butting in, yet friendly and cheerful. He has given us much advice, and in general has entertained us liberally but we had an idea we'd like to have Mr. Peter Bock's ideas about Germany also, so this morning Alice captured him and he was telling us in restrained but fervent manner all aboutit - when Prof. Busse appeared. "Now, I've told them to stay at the Excelsior!" - "The Excelsior?" and then they went to it. Mr. Peter Bock had been curled up in a steamer chair, purring like a grey cat - but he rose to his feet and they went to it with a heat that made us nearly hysterical - good-natured, but yet in earnest. It was like two Bantam roosters and lasted a long time. They differed on every point and we had a most amazingly good time. But all told, we really have learned much from our companions. One group, did I say, the Whitfords from Cambridge, almost repeats Anne's and my trip of two years ago, hind end to[o].
There is the usual intense flirtation to watch; one Norwegian Dr. Nielson, who has studied at Harvard, has discovered some symptoms diagnosed as brain tumor, is going home to set his affairs in order before letting Harvey Cushing operate on him - and on the voyage the tall blond helps him pass the time until her somewhat acid friend, a Hopkins psychology person, is scandalized and talks - which only urges things on. But I think the principals are both experienced!
Tomorrow morning early the mail is put off at Christianssand so I'll stop now. We do not land - only a tender comes out - but reach Oslo late in the day, too late, alas, for museums and such.
You'll see the Ibsen stamps, of course - a special issue. I'm putting in one uncancelled one. [no longer with the letter] Oh - Mr. Peter Bock is a stamp enthusiast, and told me to look on the right side of Friederichstrasse in Berlin! He really is good enough for a book!
But I must stop.
Much, much love, honey dear - and I do hope your next voyage will have as much pleasure in it as this has -
Abby