Turist - Hotel
CopenhagueKobenhavn B., d.
Amsterdam, July 28
Honey dear:-
I'll send a note off this morning to say that I didn't lose my mind and not finish the last letter from Norway, but that Anne suddenly discovered Norwegian stamps, and so I rushed your letter off at the last station in Norway to save them! But I am vague as to just where the narrative stopped! Alas I thought I'd like to say that we flew the long distance from Malmö and descended successfully.
I think I had told you about Finse, which was most remarkable, and it may have been possible that the rain in Oslo was mentioned, for that and the Viking ships were most conspicuous. Oh yes, I'm sure I told you about the Viking ships for the one found more recently is since your visit.
We took a car ride - autos are impossible in the rain for you just don't see a thing from an open car in the city with a top on. They put tops back over here still and you have the freedom of the world. So we took a trolley - and got stung. There were a few pretty hours on one line, and then miles of just drab and uninteresting houses. Time wasted absolutely. Oslo has few charms on a rainy Sunday!
Monday early we left for the long train ride to Malmö. It rained all day as usual, and that hard, too. We saw a bit of the approach to Oslo by the water, which must be lovely in good weather, and then went down thro' the country with hills lower and more prosperous farms all the time. It was interesting to go along by the Göta canal for a spell, but though we passed through Trollhätten we saw nothing of the big fall, alas, the one so much developed electrically.
July 29
We passed through Göteborg, where we landed and still looked uncommon clean. Sweded is cleaner than either Norway or Holland, and that's saying a lot, as you know. Remember those white laundered curtains in the Göteborg street-cars! Nothing like that anywhere else. A Swedish woman I've just met says Denmark is the most progressive of the Scandinavian countries now, scientifically and politically.
Well, we saw Miss Bensen, the Bridgeport one, at Skälderveken [?] as we went through, only a minute, in a pouring rain, but she brought us lovely flowers and it was nice and cheerful.
Malmö we reached in a 2:40 gale - no rain at the moment, but I nearly blew into the canal crossing from the station to the good hotel - so much better than Oslo and for very little if any more money. We rose betimes, took the light breakfast recommended and at 8:00 a.m. started for the flying field.
It certainly was an interesting experience and I'm glad we did it. We started at 8:30 and landed at Amsterdam at 4:00 with 3 stops, in all about 1 1/2 - 1 3/4 hours off. The starting is amusing - you see your plane trundled out by a dozen men, and then the baggage which has been weighed - I had only 1.25 kr (= 35¢) overweight, and the allowance was 15 kg. Now never say I require a lot of luggage! Well, you show your passport (we've shown them 15 times so far) and you see your baggage pushed into a little compartment. The plane certainly does look huge, but there [was] no room wasted on wide doors! Ours carried nine folks and had also, beside the baggage compartment, a small toilet which I didn't try. The pilot and mechanic sit outside. Each person has a window, around 18" square, and a very comfortable chair, with a stout belt to fasten you in. There's also a long net above and various handles &c. Also, a holder in front full of bags for the sea-sick, labelled in all languages. The windows open like train windows by a strap and most of the time one window was open a little. It was surprising not to have it colder, for there seemed no heating.
They tried the engines evidently and then very soon after we had gotten it we "taxied" across the huge flat field as another car had done, we lifted gently and were off! We rose quite a bit and I think the air was choppy like the sea we immediately flew over. The wind was high on shore and we could see the tree-tops as we flew over for at least half the day. Also it was bumpy, the machine did surprisingly hard and very fast bumpy. I had no idea they wouldn't be sort of sliding, but they were harder than an auto on a bad macadam road. They hurt my head and eyes, but didn't make me sick. A man in front of me was sick forty-leven times, all day, poor soul. He was as nice as he could be! His wife dealt him the paper bags at intervals and we passed them to her! We talked with them on landings, nice American folks. Most of the others were Swedes and Germans.
The views are exactly like the pictures - Denmark - for we crossed at once to the Copenhagen field and really saw no Sweden - was all so neat and the white churches shaped differently from any others, square, gable-roofed towers.
North Germany certainly has no waste land except the heather stretches and sand dunes! The forests look as neat as the grain fields. We landed at Hamburg and they grabbed our passports while we went to the toilet! The Germans are thorough - we got those passports back only when we were seated in another plane ready to start. Of course there was no time to go off the flying field, and it was interesting there to see how many mechanics were running around and how the several planes were starting for different places, Berlin and others. We set off anon, but came down in another hour at Bremen for repairs, since one engine (we had three) was skipping. That took rather more than half an hour and several men scrambled over the plane - and then we went on to Amsterdam.
Alkmaar - July 30.
This is all being written while I wait moments here and there!
The route rescheduled for the air plane (we had grand maps) was over the Zeider Zee but we went around the southern border over typical Dutch villages & green meadows separated by tiny canals and dotted with thousands of black and white cows. The circle around the aerodrome was such a beautiful sweep - it gave me the same feeling that a nice curve used to do in coasting, but it also gave a last upset to the seasick man, who however bobbed up serenely for the ride in 10 miles in a bus. He affirmed he was all right but he scorned our chocolate.
We have a very good pension, most conveniently located, where we have now met Grace Bacon and her pleasant party. Anne really chose it, but yet she fusses about the beds and the breakfast. Only the expensive hotels please her. She seems to sleep, however.
The Federation is very interesting but there are a good many people to be steered around and things sometimes seem to move slowly. The Dutch women are certainly most cordial. The place of meeting is a new building not yet formally opened, the Kolonial Instituut (when in doubt how to spell, double a few letters!) very elegant and spick & span. The audience room must hold 800-1000 as against the Paris 300-400 and it seems quite as full. The first night there was a reception with speeces of which we heard some, then elaborate refreshments, quite vinous, and then two stunts, one a sort of tableau thing with a few lines on the theme of the Dutch connections with other countries. The second was a series of sketches thrown on the screen comparing the descendents of Eve & Lilith, the latter presumably Adam's first wife & progenitor of all groups of women equal with men, while Eve mothered the vamps, e.g. Cleopatra. There were lines read in Eng. Fr. & Ger. and songs, and while all the show was good, it was interminable. We cut a little of the last so as to get to the checkroom before the crowd. I think those who took part in the shows were mainly undergraduates. These are all about as guides &c, and very nice. One little damsel from the Univ. of Leyden is a delight to me.
The next forenoon which as Thursday I guess, (?) we went hunting a hat for me and doing some other errands. My hat is now awful, but I hope I can finish buying one today - velour, but not expensive. My raincoat is also going to pieces rapidly. Of course it has had hard wear on the wet boats &c, but yet it must have been a poor one. The real disintegration set in at Finse. Norway is not easy on clothes. But it's a fine place. Our box with dress-up clothes sent from Göteborg turned up all right at Cook's. [?]
There was a trip around the canals, in a boat all flag-bedecked, but it poured, and we held our heels up and hoped we weren't getting wetter and saw nothing. The trip around the Rijks museum with one of the staff was better though we were too many. The Rembrandts and all the Dutch paintings are a delight. I must go again by myself. There was a complimentary theatre show at the Municipal Theatre - very near us - very elegant. A speech by the Bergomaster, and most of these speeches are in English since the British & colonial & American delegates make up I should say half the foreigners and all the Scandinavians speak English. French is the other language officially, but occasionally German is used. The theatre show had an English number, a recitation of "The Bells" and Poe's "Raven" - such queer choices! But well done! There was a German and a French one act play. We were all given roses as we went in - we sat in the elegant part of the house - we had even more elegant refreshments, even more vinous, in the middle. My drinking is modest - but I try 'em! The little cakes and candies were very elegant. Grace Bacon went with us. On the way out your friend Emily Dutton hailed me, and with her were three other deans (or has-beens) Miss Kerr, an Agnes-Scott one, and Miss Brownell of B.M. All four are coming to our Pension today because they don't like their hotel.
The reports of the delegates from different countries I heard in part - such interesting women from Norway, Sweden, (she'd been at Harvard last year with Dr. Folier) Italy (a charmer!) Germany and others. Some were inaudible or dry or spoke French, of course.
They build hay-cocks from hay in boats here - and dote on the little windmills that pump water for the cows.
Mildred Dennett is here with her husband and two babies. I go to dinner with them tonight! The second baby has been a mere episode in a year of foreign study! There a [sic] no other Mt. H- people whom I have met - but quantities of other folks and many nice ones. A Prof. & Mrs. Bryant of Middlebury we met everywhere; also a bunch of nice middlewest people. There's such a nice girl from Australia - tall and fine-looking - (17 from Aus. in all) and an Eng. woman who dogs my footsteps - Miss Johnson! It's a great lark - and really interesting, but this train is impossible. [her handwriting has been shaky the last few paragraphs]
It is now 10:30 or some more and I'll write until it is time to have the light out. Anne isn't quite ready.
Can't tell you about going to Alkmaar, or several other things, but we start tomorrow night, July 31, for 2 nights and a day back to Stockholm, our chief beloved for cities. I'll hope to write on the train.
Lots of love, and I hope you're having a good time. I don't dare send this to Gaspé though I presume it might make it. I'll let E. Doak forward - for the time mail takes is very uncertain -