Through Finland in Carts Part 26

"Let us go and buy another," remarked my sister in desperation.

"Impossible," replied our student, who had now joined in the search, "you might get one in _Helsingfors_, but nowhere else."

We were in despair. Before evening the whole town had heard of the English ladies' strange loss, and the bathing cap was as much commented upon as though it had been a dynamite bomb.

Confession, they say, is good for the soul. Then let me own my sin. The next day that bathing cap was found--_I had packed it up_!

Wherefore my sister on all inconvenient occasions says--

"Yes, she packed _once_; she put away everything we wanted, and left out everything we had no use for."

How cruelly frank one's relations are!

Alas! my haunted Castle is restored, and the revels of the ghosts and the goblins are now disturbed by the shrieks and snorts of the modern locomotive.

FOOTNOTES:

[C] A Girl's Ride in Iceland.

[D] Gotstaff is old Finnish for Gustavus.

CHAPTER XII

PUNKAHARJU

Every one we met in Finland told us to make a point of seeing _Punkaharju_, just as strangers in London might be advised to visit the Tower, though in this case the great show was not a historical place, the work of men's hands, but a freak of Nature in one of her most charming moods.

_Punkaharju_ being only a short distance from _Nyslott_, we proceeded thither in a small steamer supposed to start at noon.

By one of those lucky chances that sometimes occur in life, we happened to arrive at the steamer half an hour before the time she was advertised to sail, and were, to say the least of it, barely on board before a whistle sounded, when away we went. We were amazed at this proceeding, and, taking out our watches, discovered it still wanted _twenty_ minutes to the time printed in the newspapers and on the advertis.e.m.e.nt at the bath-house.

It was only another instance showing that punctuality is absolutely considered of no value in Finland, for the steamer actually did start twenty minutes before its appointed hour, and no one then or after made the slightest complaint.

Imagine our Flying Scotchman speeding North even one minute before the advertised hour!

Having been told that _Punkaharju_ was very full during the summer holiday season, we had therefore asked our charming student friend, who preceded us by a day, to kindly engage rooms to await our arrival. What was our surprise when we arrived at the little pier, not only to meet him beaming with smiles as he hurried to say he had secured rooms, but to find a lady who had travelled with us some days before from _Wiborg_ and spoke English well, warmly welcoming us, the while she exclaimed--

"I found the Hotel was so full when I came that I told the landlord rooms would be required to-night, for I did not wish you to be disappointed."

She was a stranger, and her thoughtfulness was very kind. The plot thickened, however, a moment afterwards, when the Russian General, who had also travelled for a whole day on a steamer with us, arrived in his scarlet-lined uniform, and, saluting profoundly, begged to inform Madame he had taken the liberty of bespeaking rooms "as the Hotel was very full."

This was somewhat alarming, and it actually turned out that three suites of rooms had been engaged for us by three different people, each out of the goodness of his heart trying to avoid the dreadful possibility of our being sent away roofless. No wonder our host, thinking such a number of Englishwomen were arriving, had procured the only carriage in the neighbourhood and ordered it and a cart to come down to the pier and await this vast influx of folk. Although the Hotel was not a hundred yards actually from where we stood, everybody insisted on our getting into the little carriage for the honour of the thing, and my sister and I drove off in triumph by a somewhat circuitous route to the Hotel, only to find all our friends and acquaintances there before us, as they had come up the short way by the steps.

Even more strange was the fact that each one of our kind friends had told a certain Judge and his wife of our probable arrival, and promised to introduce the strange English women to them, while, funnily enough, we ourselves bore an introduction from the lady's brother, so, before any of our _compagnons de voyage_ had time to introduce us, we had already made the acquaintance of the Judge and his wife through that gentleman's card. They were all exceedingly kind to us, and we thoroughly enjoyed our short stay among them. Such friendliness is very marked in Finland.

_Punkaharju_ is certainly a strange freak of Nature. Imagine a series of the most queerly-shaped islands all joined together by a natural roadway, for, strange to say, there is a ridge of land sometimes absolutely only the width of the road joining these islands in a connective chain. For about five miles these four or five islands are bound together in this very mysterious manner, so mysterious, in fact, that it seems impossible, as one walks along the roadway, to believe it is nature's freak and not man's hand that has made this extraordinary thoroughfare. It is most beautiful in the wider parts, where, there being more land, the traveller comes upon lovely dells, while the most marvellous mosses and ferns lie under the pine trees, and the flowers are beautiful.

No wonder _Runeberg_ the poet loved to linger here--a veritable enchanted spot.

The morning after our arrival we had a delightful expedition in a boat to the end of the islands; but as a sudden storm got up, in the way that storms sometimes do in Finland, we experienced great difficulty in landing, and were ultimately carried from the boat to the beach in somewhat undignified fashion. However, we landed somehow, and most of us escaped without even wet feet. Just above us was a woodman's house, where our kind Judge had ordered coffee to be in readiness, and thither we started, a little cold and somewhat wet from the waves that had entered our bark and sprinkled us. On the way we paused to eat wild strawberries and to look at the ancient Russian bakeries buried in the earth. These primitive ovens of stone are of great size, for a whole regiment had been stationed here at the time of the war early in the last century when Russia conquered Finland. And then we all sat on the balcony of the woodman's cottage and enjoyed our coffee, poured from a dear little copper pot, together with the black bread and excellent b.u.t.ter, which were served with it.

On that balcony some six or eight languages were spoken by our Finnish friends, such wonderful linguists are they as a nation. At the end of our meal the wind subsided and out came the most brilliant sunshine, changing the whole scene from storm to calm, like a fairy transformation at the pantomime.

We walked back to the Hotel, and the Finlanders proved to be right. As a beautiful bit of quaint nature, _Punkaharju_ equals some of the finest pa.s.ses in Scotland, while its formation is really most remarkable.

A ridiculous incident happened that day at dinner. Grandpapa, like a great many other persons in Finland, being a vegetarian, had gone to the rubicund and comfortable landlord that morning and explained that he wanted vegetables and fruit for his dinner. At four o'clock, the time for our mid-day meal, we all seated ourselves at table with excellent appet.i.tes, the Judge being on my left hand and his wife on my right.

We had all fetched our trifles from the _Smorgsbord_, and there ensued a pause before the arrival of the soup. Solemnly a servant, bearing a large dish, came up to our table, and in front of our youthful Grandpapa deposited her burden. His t.i.tle naturally gave him precedence of us all--an honour his years scarcely warranted. The dish was covered with a white serviette, and when he lifted the cloth, lo! some two dozen eggs were lying within its folds.

"How extraordinary," he said; "I told the landlord I was a vegetarian, and should like some suitable food; surely he does not think I am going to eat this tremendous supply of eggs."

We laughed.

"Where is our dinner?" we asked, a question which interested us much more than his too liberal supply.

"Oh! it will come in a moment," he replied cheerfully.

"But did you order it?" we ventured to inquire.

"No, I cannot say I did. There is a _table d'hote_."

Unmercifully we chaffed him. Fancy his daring to order his own dinner, and never inquiring whether we were to have anything to eat or not; he, who had catered for our wants in the mysteries of that castle home, so basely to desert us now.

He really looked quite distressed.

"I'm extremely sorry," he said, "but I thought, being in a hotel, you were sure to have everything you wanted. Of course there is a _table d'hote_ meal."

At this juncture the servant returned, bearing another large dish. _Our_ dinner, of course, we hoped. Not a bit of it. A large white china basin, full of slices of cuc.u.mber, cut, about a quarter of an inch thick, as cuc.u.mber is generally served in Finnish houses, again solemnly paused in front of Grandpapa. He looked a little uneasy as he inquired for _our dinner_.

"This is for the gentleman," she solemnly remarked; and so dish number two, containing at least three entire cuc.u.mbers for the vegetarian's dinner, was left before him. Another pause, and still our soup did not come; but the girl returned, this time bearing a gla.s.s dish on a long spiral stand filled with red stewed fruit, which, with all solemnity, she deposited in front of Grandpapa.

His countenance fell. Twenty-four eggs, three cuc.u.mbers, and about three quarts of stewed fruit, besides an enormous jug of milk and an entire loaf of bread, surrounded his plate, while we hungry mortals were waiting for even crumbs.

Fact was, the good housewife, unaccustomed to vegetarians, could not rightly gauge their appet.i.tes, and as the gentleman had ordered his own dinner she thought, and rightly, he was somebody very great, and accordingly gave him the best of what she had, and that in large quant.i.ties.

After dinner, which, let us own, was excellent, we had to leave our kind friends and drive back in the soft light of the night to _Nyslott_, for which purpose we had ordered two _karra_ (Swedish for cart), _karryts_ (Finnish name), a proceeding which filled the Judge and his wife with horror.

"It is impossible," they said, "that you can drive such a distance in one of our ordinary Finnish _karra_. You do not know what you are undertaking. You will be shaken to death. Do wait and return to-morrow by the steamer."

We laughed at their fears, for had we not made up our minds to travel a couple of hundred miles through Finland at a not much later date by means of these very _karra_? Certainly, however, when we reached the door our hearts failed us a little.

The most primitive of market carts in England could not approach the discomfort of this strange Finnish conveyance. There were two wheels, undoubtedly, placed across which a sort of rough-and-ready box formed the cart; on this a seat without a back was "reserved" for us. The body of the _karra_ was strewn with hay, and behind us and below us, and before us our luggage was stacked, a small boy of twelve sitting on our feet with his legs dangling out at the side while he drove the little vehicle.