Douglas Island news., 1911-02-08
AROUND THE WORLD
Dr. Simpsons Story of His Visits to the Countries of the
 Old World
COLOGNE (Continued)


 Chapel of St. Agnes has celebrated painting, but l know very little about those things; the tomb of St. Irrni, garde, who died in HOO, and there is also large wooden cross at which she used to pray. The stalls are of carved oak and are wonderful. There is some fine tapestry done by the ladies of Col ogne, hundreds being engaged on it for ten years. They showed me one little piece of mosaire work in the choir that cost 2O,0OO marks. The treasury con- tains articles of priceless value. l would not dare to say at how many millions they estimate the contents.
 There are two reliquaries, that of St. Englebert and that of the three magi, Gaspar, Melchoir and Balthasar. (I give their names simply to please Frank Bach.) Those reliquaries are of gold and silver, dotted or studded with precious stones, some as large as an or dinary door knob. Both shrines are beautifully carved and that of the magi dates from 1900. Their skulls are shown on certain days.
 There is also piece of the true cross, the staff used by St. Peter and two rings of the chair which bound him in prison. There is splendid lot of man. uscripts and some beautiful ivory work done by priests.
 The road from Cologne to Aix passes through very rich country. It is both a farming and manufacturing district. It was like passing through the "black country" of England or the iron and coal district of Scotland. Everywhere were tall smokestacks with fire blazing out of their tops, and every few mln- utes I passed a large town. The land was rich and we'll cultivated. All along the way were large fields of grain or vegetables as turnips, carrots, beets or potatoes The country was also we'll wooded. Dividing the fields or farms were lines of trees and every few miles were forests sometimes covering hun dreds of acres. The Germans seem to com bine the useful with the ornamental better than any other people ever saw, except possibly the Japanese.
 In England you will sometimes travel a hundred miles through country as pretty as a picture. The whole thing will look like park. In the hundred miles you will see probably half a dozen vegetable gardens, as many fields of grain and hay, and the same number of hop fields.
 In Canada you see timber; prairie, cultivated or uncultivated; and in the East field after field of hay, grain or vegetables, with fruit orchards. Not many tennis courts or golf links. If there is anything beautiful in the coun- try it is the work of nature, not of the ] Canadian.
 I think the thing that struck me most in Spain was the scarcity of trees, and as travelled hundreds of miles through the barren, hilly, treeless waste real ized what forests will do for country. In Madrid they have planted many of the streets and squares with trees and it seems like paradise compared with the surrounding country. That is one reason why Granada is so beautiful. The Duke of Wellington ordered trees to be planted there about hundred years ago and now the Alham bra seems to be in the midst of the woods. 1t Is cool, there are hundreds of kinds of birds there; the flowers are not parched