Ellsworth American. [volume] (Ellsworth, Me.) 1855-current, 1924-08-20
Cecil Hotel, Haldenhof,
Lucerne, Switzerland,
July 81, 1924.

i1Nttl L oihS.
There is no time for private letters
when touring, so l will send you
little journal of my trip from the
time l left New York
Our company of about $50 en-
joyed a delightful passage on the S.
S. Leyiathan (the largest ship
afoap, carrying $500 people, and
like huge hotel inside in its beauti-
full appointments, service, etc. We
were known as the college cabin"
as we represented fifty-seven schools
and colleges, and were given many
favors en- route.
CherbOurg, France, was reached
July IL, about p. M, but as we
were taken ashore on huge tenders,
it was nearly 8 before we were really
landed and by the customs officers
The women got by nicely, but the
men held up the lines for some time
with their favorite brands of cigars.
tobacco being taxable in France As
we were still five hours from Paris,
we decided to remain in Cherbourg
over night, and Miss Hacker, of
Pennsylvania State normal school,
g." nv 10 lilS WIN pStilloIlJ anu L, W tHl
to the hotel Del-la-Moderne where
we slept in an oldfashioned bed.
made very high. spread with coarse
hand-woven linen sheets, and with
down puff on top of all, which was
itself like thin feather bed They
spoke no English. but we managed
with our poor French to order break
fast, and made our train at $50
All my life | shall be glad that I
saw Paris by daylight and that
passed through the French country
for the first time on bright summer
morning, as it was the most beauti-
full bit of scenery | saw. The land
scape is like a large garden, all I'M
der cultivation, with no fences to
mar the beauty, but in their places
straight rows of trees. Gorgeous
wild flowers of the most brilliant
colorings grew all along the way
side Most of them | did not know
but there were few familiar friends
like the daisy, only here it grows as
large as our dahlias. The bright red
peoples which grow wild everywhere
in the country were a picture when
sprinkled with blue corn flowers, not
just a few, but thousands of them in
a riot of color.
Peasant women with wooden shoes,
working in the fields, or driving don
key-carts to market quaint houses
with matched or tented roofs, each
with its own little garden laid out so
evenly, funny trees growing tall
without limbs and spreading out like
feather buster at the top, sblack and
, white magpies as common as robins,
native people in queer costumes com
ire and going-these were some of
the things that interested us on our
first ride through France.
We reached Paris at noon, and
went 10 a nice little hotel, very
hOmelike, where they spoke English
and made us very comfortable.
Paris is indeed gay, Wine-wine
everyWhere-they never seem to
drink water at ALL but always wine,
and as soon as we tasted the water
we could understand why, as it was
very fiat and tasteless and we bought
all the water we drank by the bottle.
We spent our time doing the shops,
at the Louvre, and riding about the
city. The Louvre contins many of
the finest pictures in the world, and
is so large it would take a week to
see everything in it.
We took ride along the wonder
full Boisde Bologne, with the park on
one side and splendid residences on
the other, and visited many places
whose names would not mean much
except to one familiar with them.
After our tive-days' stay, we moved
on to Rheims, where we had lunch
con and visited the famous Gothic
cathedral which the Germans bonn
barded every day for four years, and
yet it stands, magnificent in its ruins.
1t is being slowly rebuilt, Morgan
having given one million dollars
toward its restoration.
From Rheims we took a motor bus
and visited the battlefields from the
Marine to the Aisne, riding about $50
miles. We visited the grave of
Quentin Roosevelt at Chamery, near
where his airplane was shot down
His mother has given a beautiful
fountain to the little town in his
honor, In some places where the
Germans mined there was a mile or
more of sub-soil which is white as
chalk and shows up plainly on the
landscape before you reach it.
We visited two American ceme-
teries. One had 5000 white crosses
and the other 4000-a sad sight to
behold-but the land is all owned by
orr pOVprOmpOt and is heautifulIV