Putnam patriot., 1929-07-11


 fir and hemlock. Travel is not suiii- ciently heavy 10 be annoying. We forge steadily forward to Caramnk. The Forks and to lovely Lake Parlin, where there is an excellent hotel for the night or for a passing meal. ! Twelve miles further on and we are at the border town of Jaekman. ] There is about Jackman still some ] thing of the frontier atmosphere. ] The frame houses of the settlement, the huge convent in an open field, the ] immigration station and the crude i hotels all denote the boundary line but give little hint Of the radical ] change that surprises the traveller once he has struck out into the real l Province of Quebec beyond
 Going northward out of Jackman, the tourist does not have to bother with the American customs officers at the border line. That is an un- pleasant matter for the return tour. In deep valley. with scarcely hab- itation for nearly fifty miles. the road winds over a hard dirt surface up and down between the high mountains to the right and the let Then down long winding road ona comes sud denly upon Armstrong and the Cana dian Customs house. 4 brief stop for registry and suddenly to the eye the traveller is conscious of being in an utterly foreign country.
 A Striking Boundary
 Even in Europe or Africa, unless il is that extraordinary line that di- vides Morocco from Algeria, can we remember a boundary that is so dis tinct as that which divides our State of Maine from the Province of Que bee. Where there were white New England towns. factories, pulp mills. filling stations, cigarette advertise ments, antique shops, tourist board ing houses and motor rests we find ourselves in a foreign land. What roadside signs there are,-and they are hessedly few,-are in French. The country is broad fertile valley, intenssvely cultivated and divided into narrow fields even as they are in France itself. Along the hard dusty dirt road we pass through one town after another bearing the name of some saint-St. Come. St George, St. Joseph, St. Marie, St. Henri and St. Louis. Every one of them cluster about the bastions of huge churches. The only other structures of any size are convents, monastaries and paro- chai schools. The horse, we find, has not yet, in the province, been su- perceded by the automobile. We are taken back twenty-five years or SO to the era of dirt roads, horse drawn vehicles and we hear foreign lan- luage where an hour before the drawl of the down-easterner was hard lv a cause for comment There are, in the towns, little places marked Bar" and "Cafe" though in the sem sible interpretation of alcoholic distri- button in Quebec, one can buy there only wine and beer and aperitives.
 So as the day wanes, the motor goes steadily along until, late in the afternoon, far over the flat country side one sees the mountains on the other side of the St. Lawrence, and near twilight, the peak of the huge tower of the Chateau Frontenac looms above the horizon and soon the motor is winding down through the steep streets of Port Lewis to the fer ry which carries the traveller to the foot of the citadel which is crowned with historic Quebec.
 At the Chateau Frontenac
 In the panorama which Quebec pre- sents from the other side Of the river, the continent has one of it's most pie turesque possessions Below, along the river front itself are the wharves and the busy shipping district. Be- hind the great bluff rises abruptly to the Citadel and the giant hotel, the Chateau Frcntenac, facing the wide promenade of Dufferin Terrace with the famous Plains of Abraham lying behind.
 We roll from the ferry and climb through this utterly foreign city with it's English soldiers and policemen, it's French population and provincial French architecture to the most mod ern cf hotels. It is thronged with a thousand tourists. Motors from all points on the map crowd the court yard. There are Americans, Cana dians and many English. Some are there for the night, some are to sail tomorrow on the Empress of Austra- lia," some are officers, bristling with medals in the encourage of King Georges third son, the Duke of Glou- cester, homeward bound on the "Em- press" after an official visit to Japan.
 At dinner in the Frcntenac we fare excellently We see other Americans ordering their wine without feeling that they are breaking a law. We see in this drink-regulated land, no drunk enness, little alcoholic exhnberanee. We walk on Duferin Terrace and look up and down the glimmering lights of the St. Lawrence Valley and SO to bed.
 In the morning we shop about the quarter that lies around and below the Frontenac, and excellent shops they are, too. We drop in at noon for a glass of port and brioche at q tiny restaurant We lunch excellent ly and with a bottle of delicious saul terne at the Chateau.
 The Empress" and a Duke
 The Empress of Australia" sails ait 4.3O and We are aboard ship at three. What a contrast Co the average bedlam sailing of liner from New York. Special boat trains from New York and the West arrive and their passengers go aboard. There are no ,.,n.,-Io an fka dnek There are no