One Fellow Missus
Norddeutscher Lloyd, Bremen.
Dampfer Prinz Sigismund
Lover dear:
We sailed yesterday morning at eleven and are having ideal weather so far. The steamer is small but very comfortable. My stateroom has two big port holes, a nice roomy closet, and I can leave my trunk in the middle of the floor, oh, yes and a long mirror, full length. Everyone is German so I hope to improve my knowledge in that line. All the stewards etc. are Chinese except a few from New Guinea, which are perfectly killing. This morning I happened to pass one just as he had dropped a tumbler and by way of explanation he said, “Me no bloke him. Hand belong me he sleep.” He thought it wasn’t his fault, but his hand’s because it let the glass slip. Everything is “fellow”. I am the only female in the first class and they call me “one fellow missus”, the sea is “big fellow salt water”, and a motor car “steamer belong bush”. Out here they always say bush instead of woods or forest. The captain has a big dog that loves oranges, and he has one after every meal. He sucks out the juice first and then eats it, skin and all.
On our way to the steamer yesterday we stopped with a final hope at consuls and there was a letter from you for father and the cunning little plum pudding. Did you see any of them? It is all done up in a little round box and inside of that a little bowl and Christmas cards and then the pudding. Mrs. Leslie gave me such a lovely silver pen knife just before I left, and tonight we are going to cut it with this knife. Father, the captain, and a big German doctor that seems awfully nice. You were such dears to send it, and it is the last thing on earth I could have thought of. In fact had mentally gone all through Daniel Low’s catalogue wondering what it might be. So you see it was a fine surprise. Had a long letter from Mary, and she seems quite happy to be in Pittsburg – my, oh! Wouldn’t I be happy to be there, and it wouldn’t take me long to cover those hundred miles home.
I bought a real “nifty” looking white cotton crepe dress with net frills around the sleeve and down the front, and I added a touch of course Delft blue embroidery – also a big linen hat for the sun, white but faced with that shade of blue. These are probably out of style at home, but “the latest thing” out here.
We get to Brisbane tomorrow where I’ll mail this. Then our next stop is New Guinea in a week, but there’s no use mailing any letters till we reach Manila, because this boat carries the mail.
I got back from the Leslie’s just two days before sailing, so had loads to do. Our motor trip was fine, and weren’t they good to take it, for they planned it all for me just so I could see different parts of Australia.
Have laid in a goodly supply of sewing, reading and cool white dresses for this trip, and will need them all, for it is terribly hot and after we leave Brisbane our passenger list will be very small.
These are flannel flowers, the national flower of Australia. I wanted to send you a box of them, but decided they wouldn’t keep.
Father got a perfectly beautiful black opal, selected the stone and then had it set in a stick pin. He wanted me to choose one for a pendant, but I thought I’d rather have linens and embroideries from China, and laces from India. Now he wants me to have this one of his set in a ring for myself, but I wouldn’t think of it, for it makes such a stunning pin, and he seems so pleased to have it. He wanted to send you some lovely candle shades made of ostrich eggs painted. They really were beautiful, but so delicate I knew they would never get home safely. It’s nice of me to tell you about it now, isn’t it?
Oceans of love for you and Shang.
Alice
January 12, 1913
Yesterday Vin brought me the biggest bunch of flowers (roses, ferns and sweetpeas) I’ve ever seen. He looked like a walking florist shop when he came on board, and a woman brought a huge bunch of the flannel flowers. Wasn’t it good of them?
Burial at Sea
HOTEL KOSCIUSKO, N.S.W.
Dear Shang:
Here we are at last at our destination. We have motored 476 miles so far and it will be farther than that going back. The first day we made 230 miles. It was so hot we nearly melted, but had lots of fun and stopped at funniest little places imaginable for lunch and dinner. One place where we spent the night was called Yass; the others are regular jaw breakers. This girl’s name that is with us is Miss Featherstonehaugh. Isn’t that almost equal to some of our Pennsylvania Dutch!
This mountain, Mt. Kosciusko, is the oldest in the world – geologists have proved it by the surface of the ground – and is a little over 7000 feet high. The day I left Sydney it was 106o in the shade, and today we were driving through snow. These flowers I picked on the top of the mountain when we motored up this afternoon. We have had every kind of scenery as well, from tropical growth with its tree ferns etc. to a regular Sahara Dessert where we could hardly find the road on account of the drifted sand. I wish you could see the birds here. You would go simply crazy over them. One field we passed was white with cockatoos, then they have one that belongs to the parrot family but is about the size and shape of a black bird. Its body, head and fan tail are bright scarlet with wings of Yale blue. Another with an apple green body, red head and orange wings, and one that is soft pearl gray with head and underneath the wings of rich old rose. They are perfectly beautiful, and you see them everywhere. Another one that isn’t pretty, but queer because it is never seen alone – always twelve together, and they are called the “twelve apostles”. When we were at the Jenolan caves and on the way back we saw lots of wallabys. They are just like kangaroos only smaller. They stand about four feet high and are not dangerous because they are very timid, but around the hotel they are quite tame, and in the evenings come down to the hotel to find something to eat. Then last but certainly not least are the rabbits. They are a most terrible pest here, and people are only too glad to have anyone shoot them. We had tea on one of the sheep stations the other day, and the man had killed nine thousand that morning and said it was nothing unusual. They all get out just before daybreak and go out to the fields with big branches and chase all the rabbits into one corner that is shut off with wire, and then hit the poor little fellows on the head. It sounded brutal, but when I saw what damage they do and how many they are, I changed my mind. We never go out without seeing hundreds everywhere we look. They really look like ants in swarms. Vin shot a lot on the way on this trip and gave me the tails. I’m going to use them for trimming.
Happened to think today of a couple of things I don’t believe I ever told you at home. One was that on the steamer coming over from Wellington a man died and they buried him at sea. It was most impressive till the crucial point arrived, and just as they got the board up to the railing he slipped off and went ker-plunk into the water. The other thing was that where ever we went in New Zealand by coach, boat or motor we carried carrier pigeons and then if anything went wrong they sent off one with a message and also sent one ahead to the hotel to say how many were coming. There they are just about five years behind us in everything, and here they are about three years behind.
Mary’s presents came last week and I was delighted with mine, but yours haven’t turned up yet though I’m still hoping.
This motor trip certainly has been fine and we have had such good luck in every way. We start back along the coast tomorrow and I’ll be sorry to leave this hotel for it is so comfortable and nice and it will be so frightfully hot in a day or two. Mrs. Leslie is very nice and Vin keeps us all laughing and stirred up the whole time.
I think I told Sallie that our address is now c/o American Consul, Hong Kong, China. Do tell me where Miss Ligget is and what she is doing, for I might run across her somewhere.
How fine it is that you are walking to the river. My, I am just longing to take some walks to the river and all around with you.
With oceans of love,
Alice
January 3, 1913
Southern Cross for Christmas
Jenolan Caves hotel
Harry Smith,
Lessee
Jenolan Caves, N.S.W.
Sydney Office:
Railway Buildings, 474 Pitt St.
Telephone 2267 Central
Lover dear:
Here it is the end of the year. Just think of it, but by the time you get this, you will be so used to it that it will seem quite natural to say 1913!
I have been with the Leslie’s nearly a week, and I know your hair will fairly stand on end when you hear that father and I were not together for Christmas. Two days before, I got Mrs. Leslie’s note saying she expected me the next day. I had no intentions of going till father said he wouldn’t feel comfortable going off on his motor trip the day after Xmas unless I was safely off beforehand, and seemed to really want me to go. I dreaded the thoughts of having to visit a lot of people, especially when she said there would be some young people there too, but I packed up in a terrible rush and left. They have a beautiful summer home up in the Blue Mountains, and we motor all the time. There is another girl visiting (of uncertain age) and a young fellow of twenty. These two went to England with the Leslie’s last year, and they are all together a great deal. No one out here makes anything of Christmas. It was boiling hot, and of course I had to get under the weather, and had the most awful cramps I’ve ever had – really thought I was going to die, and couldn’t even go down to Christmas dinner, so it was rather gloomy all around. Later in the day felt a little better, so went down and lay in the hammock under the trees. It was blazing hot and wasn’t a bit nice. I lay there and thought about you all, and home, and what you were doing, etc. all day – oh! I was miserable. Father gave me the dearest little traveling clock. It is in three parts all hinged together, and folds up as small as a cigarette case. The outside is dark leather, and is just what I wanted. A gold bar pin with the Southern cross in turquoise like this [sketch]. Everyone wears one, and I think it is nice to have one. And another bar pin about two inches long. The bar is an opal about as thick as a pencil, and has no mounting except a little gold at each end to hold the clasp. It has lovely lights in it, and is quite unusual. Then too he gave me some Maori pictures that I had been wanting, so I think I fared very well. I gave father my picture, two silk hankies with colored threads in the borders, and two pairs of socks with [clocks?] to match the hanky. The pictures I was dreadfully disappointed in. They were taken in Wellington, and I had to leave befor[e] they were finished. The proof looked much better – had more expression, and then too he spoiled it by trying to scratch out a chair behind my hands. He didn’t mount them on a big enough mat, and I didn’t want them stuck to the cover, but it was too far away for me to grumble so I took them, and do hope you will tell me truly if you like it or not.
Yesterday this young fellow (Vincent Sheppard) three other girls, and I motored over here to see the caves. Mr. Leslie arranged everything, rooms, etc. here so it has been lovely. About 65 miles from there and we spent the night. Yesterday afternoon a guide took us through two caves, one where an underground river flows through. Then in the evening we went through another that took three hours and every one carried a torch. Most of the caves are lighted with electricity, just so you can see your way around, but not bright enough to spoil the weirdness of them. This morning we spent going through what they call the Cathedral cave, and it really is wonderful. Great pillared cloisters, high domes, alters and all. Some places are pale pink, then pale blue and sparkling white and green. Oh! It really is impossible to describe them. Am so sorry father couldn’t see them. One could spend several weeks here going through the different ones, and always find something new. We leave this afternoon for the Leslie’s again, and tomorrow morning Mrs. L., Miss McDonald, another girl and Vincent and I start on a motor trip (800 miles) to the south of Australia. I wanted to go to the dentist’s before I left Sydney, but am afraid we won’t get back in time to go before sailing. Isn’t it too bad about Mrs. Perchment. Won’t she ever get any of her money back? Is Nell Calvin still with Aunt Hat? Father had a letter from Uncle John saying he would be in Sydney in March, just when we intended to be there, and is then going on to South Africa, so we won’t see him. Isn’t it a shame! Is Margaret Lawson living in the east again, or just visiting there? Wasn’t it lovely of Mr. Leslie to give us all this lovely trip. Six of us and everything so nicely arranged. The strawberries here in New Zealand are just like those lovely ones we used to get in England, as big as eggs and so good. We have been living on them and raspberries, gooseberries, etc. This is all terribly disconnected, but please don’t mind. Happy New Year to you and Shang, angel dear. December 31, 1912
Alice
Enough Fuss About Admirals
Sydney
Angel dearest:
We are here at last and I feel that I can turn over another page of our trip since New Zealand is finished. They say we had the smoothest trip that any one has seen for months, for it is usually terrible. The boat was jambed, but some very nice people. You wouldn’t think, would you, that it took us as long as to go from N.Y. to England – five solid days but we got in early yesterday morning, and it is simply steaming here. We have been away from home six months yesterday – a quarter of our time if we stay two years. Am now starting on the longest time I have ever been away from you, and it certainly seems so.
This hotel is splendid; wonderful things to eat, music for lunch and dinner, and lots of nice looking people, that is, comparatively speaking, for you have to change your standards here just as you do in England, I think.
One of my evening dresses that had a pink satin lining all dropped to pieces from getting soaked at Pipirika, that is the outside did, so I had an inspiration to veil it with some Delft blue silk net, big diamond shaped meshes, but when I got that part ready, discovered that the lining wasn’t worth bothering with, so bought a soft white satin slip to make it over – trimmed it with little pink roses, heavy cream lace, and edged the whole tunic with a two inch hem, waist, sleeves and down the fronts and back which were open a few inches and sewed Delft blue wooden beads where it was stitched. Nearly lost my religion with the beads, but it was well worth while for it is the prettiest dress I ever had. Started this in Wellington and finished it here. This is the most civilized place we’ve been in since we left the States, and is quite exciting. The stores are very good, and I do hope we won’t have such a round of festivities as we had in Wellington, but things don’t look promising so far. The “Drake”, the English man-of-war that was in W. is now here, and we are to take lunch tomorrow with “Her Ladyship” and “His Excellency Sir Admiral George King-Hall”. I thought we made [a] enough fuss about admirals at home, but it is nothing compared to the pomp and ceremony here.
There was such a nice girl on the steamer with us from W. She is on her way to England to be married, but will stay here a month first – her mother too, and she was so desperately ill that she lost 15 pounds in the five days and is in bed now here. Whatever would have happened to her if it had been really rough. The girl and I had such fun on board, have been shopping here together, and this morning she came around and we sewed. It was too hot to go anywhere.
The consul here sent all our mail to Wellington last week, so goodness knows when we will see it. Father wrote to the consul in Aukland to go to the customs and see if he could locate the Christmas presents you sent. I do hope they’ll turn up on the steamer next week. From your last letter and Shang’s, Clarion is certainly getting gay, isn’t it? So many people came to see us off at the steamer. They are so lovely here about things like that.
Heaps of love, angel dear
December 18, 1912 Alice
We leave here on the 11th and expect to be in Manila the 1st of Feb., so if you write right away I ought to get one letter there from you. We will be there till the last of February. Sir John Findlay came over on the steamer “Moeraki” with us, and he and I used to walk and talk together half the time. He was a great friend of Stevenson’s, had visited him several times at “Vailima”. They always corresponded: for years, and he wrote a book on Stevenson. Told me so many little things about him, and I did so wish Shang could talk to him, for she would surely have enjoyed it. I got quite “chummy” with an English lord too. Don’t think I can condescend to talk to an ordinary Mr. now. The first time I ever said “Sir John” to his face, I felt as tho’ I’d have to laugh right in his face. He and Lady F. called today. You can guage whether or not to write me at Manila Naval Station, c/o Admiral Moore by the time this takes to reach you Then c/o American consul, Hong Kong, China after that. Mercy that seems far off!
Alice
Sir John gave me this card.
[Enclosed leaf] This is the Australian xmas tree, so called because it blooms just at this time. The tree is just ablaze with these feathery red flowers.
Angel:
Have you ever been way off with no one to love you the way you want to be loved, and no one to turn to when you’re lonesome, and no one to really talk to? If you have, you know how I feel today, or in fact all the time only generally I can “keep the lid down”, but sometimes it will fly up no matter what I do. I know father loves me dearly and all that but, lover, no man can ever take your place, and I do want you so right now. Have you read “A Daughter of the Rich” by the author of “The Wood Carver of L.”? I am just in the midst of it, and love it, but it makes me remember what a silly life I’m leading, how perfectly useless and what a dreadful waste of time. People may say, “Oh traveling gives one such experiences” – may be, but what good do these experiences do you when your life is aimless and you hate every minute of it. By tomorrow I’ll be furious at myself for giving way like this, and resolve to be cheerful and happy, and try to make everyone I come in touch with happy and so go on for another while. Although I shouldn’t say it, I truly have been better the last month, have kept all my feelings to myself, joined in the society ranks, etc. and really think I’ve helped father enjoy things more – but then I’m a true hypocrite in every thing I say. You can’t imagine what a comfort my diary is. Everytime I write it up, I look up at the top of the page, and see what I was doing a year ago, two years and three years ago. Last week a year ago Sarah was with us, Uncle Joe down several times, etc. And a year ago today, Hobson gave his lecture. Mary was home, and we were all having such a heavenly time. By the way, why doesn’t that pig of a Mary write to me?
Yesterday a couple of Americans whom we knew at Wanganui called and later we all had lunch together. We expect to see them in Manila and China too.
Do you remember that Miss Wood I told you about in Rotorua, the one with whom I got so much practice nursing? She went home just before we left there, and yesterday I got a letter from her saying that the sprain in her spine she got from stepping into a hole was much worse than the doctors thought. She has been under xrays, and they say she will never walk again, and can’t hope to be any better. Isn’t it dreadful. Now I ought to be thanking my lucky stars I have two good legs and a husky spine instead of moping around with a chip on my shoulder. In the same mail I got a big surprise in the shape of a letter from an old bean, used to be a cadet at A. and took me to a couple of hops there. I hadn’t heard of him for ages, but he is at the naval station in the Philippines and is aid to the Admiral Moore we are going to visit there- funny isn’t it?
I have been invited to spend two weeks up in the mountains with some terrifically wealthy people – met the husband in Rotorua, and he was awfully nice. Father wants to go to Melbourne to fish and some other people want him to go on a five days motor trip. If we do these things it will be some time this week. Will be able to tell you more in my next letter. Thought I would be able to sent the surprise before this, but guess it will be from me a Christmas present, but by the time it reaches you, you’ll think it’s intended for the 4th of July! We went to the Church of England this morning. Did I ever tell you that the one aim and ambition of a New Zealander or Australian is the get to England. Everyone must go, it’s see England and die. The rich ones go every year or two, and the poor ones save up all their pennies for the visit “home”. And they call it home whether they or their parents have ever lived there. I always have to be very careful not to say “home”, but always America, or they think it means England.
If you get this letter and my last one at the same time, you’d better write me Naval Station, Olongapo instead of Manila, but it really doesn’t matter much.
Goodbye, you sweet thing!
December 21, 1912 Alice
I got [a] real pretty new hat, rather small with heaps of light and Delft blue flowers all tumbling over the crown, and a stiff black taffeta ear affect sticking up on one side.
