Sunday, July 18, 2010

Some small urchins begged of us

Our steamer is a fine one and we are quite comfortable. I have a stateroom with a Finnish lady, who is charming for she goes up on deck at 4 A. M. and lets me dress in peace and quiet and then she arrays herself. Unfortunately we have a cracked basin, so it is rather hard work to dress comfortably, but they have promised another for tomorrow. Ed. has a stateroom with Mr. Calmeyn who decided to go to Petersburg, so he is all right. He has captured a small girl who came on board to sell flowers, so he is happy drawing her. She is quite pretty and is posing beautifully. We went round the town and saw the old Cathedral and also a fine view from the Observatory. The people here speak Swedish or Finnish, not Russian. Tomorrow we go to Helsingfors and thence by rail to Petersburg. We took some time to get here and came quite a distance up the river to anchor alongside the quay. The town is extremely clean and the people ditto; but some small urchins begged of us, whilst in Norway such a thing is unknown.

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