CHAPTER XVII PALDISKI AND THE ISLANDS: A DREAM THAT FAILED
Ever since I saw from the sea the lovely islands that fringe the coast of Estonia, each one a story-book, I had wanted to visit them; and on my return to Tallinn, one of my young Estonian friends, Elizabet Pirson took me to Paldiski and Little Pakri Island. She was a tall, pretty girl, a graduate of the University of Tartu, and at this time was foreign correspondent for a large firm doing an international business in plywood. She spoke English, German, Russian, and French beside her native Estonian, and, young as she was, had so much independence of spirit, and curiosity about the world, as to spend her vacations in traveling alone to England and the various European countries. She called for me at half-past seven and had breakfast with me, but for all our early start, we missed our train through the taxi-driver’s mistake. But I was glad we did, for otherwise I should have missed a ride on the “interest train” which we took because it was the next one. This is a train composed of a very long line of box-cars fitted up for passenger service by the simple device of putting planks across from side to side for seats. It runs only on Sundays and other holidays, charging a fare of only a few sents, and it is called an “interest train” because it is run for the benefit of people who feel an interest in the countryside. A lot of people evidently feel it, for the long trains are instantly filled to bursting. Crowds of men, women and children, all in holiday clothes, dragging along a few dogs and carrying lunch-baskets, climbed into these bare wooden boxes on wheels with side doors wide open, and joggled, and rattled, and roared off into the cheerful outlands. The train stopped every ten or fifteen minutes to let somebody off or take somebody on. There were so many of these trains, I wondered if there was anybody at all left in Tallinn on a summer Sunday. I was struck with the modish clothes worn by the women and children. I knew that ready-made clothing was expensive in Estonia. I asked Elizabet: “Where do they get such nice clothes?” “They make them” she said. “We can all sew rather well.” “They are so stylish - quite up to date! How does that happen?” “Oh, we have patterns. Mrs. Mäelo’s magazine Eesti Naine carries a pattern supplement.” All the heads were bobbed and waved in the current style. The legs, following the same mode, were mostly bare, the sturdy feet strapped into sandals through whose open spaces the straight toes and the broad-backed heels betrayed the peasant feet. All this time we were approaching Paldiski. I had no idea what sort of place it was; and when we arrived I was not much wiser. Here was not a town, but a wide open space beside a quiet sea, with a few old stone houses almost hidden behind walls and trees. A hundred or two people swarmed out of the train with their lunch-baskets, and some women and girls near the station offered to sell them berries and bread, little cakes, and chocolate candy. “Where are they all going?” I asked Elizabet. “Up the road,” she said, vaguely, and then I saw that the open space had straight edges, and was, indeed, an extremely wide road, now all in grass except a narrow wheel-track in the center. “But why do they come here?” I marvelled. “What is there to come for?” “There are woods,” said she - as if that was worth mentioning in Estonia! “And they picnic, and go boat riding, and over to the island to swim.” Where is the town?” I went on. “Oh - there isn’t any” said Elizabet. I felt a little blank. We were walking right along, apparently going nowhere. “The house is just a little further on,” she encouraged me. “What house?” “The house I’m taking you to - Mrs. Adamson’s. She is the widow of our most famous sculptor - Amandus Adamson. You must have seen his statue of Kalevipoeg in the park at Tartu.” “Yes, I did. It is very beautiful. But why does Mrs. Adamson live here?” “Don’t you like it?” inquired Elizabet, anxiously. “I love it; we all love it. I have spent many vacations here. Many of our artists and writers take houses here for the summer. You can buy one for a song.” (To be continued)
A Search For a Happy Country (27)
Eestlased Kanadas | 13 Feb 2002 | Marion Foster WashburneEWR
Eestlased Kanadas
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