February 1^st 1904 found Marjorie and her chaperone Miss Helen Macartnay steaming south toward the old historic city of Luxor, site of the ancient Egyptian city of Thebes.  Arriving in the evening, they moored directly beneath the Temple of Luxor with its two obelisks and magnificent colonnade.  “That night the full moon rose between the columns – I shall never forget the beauty of that scene,” wrote Marjorie.

The Temple of Luxor

At the Luxor temple, only a few steps from where the boat was moored, Marjorie admired the carvings of Rameses II in his chariot, fighting single-handed against the Hittites.  She took a photograph of it:  But, “The best thing at Luxor was a statue of Rameses the Great, standing – his huge hand grasping a scroll.  It was absolutely unblemished, through all these years.”

Marjorie’s photograph of Rameses the Great at Luxor

So enchanted were they with the sight, they decided to tour the nearby Karnak temple in the moonlight.  They hired donkeys and “sped through the little town and over the moonlit plain toward Karnak.  The trees each side of the road made dark mysterious shadows, and the palm trees raised their graceful heads against a silver sky.”  They passed through an avenue of sphinxes and then dismounted and entered “one of the grandest temples ever built by Rameses II or anybody else.”  The most fascinating part of all was the Hall of Columns, “huge columns towering above us with their beautiful capitals, and shadows creeping from every corner.  A perfect evening, surely.”  (It was not until 1922 that Howard Carter discovered the tomb of Tutankhamen at Karnak, buried in the sand.)

The Karnak Temple

The next day they hired donkeys again and rode to the Valley of the Kings where many of the great old Egyptian kings were buried.  “We rode through the narrow, rugged valley, bound on either side by cliffs of yellowest limestone and with the blue sky above.”  There they saw the tombs of Rameses IX, Rameses VI, and Amenhotep II.  In the afternoon they attended the donkey races and camel races at the Luxor Country club.

They next steamed up the Nile, to Komombo where they saw a curious temple dedicated to the god of evil in the form of a crocodile.  On February 7 they arrived at the large town of Assouan (or Aswan).  Here they reluctantly left the Rameses the Great and took the train to Phylae where they boarded the next river boat, the S.S. Prince Abbas, to travel south on the Nile to the Second Cataract.  This boat was smaller than the Rameses the Great, but very comfortable.  It held 39 passengers, including some of the people Marjorie had befriended on the Rameses.  The weather was hot and sultry, but Marjorie was excited, “and tonight we see the Southern Cross, so nothing matters much.”   The Southern Cross is a constellation that is found in the southern region of the night sky, and Marjorie had to get up at 3.20 am to see it.  “Oh, it was so beautiful.  I sat all by myself curled up in one of the deck chairs and tried to believe I was on the yacht in West Indian Waters – oh how homesick I did feel for the dear old ‘Marjorie.’ In a few moments the moon came up, just a wee silver crescent over the horizon …it was a lovely night.”

The Southern Cross formation

            At daybreak, suddenly the scenery changed.  There were mountains of granite coming close to the river’s edge, flat wastes of grey rock, and no greenery at all.  The dam had recently been built above Assuan so that all the year round there would be water for agriculture.  They crossed the Tropic of Cancer in a narrow rock-bound gorge and visited the Temple of Dakka.  They were now in the Valley of the Lions and could see caravans of travelers on camelback on the banks, making their way through the desert to Khartoum.

The highlight of the trip was yet to come.  On February 9^th they arrived at Abu-Simbel – “I have seen Abu Simbel!  The most wonderful temple that the world has ever seen…if only I could make you feel as I did when we had climbed the dusty bank and I stood face to face with those four marvelous figures cut into the rock of the mountainside.”  It was the tomb of Rameses II and his wife Nefertari, the cartouches of Rameses II carved out of solid rock 65’ high in the thirteenth century B.C.    It had been buried in the shifting sands until 1817, and was so full of bats that Marjorie could hardly see the hieroglyphics.

           The 65’ high cartouches of Rameses II

The main hall of Abu Simbel Temple

“We found ourselves between two great rows of Osiris figures”

Marjorie was so transfixed with the temple that she and Miss Helen got up at 4.30 the next morning to see the moonlight on the temple – a never-to-be-forgotten spectacle.  But then when the sun came up over the hills there was another extraordinary sight.  “Beam after beam came slowly creeping down the mountainside until the crowns, and then the faces, and finally the whole of the great figures were lit to a blaze of glory.  Was it my imagination, or did they really smile when the sun’s rays first kissed them?”

Another morning’s journey and they were at their turning point, Wady Halfa (“the dearest town in all Egypt.”) where they walked among the small, white, gleaming houses, and caught sight of white minarets above the trees.  They rode donkeys the six miles to the second cataract where the swift current was very blue and the black rocks glistened like coal in the sunlight.  “Little boys were ‘riding the cataract’ seated on inflated skins, their arms wildly waving in the air…There we were on the edge, the jumping-off place between civilization and nothingness.”

            As they moored again at Abu Simbel, on their return journey, Marjorie and her friend Miss Allen climbed the steep yellow sand bank beside the temple.  As they climbed back down they heard a guide from the boat calling to them to come and hear the singing sand.  The steep sand bank ran just like water, in waves, to the bottom.  “And as we listened we could hear a deep roaring sound as of thunder seeming to come from the depths of the earth beneath our feet, and all the time the ground trembled and we could feel ourselves sinking, sinking, far into the sand.  It was almost supernatural.”  This phenomenon is explained by the fact that the sand contains silica, and is of a certain humidity, and the “singing” is caused by the wind passing over the sand, or by walking on it,  creating a ‘roaring’ or a ‘booming.’

Just when Marjorie thought she could never see anything so wonderful again, they took small boats for an excursion to the Island of Phylae  “where there is one of the loveliest temples in the whole of Egypt.”  The building of the first Aswan Dam (completed in 1902) had flooded the temple, and it was feared that it would not hold on to its foundations much longer.  In the meantime, the water added charm to it, and they sailed their boats through the courtyards and between the pillars. “The courtyard itself is surrounded with graceful columns and with the reflections in the water was truly lovely.  Exquisite blue lotus flowers formed the capitals, and the whole ceiling was wonderfully painted.  The view was fascinating.  Pharoah’s Bed was just below us, that famous little temple with its roof supported by eight columns, like a double four poster!”

Marjorie’s photograph of Phylae, Jewel of the Nile, 1904

Many years later, the temple was stabilized and moved to higher ground.

The S.S. Prince Abbas took them back to Luxor, where they said their goodbyes to their new friends and took the train to Assuan where they stayed for one week at the Cataract Hotel.   The next day they went camel-riding, pitching and sliding, their knees wrapped around the pummel, their feet crossed on the camel’s neck!  “I had a race all the way up the main street, till an Egyptian policeman came out and requested us not to go so fast!”  They went on several day trips, always trying to get back to the hotel around noon so as to spend the hottest part of the day indoors.

After five weeks sailing up the Nile and back again to Cairo, Marjorie and Miss Macartnay spent a few days at the Mena House.  They read and rested for a day, and then went out to see the Pyramids and the Sphinx — Miss Macartnay in a ‘sand-cart’ and Marjorie on a camel. They went back to see the Sphinx after sunset: “By moonlight you forget that the Sphinx is mutilated, that she is weather-beaten and half-covered up by sand – instead she seems a wonderful super-human creature whom time cannot affect, who has, and will, stand immortal through all ages.  I sat on the sand close beneath her and just looked and looked at that strange inscrutable countenance.”       

The Sphinx, ‘weather-beaten and half-covered up by sand.’

            The Mena House has spectacular views over the pyramids, and Marjorie and Miss Helen enjoyed having tea by themselves on an upstairs balcony with a fine view of the great Pyramid itself.  They spent the last days shopping and visiting the museums of Cairo. At the end of the month they took the train back to Alexandria, and there they boarded ‘The Cairo’, a steamer bound for Sicily.

In March they arrived in Sicily.  Join Marjorie next month as she discovers Messina, Taormina, Syracusa, Girgenti, Palermo, and Naples.

In Cairo they were met by a representative from the famous Shepherd’s Hotel who took them through the busy streets to the hotel.  Marjorie describes “A jumble of curious sights and sounds, scarlet tarbushes everywhere, black-robed women, and donkeys braying.”  On the first afternoon they had tea on Shepheard’s terrace, right over the street, where it was said that if you sat long enough you would see the world go by.  Marjorie wrote to her mother, “I never sat long enough!”  She did sit long enough, however, to see vendors “crying their wares and offering to sell you monkeys, post cards, pipes, fly brushes, ostrich plumes, embroideries, scarabs, donkey beads, inlaid boxes, and crocodiles!  There are groups of tumbling acrobatic children, and dragomen eager to show you the sights and water carriers with skins full of water, and men with huge stone or glass jars of lemonade and in their hands two little brass bowls for you to drink out of which they keep clinking together to make you know they are there.”  On the terrace itself there were exquisitely dressed people to watch, English, American, French, German, Turkish, and Syrian.

The next day they visited the Bazaars – narrow streets lined with shops.  “In front of each shop was the shopkeeper sitting cross-legged on a broad shelf – useful alike for counter, couch, and table – and smoking his long cocoanut bowled ‘nargileh’ [or waterpipe].  The shops themselves were hung with bright shawls and carpets and offered for sale a fascinating variety of bracelets, beads, embroidered jackets, slippers, and wares of silver and brass.”  Marjorie was fascinated with the spice bazaar where herbs and medicines were being prepared in stone mortars.  And the perfume shops where they sold attar of roses and incense.    But the silk shops were the most interesting, “…where scarfs were being woven by busy hands and feet.  And when they have a big thing like a carpet to do, they stretch their looms right out into the street and then run up and down with a huge shuttle shaped like a parasol made of bamboo.”  They also visited the brass bazaars, and the silver and goldsmiths.  All accompanied by young girls singing and playing their tambourines.

They hired their own Dragoman (a local guide) to accompany them to the Mosques.  His name was “Mohammed Brown” and he showed them all the interesting places in the city, and to the Pyramids.  Marjorie climbed the largest of the three, and commented that it was quite a climb, “But oh! The view is worth it.”  From the top she could see the sphinx, “her proud head almost hidden by the sand hills – and beyond the great flat nothingness of the dessert stretching in waves of pinkish yellow sand to the horizon.  On the other side it was all so totally different, for there the wonderful old Nile held sway and the country was green with foliage and dotted over with date palms…I could have stayed forever looking at this twofold view.”

The Great Sphinx, partly covered by sand

The next part of the tour was a week-long trip down the Nile on the famous paddle steamer “Rameses the Great.”  The boat carried 78 passengers.  Marjorie and Miss Macartnay had secured the best rooms on the upper deck, on the sunny side, near the large outdoor sitting room with easy chairs and a piano where all the passengers gathered in the afternoons for tea.  “In the evening, the light grew better and the hills began to wear their lovely mantels of purple. [later in the evening] the moon was out, and as I looked from my cabin window, the whole river was flooded with a ghostly silver light and the palm trees on the opposite shore lent their reflection to the water…we could indeed feel that we were in ‘beautiful Egypt.’”

Marjorie on board “Rameses the Great” 1904

            Each day there were different excursions, the most beautiful being to the temple of Athor, the Egyptian Venus, begun by the Ptolemies and finished and embellished by Cleopatra.  It was later restored by the Roman Emperors.  “Our first glimpse was of a great triumphal arch, and then suddenly the grand temple itself rose above the sand hills…the wonderful grandeur of the façade came up on us – with its rows of massive columns.  Each column was covered with hieroglyphics and bore a representation of the goddess Athor.  As we passed into the semi darkness of the grand hall of columns the centuries seemed to roll away and we were again back in the days of the Ptolemis.  But alas there were no processions of priests, no crowds of awe-inspired spectators, only a handful of peering tourists and some birds flying in and out among the forest of pillars and breaking the stillness of the ages with their song.” 

Taken from letters to her mother, Bessie

DECEMBER 1903 – ROME

When Marjorie and Miss Helen arrived back in Rome from Naples, the cool wet weather changed suddenly and they were pleased to see the sun:

“You can imagine how welcome it was! And it was delightfully warm too, almost like spring. It is such a lovely city in the warm sunshine,” wrote Marjorie to her mother. They took the opportunity to drive out into the country, and up into the hills surrounding Rome. But the good weather did not last, and Marjorie commented that Rome can be dreary on a rainy day, “…only there are so many beautiful things in it, and every bit is interesting. There are great sunny piazzas, and scattered all over the city are hundreds of fountains – big and little, adorned with beautiful statues or just tumbling out of a stone barrel. There are bits of old Rome everywhere you look.”

They returned to the Vatican and St. Paul’s again and again. Marjorie particularly loved the Sculpture Gallery where they saw “the wonderful statues of the Emperors, the beautiful Apollo Belvedere, the Loacoon, and the glorious Sleeping Ariadne … and lots of lovely things.”

Apollo Belvedere

Sleeping Ariadne

With Christmas fast approaching, Marjorie and Miss Helen went shopping for Christmas cards to send to people at home, and last-minute gifts for the family. Marjorie had been collecting gifts to send home from her favorite places. There was lace from Jesurum’s in Venice for Bessie, and a calendar from Florence; tortoiseshell brushes from Naples and Venetian cufflinks for Will; and a collection of toys for Augustine – a photograph frame from Venice, vases from Florence, castanettes from Pompeii, a fan and a mandolin from Naples, and a papal guard doll from Rome. She added a small Italian flag to stick out of the top of Augustine’s Christmas stocking, and “…in the afternoon I wrapped up and tied up packages and sent them all off to America.”

Once the weather improved again, they enjoyed taking rides in the Borghese grounds – very close to their hotel:

“Oh they are lovely!! Great avenues of ilex trees, moss grown fountains, rolling lawns and linden trees throwing their long shadows on the grass.” They went up on the Pincian Hill – a fashionable park of Rome – where they loved to spend the afternoon driving around, listening to the bands, and watching the people. Marjorie wrote, “What I liked best were the children, there are thousands of them walking and driving, attended by nurses in pink or blue with such beautiful coral necklaces and long streamers of gay ribbon down their backs.” They took tea every day at Aragno’s on the Corso where Marjorie observed people from many different countries and loved the atmosphere, even though it was “smoky.” In 1893, Baedeker’s travel guide described Aragno’s as “the finest café in Italy.”

By December 13, the streets were full of fascinating “Presepios,” or crèches: “… a little moss-covered grotto with the manger, the ox and the ass and St. Mary and Joseph and the Shepherds and Wisemen all arranged in a group.” They went to the Vatican Etruscan Museum to see the cinerary urns and the lovely vases, and to the Vatican Library to see the precious illustrated manuscripts – among them, curiously, Henry VIII’s love letters to Anne Boleyn. They took drives into the country where Marjorie admired the cypresses and umbrella pines. They walked down to the Piazza di Spagna and bought pansies on the great Spanish Steps. At the Borghese Villa Gallery Marjorie noted her favorite paintings, Correggio’s “Danae,” Titian’s “Sacred and Profane Love” and his “Three Graces,” and Botticelli’s “Madonna and Angels.”

On the morning of the 24th, Marjorie and Miss Helen went to the Spanish Steps again and bought a big branch of holly and other greens with huge red berries, and a beautiful bunch of pansies. “From that time on Christmas really began.” In the evening they were invited to a grand concert and ‘arbre de noel’ festival at the hotel. Everyone was dressed in their best clothes. “The tree was a beauty!” wrote Marjorie. “With lights of the national red white and green, and all shining with pretty things – but oh how homesick it did make me, for Katrina’s trees are always nicest of all.” (Katrina was Bessie’s maid who stayed with the family for almost 50 years.) “After we had got settled down, from behind a thin screen decorated to form a church window, the music began. There were a choir of boys from one of the Roman Churches, and also a quartet of soloists … Later in the evening we had refreshments of every description and then were presented each with a gift “from the tree”. Mine was a very pretty leather card case. We had a beautiful time.”

The next morning Marjorie found a table filled with gifts and letters from home. After opening them, they went to St. Peter’s for the “Gloria in Excelsis”. They had lunch at the hotel (with mincepies) and then set out for the Christmas service at Santa Maria Maggiore where the whole church was lit with candles. From there they went again to Aragno’s, “How gay it was on Christmas night – all Rome seemed to be there.” That evening there was another concert in the Hotel, and when it was all over Marjorie “…wished pretty hard for a good-night kiss from you, Mother dearest.” She ended her last letter of the year, “Well, Mother dear I must close now, with just lots and lots of love and Happy New Year wishes from your little daughter, Marjorie.”

Marjorie had much to look forward to in January. She and Miss Helen had train tickets to Brindisi where they would take a boat to Egypt and spend two months exploring Cairo and sailing down the Nile in the Rameses II Steamer. Notes from the Archives in January will cover their exotic and exciting adventures.

Taken from letters to her mother, Bessie

NOVEMBER 1903 – ROME

We go back 108 years, and it is November 1903. Twenty-year-old Marjorie was very sorry to be leaving Florence, but madly excited to get to Rome. Miss Helen had asked the hotel in Rome, the Hotel de Russie (still in operation in the heart of the city, between the Spanish Steps and the Piazza del Popolo,) to try to secure three tickets to the Consistory at the Vatican that was to take place on November 12. They rushed out to buy black veils and gloves in anticipation, but the day before the event they still had no tickets. However, that evening after dinner “…when we were just giving up thoughts of it…” the tickets arrived. “We fairly shivered in anticipation. It is a great occasion – being the first Consistory,” wrote Marjorie to her mother.

On Thursday the twelfth, at 8:30 a.m. they set of for the Vatican, dressed in an assortment of borrowed long black coats and black taffeta petticoats. On their heads they wore black lace scarves. This was the first public Consistory held by the new Pope Pius X, called to witness the canonization of a new Saint. (Pope Pius was, himself, canonized much later.)

“The scene was a gay one – the whole scheme of coloring being the Papal crimson. The room was a blaze of color, for the black gowns of the ladies only served as a background to set off the gay uniforms of the men. The Papal Guard costume is yellow and black, partly striped, partly plaid, and patched with red. Michael Angelo designed the costume – he wanted it as conspicuous as possible – I think he succeeded! …Then came the Pope himself on foot … he wore a huge silver mitre embroidered with gold and precious gems, a white gown covered with a red gold embroidered cape … a very wonderful sight.”

Following this exciting introduction to Rome, Marjorie spent the next days visiting churches, monasteries, and museums; and the grave sites of Keats and Shelley. They hired an English-speaking guide, Malaspino, who took them to all the famous sites and gave them the history of Rome and its ruins, and then accompanied them along the historic Appian Way to see the villas and the tombs of all the old Patrician families. Malespino took them to the Forum – the political and architectural centre of Old Rome, where the Ancient Romans built beautiful temples to their gods and held feasts in their honor. It was the centre of public life. Marjorie was fascinated to see the rostrum of Julius Caesar where Mark Anthony delivered his famous oration; and the entrance to the Golden House of Nero that was ¾ of a mile long. They visited the prison where St. Peter and St. Paul were imprisoned, and the gravesite of Romulus. The whole Forum area had only been uncovered in 1870, and every few months archeologists were digging up new and fascinating ruins. Marjorie wrote, “I should like to take a spade and dig myself!” They climbed to the very top of the Colosseum and pretended they were slaves watching gladiatorial combats and sham naval battles.

The Colosseum, Rome

Later in the month they returned to the Vatican to see the Sculpture Gallery, and to the Palantine Hill where the wonderful “Circus Maximus,” the gigantic stadium of Ancient Rome, stood. “It all seemed near enough to have been yesterday instead of nearly two thousand years ago!”

A quick trip south to Naples and Pompeii was in order before Marjorie’s friend Gertrude had to return to the United States just before Thanksgiving Day. Marjorie loved Naples and would return to that area many times.

Marjorie’s pastel of The Bay of Naples

“They call the Bay of Naples the loveliest in the world, and I don’t wonder. And oh the climate of Naples is so perfect – the air so soft and gentle and the fresh, sweet breeze from the sea. Every Italian city has its own special charm, and I think Naples’ is its air and its people – the latter are charming! I believe they can cheat you there worse than other places, but they do it in such a sweet coaxing way, and if you find them out they don’t seem to be upset at all, but think it a huge joke just between you and them. And all the time they have the most beautiful manners and an air of doing it all for your best good. Oh they are delightful! I love them one and all.”

A train took them on a day trip along the coast to Pompeii, at the foot of Mount Vesuvius. Pompeii was completely buried in A.D. 79, and the ash-covered ruins were only discovered by accident in 1749. Since then, more and more of the once thriving city has been uncovered. Marjorie wrote to Bessie, “But what is uncovered is SO wonderful.”

Marjorie’s pastel of The Forum, Pompeii

She described the beautiful courtyards filled with statues and arbors, and rooms with their wonderful frescoes, busy little cupids working at various trades – and fruit and animals. They hated to leave it all behind to go back to Naples, but that evening “some really good serenaders came under our windows and sang their pretty soft songs.” They went to the Pompeii Museum, and went shopping. It was Gertrude’s last day, and Marjorie was very sad. Dorothy had left the party several weeks earlier, so the tour would now be only Marjorie and her guide/chaperone, Miss Helen. Later in the week they took a boat to the Island of Capri where the water was beautiful and where they visited the Blue Grotto. They stepped carefully into small cockle shell boats that carried them into the mouth of the cave: “It was heavenly in there, so still and calm and all the water an exquisite silver blue – all shining and rippling. Each boat looked like a glistening fish. The cave is big inside and only lighted from the narrow opening so you can imagine the weird soft coloring. It certainly was a fine experience. The sunset that night was glorious, with the sun dropping down all fiery red beside the hazy blue Capri.”

Thanksgiving Day came and Marjorie and Miss Helen had a special dinner at the hotel, “We had woodcock instead of [turkey] – but otherwise it was quite perfect. We even had nuts at the end, and oh such fascinating preserved grapes – much nicer than raisins – and all done up in a case of grape leaves. We had a beautiful drive this afternoon to celebrate the day and now we are spending the night at charming Sorrento, perched up on a cliff and overlooking the whole Bay of Naples.”

Back in Rome, Marjorie and Miss Helen took advantage of a rainy day to visit the Sistine Chapel. “It is lovelier than ever I dreamt it would be. Oh it is wonderful, every bit of it,” wrote Marjorie.

The next chapter of “Notes from the Archives” (December in Rome), will describe the days leading up to Christmas, Marjorie’s first away from home. There was much excitement in the city, and Marjorie enjoyed the Italian Christmas customs, decorations, and special foods.

​It is now October 1903 and Marjorie has just spent an idyllic month in Venice — visiting churches, art museums, palaces, a glass factory, and a lace factory.  She spent a day at the Lido and took daily walks to St. Mark’s Square where she never tired of gazing at the glorious façade of the Cathedral of San Marco.  She loved exploring the city, getting lost in the narrow, warren-like streets, or gazing awe-struck from a gondola as she lay back on the cushioned seat listening to the “dip…dip” of the oars, and the beautiful arias sung by the gondoliers. At the end of September Marjorie, Dorothy, Gertrude, and Miss Macartnay “…had a most mournful last gondola ride down to the station and took the 2.30 o’clock train for Milan.”

​The train from Venice passed through Padua, Verona, Vicenza, and Brecchia, arriving in Milan in the evening.  The next day was delightfully clear and sunny, so they decided to take a trip to Lake Como while the weather was good.  They arrived at the town of Como just before noon, and immediately boarded a boat to take them up the Lake. The glorious fall weather enhanced the colors of the water, the surrounding hills, and the gardens of the villas along the lakeside:  “The vines that covered the Italian villas had all turned red and shone so exquisitely in the sun.  Each shore of the lake was terraced and crowded with grape vines, gracefully twined —and the grey green of the olive was seen everywhere.  It was a perfect day with the blue sky reflected in the water, and vines so red, and the villas so bright and picturesque in the sunlight,” wrote Marjorie to her mother. Their destination was Bellagio, a charming little town on a point of land between Lakes Como and Secco.  They left the boat and wandered around among the roses and oleanders, walking through the quaint arcade, “where everything imaginable is for sale, from roast chestnuts to real shell combs and brushes.” They climbed the cobble-stone path leading from the town up the hillside to the silk factory where they watched the workers making scarves and blankets.

​Back in Milan they visited the museums and churches, and particularly enjoyed the Cathedral: “It is wonderful.  All white and glistening outside, with hundreds of carved Gothic spires.” They shopped in the famous “Galleria” and had hotchocolate at the celebrated restaurant “Biffis.”

​The next stop was Genoa, a flourishing seaport where the town is built on a semicircle of hills surrounding the harbor, the birthplace of Christopher Columbus.  They stayed overnight at the Hotel Savoie, and then took the train to Pisa. They drove straight to the “…wonderful group of buildings —the Cathedral, baptistery, Campo Santo and Leaning Tower.  I am so glad we saw them first by evening —for the marble turned yellow with age was so exquisite against the sunset sky. The great dome of the baptistery with the rose colored clouds behind it, I think I shall never forget.”

The Basilica and Tower, Pisa

​Marjorie was fascinated with the enormous bronze lamp that hangs in the Basilica whose swinging (so slight that you can hardly notice it) gave Galilieo the idea of the pendulum and the earth’s motion.

​On to Siena!  “One of the very red letter days.  Siena is the most fascinating Italian town – the streets so tiny and winding and all up and down hill, and the houses are old and so interesting.  The city is built on three hills, and in the very centre is a square or campo where all three meet.” They studied the della Robbias, commenting on and comparing the work of the father, son, and nephew. They left Siena reluctantly, “…but even on the train we didn’t quite lose our memories of a delightful time for we had one of the famous cakes called ‘Panforte di Siena’ as a delicious reminder.”

​A four-hour train journey took them to Florence, a city Marjorie would return to many times.  They took rooms at the Hotel de la Ville on Piazza Manin with views of the River Arno and its graceful bridges.

Hotel de la Ville, Florence, 1903

Here they studied the Medicis, and visited the Uffizi Gallery several times to see the del Sartos, Botticellis, Peruginos, andFra Angelicos.  They shopped on the Ponte Vecchio (old bridge), “…with shops on each side and a streetway in the middle – the shops are so gay, pinks and blues and yellows, and there’s a lovely open portico in the centre where you can look up and down the river and see the city as if it were in a frame.” At the Pitti Palace they saw Raphaels and Titians, and at the Santa Maria Novella the exquisite Cimabues.  They went to Michael Angelo’s house and saw his desk and chair and many of his great statues; then Dante’s tiny home, (one room full of relics of his life, and the chair he sat in while writing the “Inferno.”) They visited the Convent of San Marco to see the frescoes by Fra Angelico, and the Bella Arti to see Michael Angelo’s famous statue of David.  They rode out into the country – to Fiesole, San Miniato, Prato, and Poggio a Caiano.  Every day, after their exhausting sightseeing, they went toGiacosa’s Tea Room, still in business today on the Via dellaSpada.

Giacosa’s Tea Room, Florence, 1903

​With their time in Florence running out, Marjorie took a quick trip to Perugia, Assisi, and Orvieto.  She would have liked to stay in Florence longer, but by the end of October she was looking forward to the next part of the tour – two months in Rome.  They had applied for tickets to the Vatican to attend the first Consistory on November 12th.  Pope Pius X (who was himself later canonized) had called the assembly of Roman Catholic Cardinals to witness the canonization of a new Saint.

​The November issue of “Notes from the Archives” will be a tour of Rome, through Marjorie’s letters, including the extraordinary experience of attending the Consistory.

On June 6 the three young women and their chaperone boarded the Deutschland, a luxury ocean liner of the Hamburg Amerika Line. Their first stop was Paris where they stayed at the Normandie Hotel near the Opera House. From Paris they went to London and then followed a popular tourist route to Oxford, Stratford, Warwick, Chester, Loch Katrin in the Highlands of Scotland, Edinburgh, Roslyn, and Melrose. Marjorie wrote letters and postcards home every week, sometimes more often. The dozens of pages in each letter werefull of descriptions of her travel experiences, the hotels, the people she met, the architecture and the gardens, and her own observations on the manners and traditions of the different countries. Everywhere they went they were armed with their trusty Baedeker’s travel books (the Fodor’s of the day), letters of introduction, and addresses for the nearest Thomas Cook’s travel office where they could pick up their mail from home and draw cash on their letters of credit.

From England they traveled across the North Sea to Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, then south to Germany and Austria, visiting museums and attending concerts and opera wherever they could, finally arriving in Venice, Italy, in September.

SEPTEMBER 1903: VENICE, ITALY

Marjorie’s first impressions of Italy, as they sped south on the train, were of red-tiled roofs, Lombardy poplars, and “vineyard after vineyard.” She described “true Italian scenes”– soft grey castles and little stucco churches with their campaniles, the blue Adriatic Sea beyond, and the cloudless skies. But nothing prepared her for the stunning vista that awaited her as she stepped out of the railway station in Venice. She gasped as she caught her first glimpse of the Grand Canal:

“We could hardly believe our eyes. All the picturesque old Venetian palaces were there spread out before us, such as we had dreamt of all our lives, and at our feet lay a gondola ready to take us and our trunks to the Hotel. A more fairy-like ride I never had – the soft cushioned gondola with its graceful rowers and gorgeous blue of the canal. It was perfect weather, warm like mid-summer, and as we wound in and out of the labyrinth of piccolo canali and under the quaint stone bridges and looked up at the soft tinted houses with their vine covered balconies, I thought it must be very like Heaven … [The next day] we breakfasted looking out over the Grand Canal and watched gondolas gliding up and down with their slender black hulls and white-suited gondoliers.”

They were to spend almost a month in Venice, staying at the Grand Hotel across from the Santa Margarita Church on the Grand Canal. Their rooms overlooked the Canal, and from their windows they could see the gondolas passing by “with gay paper lanterns and filled with musicians and singers, and the voices are so sweet over the water … as the moon was full you can imagine how perfect it all was … they sing things from the opera.” They dined at Florian’s, bought embroidered linens at Jesurum’s, and took afternoon tea at Caffe Quadri’s, all in St. Mark’s Square, with its magnificent view of the Cathedral of San Marco.

“There was dear old San Marco in front of us, every pinnacle standing out against the sky and the mosaics and golden crosses a blaze of glory. The late afternoon, with the sun full upon it, is the most ideal time of all. Later we went inside, for the first time – and as much as I had always heard of its beauty, I never imagined it could be as lovely as it was … the walls and ceiling are completely covered with the most beautiful glass mosaics.”

They went to the Galleria dell’Accademia, Venice’s famed museum of pre-19th century art, and admired theCarpaccios, Titians, and Bellinis. And they visited dozens of churches, studying the ancient art in each one. A day trip byvaporetto to the Lido on the Adriatic Sea was a welcome respite from the requisite visits to churches, palaces, and museums:

“The beach was a mass of pavilions and bathing houses, and of course Gertrude and I couldn’t resist the temptation of going in the water. So we bought bathing suits – blue and white striped cotton ones! And went bravely in. Such funny sights I never saw as we looked! The pantaloons came down way below our knees, and the coat tails considerably above! But the water was delightful – so soft and warm and no surf. And the other people looked funnier than we did, with their huge bonnets, no stockings, and frequently no skirt at all. As we came home in the little steam boat, the sun was just setting over the domes and spires of the distant city. It was very lovely. That evening we sat out on the porch listening again to the singers and getting them to play our favorites and went to bed still hearing the voices wafting over the water.”

On their last evening in Venice they went to the Piazza for a farewell visit to San Marco:

“It was so lovely with the deep blue sky back of it and some tiny clouds colored pink with the sunset. Each bit of mosaic and gilding caught the last rays of the sun and shone bright, while the rest of the church was in half shadow. I think I have never seen anything more beautiful – and to think that it was our good-bye. Oh, I hate to leave Venice. But it must be the two o’clock train to-morrow.”

The October issue of “Notes from the Archives” will cover the next part of the Grand Tour adventure – Milan, Como, Bellagio, Genoa, Siena, Pisa, and Florence.