This made the third death in my circle of loved ones within four months: my husband, my father, my more or less adopted father, Sir John Erichsen—“dear Uncle John”—and my mother was very ill.
Life seemed full of sorrow.
These were the sad circumstances under which Finland was written.
Curious. Whilst so often my feelings during those days of journeying were of exhaustion from insomnia, heat, mosquitoes, jolting vehicles, and impossible beds, the papers were full of compliment on my “spirited sprightliness,” on “the liveliness of observation and the humour displayed by the narrator” whose pages were “full of entertainment and instruction.” It must often be so in the lives of those who are servants of the public. A smile and grin from actress or mountebank: the sigh and tear when the curtain drops.
A leading article in the Liverpool Post, a column and a half in length, kindly said:
“Very few English people visit Finland. There is a far-away sound in the name. Probably the general idea of Finland in this country is associated with thoughts of Polar bears and barbarity and reindeer sledges in use all the year round. The task of disabusing the English mind on this subject has fallen to a well-known and popular English lady—Mrs. Alec Tweedie—whose latest book, entitled Through Finland in Carts, has recently been published. In this, Finland is extremely fortunate. No country and no people could find a more capable champion. Not only is Mrs. Tweedie an experienced traveller, whose intrepidity might well put many of the sterner sex to the blush: she is also possessed of a remarkably keen faculty for minute observation of men and manners and scenery; and a power of expression and a literary style which are as strong and convincing as they are easy and graceful. Her book has all the interest of a well-told story; the vivacious charm of a volume of personal reminiscences; the excitement of a book of adventure, and the exactness and studious attention to necessary detail of an official Blue Book. From this time forth let no one complain that a journey to Finland is almost the only means of becoming intimately acquainted with the country and its inhabitants. Mrs. Alec Tweedie’s book—which ought to become a standard work on the subject—is a contradiction of that notion.
“It is worth a thought that—some would say as a result of the free and equal footing of the sexes—the morality and virtue of the people reaches the highest possible level. Divorce is not often heard of. When it does occur, it is oftener through incompatibility of temper than immorality. ‘Surely,’ says Mrs. Alec Tweedie, ‘if two people find they have made a mistake, and are irritants instead of sedatives to one another, they should not be left to champ and fret like horses at too severe a bit, for all their long, sad lives—to mar one another’s happiness, to worry their children and annoy their friends. Finland shows us an excellent example. The very fact of being able to get free makes folk less inclined to struggle at their chains. Life is intolerable to Mrs. Jones in Finland, and away she goes; at the end of a year Mr. Jones advertises three times in the paper for his wife, or for information that will lead to his knowing her whereabouts; no one responds, and Mr. Jones can sue for and obtain a divorce without any of those scandalous details appearing in the Press which are a disgrace to English journalism.’ Whatever may be thought of Mrs. Alec Tweedie’s plain words as to the facilities for divorce, her remarks about the English Press do not quite convince the journalistic mind. The Press has a public duty to perform, and if it can be proved that the conscientious publication of ’scandalous details’ is more likely to act as a deterrent to vice and crime than would be the case if those details were suppressed, one should pause before describing the course adopted by the majority of English journals as a disgrace to the profession....
“We can only refer our readers to Mrs. Alec Tweedie’s pages, where the inner life and the outer life of the Finns, their weaknesses and their strong points, their advantages and their limitations, are all revealed with the discreet thoroughness of an artist and the kindliness and consideration and admiration and candour of a friend.”