A Finnish bath once taken by man or woman can never be forgotten!
A real native bath is one of the specialities of the country. Even in the old songs of the Kalevala they speak of the "cleansing and healing vapours of the heated bath-room."
Poets have described the bath in verse, artists have drawn it on canvas, and singers have warbled forth its charms; nevertheless, it is not every traveller who has penetrated the strange mystery. Most strange and most mysterious it is. But I anticipate.
Every house in the country, however humble that house may be, boasts its bastu, or bath-house, called in Finnish Sauna. As we passed along the country roads, noting the hay piled up on a sort of tent erection made of pine trunks, to dry in the sun before being stowed away into small wooden houses for protection during the winter, or nearly drove over one of those strange long-haired pigs, the bristles on whose backs reminded one of a hog-maned polo pony, one saw these bastus continually. Among the cluster of little buildings that form the farm, the bath-house, indeed, stands forth alone, and is easily recognisable, one of its walls, against which the stove stands, being usually black, even on the outside, from smoke.
Every Saturday, year in, year out, that stove is heated, and the whole family have a bath—not singly, oh dear, no, but altogether, men, women, and children; farmer, wife, brothers, sisters, labourers, friends, and the dogs too, if they have a mind; so that once in each week the entire population of Finland is clean, although few of them know what daily ablutions, even of the most primitive kind, mean, while hot water is almost as difficult to procure in Suomi as a great auk's egg in England.
Naturally any institution so purely national as the Finnish bastu was worth investigating—in fact, could not be omitted from our programme. Bathing with the peasants themselves, however, being impossible, we arranged to enjoy the extraordinary pleasure at a friend's house, where we could be duly washed by one of her own servants; for, be it understood, there is always one servant in every better-class establishment who understands the bastu, and can, and does wash the family.
When she is washed, we unfortunately omitted to inquire. In towns, such as Helsingfors, there are professional women-washers, who go from house to house to bathe and massage men and women alike. Theirs is a regular trade, and as the higher class of the profession receive about a shilling for "attending" each bath given at a private house, the employment is not one to be despised. Neither is it, as proved by the fact that there are over 300 public bathing-women in little Finland.
On the eventful night of our initiation, supper was over, the house-party and guests were all assembled on the balcony, the women engaged in needlework, and the men smoking cigarettes, when Saima, the Finnish servant, arrived to solemnly announce in a loud tone that the English lady's bath was ready. Taking a fond farewell of the family, I marched solemnly behind the flaxen-haired Saima, who had thoroughly entered into the spirit of the joke of giving an English lady a Finnish bath, neither the bather nor attendant being able to understand one word of what the other spoke. Down an avenue overshadowed by trees we proceeded, getting a peep of a perfectly glorious sunset which bathed one side of the lake in yellow hues, while the other was lighted by an enormous blood-red moon, for in those Northern climes there are many strange natural effects far more beautiful than in the South. It was a wonderful evening, and I paused to consider which was the more beautiful, the departing day or the coming night, both of which were fighting for supremacy.
Saima would brook no delay, however, so I had to hurry on. Immediately before us was the bastu—a wee wooden house like a small Swiss châlet, the outer room, where I undressed, containing a large oven. The inner room boasted only one small window, through which the departing day did not shine very brilliantly, luckily for my modesty. Its furniture was only a large-sized tin bath filled with cold water, opposite to which were seven very wide wooden steps like a staircase, twelve feet wide perhaps, the top step forming a kind of platform where there was just room to sit without one's head touching the tarred ceiling above. The steps and the platform were covered with straw—Finnish fashion—for the great occasion.
I wondered what next, but had not much time for speculation, for Saima—who only took off her outer dress—grasped me by the hand, her face aglow with the intense heat, led me up the wooden staircase, and signed her will that I should sit on the straw-strewn platform afore honourably mentioned.