"You are not English?" he went on, addressing our friend.
"No," replied Frau von Lilly, "I am a Finlander."
"You? Why, you speak Russian, and you are dark, too; your face is not like a Finn's, it is not wide enough, and your hair is too black. He," pointing to Grandpapa, "is a Finlander, and looks like one."
Fancy such observations from an old Russian boatman. The same wonderful interest in our concerns and welfare was, however, evinced on all sides. The whole town of Sordavala had positively thrilled with excitement when the Committee of the Fête learned that some English people were coming to their Festival. Instantly that Committee wrote to say they would do everything they could for the visitors' "komfort," which they certainly did. They gave us the best rooms in the place, they opened their museums for us that we might view them, privately, they gave us Runo singing entertainments with ourselves for sole audience, they found seats for us in the theatre when every seat was sold, and they treated us in all ways as though we had been princesses. But everything we said was noted, and everything we did cautiously watched; therefore for a short time we tasted something of the horrors of that publicity which must be the bane of existence to royalty.
Long after we had left Sordavala we happened to refer to that town when conversing with some friends.
"Isn't it amusing?" one of them observed. "I saw in the paper the other day that some English people who went to Sordavala for the Festival, had written beforehand a letter to the Manager of the Committee to say "they required a suite of apartments, not higher than the third floor, with a bathroom."
We could not help smiling. It was the old story of "The Three Black Crows" over again! We had been the only English people at the Festival, we had never written a line ourselves to any member of the Committee; a native friend had done so for us, however, saying "that rooms would be required for three ladies, two English, and one Finnish."
One of the features of the Festival which interested us the most was a representation, at a little improvised theatre, of a typical modern Finnish play, by Finnish actors.
Anna Liisa was the piece chosen, because it was a peasant drama. It is written by one of Finland's greatest dramatists—perhaps the greatest in the Finnish language—and a woman!
It was only a small impromptu theatre, packed to suffocation by a most wonderfully sympathetic audience, but as the play was very representative, we give a slight sketch of the subject.