Page:The autobiography of a Pennsylvanian.djvu/262

 leaven of good humor which is a great saving grace. In the English Channel a dense fog settled down over us. One morning I was on deck leaning over the rail toward the prow listening to the horns which appeared to be blowing in all directions around us. Suddenly there loomed up before me, out of the fog, not more than twenty or thirty feet away, the sharp nose of a steamer, the Maine, coming directly for the side of our vessel. The deck hands on both boats yelled aloud and ran to the far side of each in order to avoid the splinters. A collision seemed inevitable and ours was to be the steamer rammed. I hung over the rail, only anxious to see that it did not strike before passing the state-room of my Daughter Josephine, almost beneath me though a little further toward the stern.

When that point was passed I felt a sense of relief, though I was told my face was bloodless. The passengers who were about ran to get life preservers. By skilful seamanship on both boats the officers and crews managed to keep them apart and the Maine swept by, almost grazing us. Then there was a mighty cheer on both boats. There was a timid lot of passengers for the rest of the trip. One man wore a life preserver the whole time and we all shall remember the Maine. At Antwerp our hotel was near the cathedral and its chimes rang every fifteen minutes through the night. We rode in a street car out to Hoboken, a village three or four miles inland. The car stopped on the way. I could see no passenger who wanted to get on the car or to alight from it. Thereupon the conductor got off and proceeded to urinate before us all in full view. The incident illustrates the different way in which these people look at some of the problems of life. At Amsterdam we had rooms at the Hotel Amstel. The fields around the city are divided off, not by fences as with us at home, but by ditches filled with sea water, and there is but one entrance for the big black and white cattle which seem to be never hungry and always 248