Page:Travel letters from New Zealand, Australia and Africa (1913).djvu/33

 greatly interests me. Dr. Beeson has a son who is thirty years old, and when the father is away the son attends to his business, as the son is also a doctor. When the father returns, the son will take a trip. Harry Clay Blaney and wife, who toured the country for years in a play called "Across the Pacific," are also interesting passengers. Mr. Blaney and his brother Charles operate theatres in New York, Philadelphia, Brooklyn, Jersey City, and in other cities, in addition to owning several road shows. Mrs. Blaney is an actress, but is very domestic, and spends most of her time sitting on deck doing fancy work.

—We celebrated our approach to Sydney, Australia, by running into a storm. I have never seen worse weather at sea. Heavy seas continually broke over the prow, and at breakfast only one woman appeared in the dining-room. It will surprise you to learn that this lone woman was Adelaide, the farmer's daughter. The gentlemen gave her quite a reception, but I wasn't there to witness it: I was sick in bed. Women are very much more subject to seasickness than men, as a rule The night before the storm, we had another impromptu dance, and Adelaide, who never danced in her life, danced the lancers with Judge Dwyer, chief judge of American Samoa. There were two sets, and a good-natured doctor from London called the figures in an amusing way. I hear it frequently remarked that we have a very agreeable passenger list; not a disagreeable per