coast-line is only thirty-two miles long, but inland the country widens out a lot, and it was for this "hinterland"—largely unknown and uncharted—that we were bound.
I must confess to a certain feeling of pleasurable excitement—what girl would not experience such?—on the occasion of this first start on what will in all probability always stand out in memory's record as the longest and most adventurous journey of my life.
Our prime business was, of course, to film pictures, and we set to work promptly. Directly we got on board the tender, we commenced photographing the first scene in a drama entitled Odd Man Out, the scenario of which had already been put together in London, and concerning the plot of which I shall have more to say presently.
Naturally our business excited the curiosity of the other passengers, and as the tug drew near to the great liner, I could see that the rails of the decks nearest to us were lined with row on row of the passengers who had joined the vessel at Hamburg, all eagerly intent on watching us and our doings; and as we stepped on board, all eyes were directed at us, and many smiled a kindly greeting. As for me, however, during those first few hours my one wish was to be alone, to arrange my cabin, unpack my belongings, and generally make my surroundings as comfortable and homelike as possible.
It is the fashion of old West African travellers to protest that the pleasures and amenities of the voyage do not really begin until Madeira is passed, but as far as I was concerned I had quite settled down to life on board after our first day at sea. We played the usual ship's games, sang, talked, and I am afraid that most of us, old as well as young, married and single, flirted a little bit. I soon gathered round me quite a small circle of friends. They were mostly men friends, but this was not exactly my fault. An actress is an actress. Que voulez-vous?
And here I feel that I must say how greatly I appreciated the kindness and attention I received during the voyage from the ship's officers. The captain, a most fatherly old gentleman, the oldest officer and the commodore of the fleet of mail steamers to which the Henny Woermamm belongs, was unceasing in his efforts to do all he could for my comfort and convenience. The food, too, was excellent, and the whole surroundings most comfortable, not to say luxurious; equal, in fact, to those of any first-class hotel.
Curious how one gets used to the throbbing of the engines on board ship, and the vibration of the propeller. When they suddenly ceased, very early one morning, I was wide awake immediately. For a few moments I lay quite still, wondering lazily what was the matter. Then it suddenly flashed upon my mind that we must be at Madeira, and all desire for further sleep promptly vanished. I jumped up, peeped out of my port-hole, saw at once that it was even as I had surmised, and at once I proceeded to dress and hurry on deck.
It was Sunday morning. Before my eyes lay Madeira. Never in all my life had I seen anything one-half so beautiful. I was quite taken aback by the ethereal loveliness of the picture, and could only stand still and gaze at it in speechless admiration.
I was almost the first on deck, and so I had it all to myself for a while, and I could drink in the beauty of it, and enjoy it at my leisure. But soon the other passengers came pouring up from below in ever increasing numbers, and all became bustle, noise, and animation. Native boys swam out and round the ship in shoals, shouting, jabbering, and gesticulating, and diving for pennies which were thrown to them by the passengers.
After breakfast we went ashore, hired a motor-car, and drove up the mountain side to a spot whence a magnificent view is obtained of the whole of the bay, harbour, and town. The road up is exceedingly steep, and it was, take it altogether, the most exciting motor ride I ever experienced. I was, in fact, afraid at times that the car would slip backwards.
But if the ride up was exciting, it was nothing by comparison with the ride down. This return journey is made by means of queer-looking native sleighs over a smooth cobble-paved, but exceedingly steep road. Each of these sleighs will accommodate two passengers, and is manipulated by a couple of natives, who stand bolt upright on the elongated runners that project behind, and guide its course with their feet.
It is very like tobogganing, minus the snow and ice, and most of the passengers made light of it, but to my mind it was a rather terrifying and not altogether pleasant experience; for the road is inclined in places at an angle of something like ninety degrees, there are many sharp curves, and the crazy little vehicles fly downwards with the rapidity of lightning. Nevertheless, so skilful are the natives that I was assured that accidents are practically unknown.
After our ride our party went together into the town, and I found it very interesting to watch the passengers busily engaged in buying curios, and specimens of native work, to take home to their friends. Everybody haggled to get the price as low as possible; and yet afterwards, when they got back on board ship, everybody came to the conclusion that they had been "had."
We utilised, too, our short stay on shore to film yet another scene in the Odd Man Out drama, this being taken in the gardens amidst beautiful tropical vegetation; and one of the curious island sledges, drawn by oxen, was also introduced. In fact, I may say here that we hardly ever missed a suitable opportunity throughout the voyage to get local colour for this our first cinema play, the early scenes in which are concerned with a young white woman going out to join her husband in the wilds of Central Africa. When later on, for instance, we passed a mail steamer in mid-ocean, the camera was got ready, and I was set to pose and act on deck, with the big ship flitting past in the background as a setting. We had some gorgeous sunsets, too, and these also we pressed into our service, so to speak.
The "Blue Peter" flying from the masthead is the signal for everybody to hurry on board, and soon the anchor is up, the screw starts to revolve, and we resume our journey. Between Madeira and Las Palmas we enjoyed two of the lovely sunsets mentioned above. I never saw anything to equal them, and certainly I could never have imagined anything half so beautiful. If a painter could have painted them exactly true to nature, I am quite sure that he would have been laughed at as a futurist, or something artistically as dreadful; because no one, who had not seen the original, would have believed in the reality of his vivid colour effects.
On the morning of September 1st we passed Teneriffe, but only stopped there for quite a short while to put off a few passengers. At noon we anchored at Las Palmas, where we had a long wait. A party of us went ashore, and visited the cathedral and the few other "sights" that the place boasts of.
Then we hired a motor-car for a drive up to the Hotel Monte. At least, the chauffeur who drove us called his conveyance a motor-car, but it was the awfullest type of its kind I ever came across. The bumping was terrific, but looking over and under to try to ascertain the reason I discovered to my amazement that one of the wheels was practically destitute of any vestige of a tyre. About every ten minutes, too, we had to stop dead, because the motor got hot, and there was no water available to cool it.
At last, after a thorough shaking-up, the worst I think I ever had in my life, we arrived at the hotel, and had our tea. The view from the summit made amends in part for the disagreeableness of the drive. It was superb. It struck me as being very strange, however, that the one side of the mountain is quite bleak and bare, whilst the other is beautifully green and wooded.
In Las Palmas I saw for the first time women washing the family linen at the sides of the roads in the streams that flow downwards through pebble and shingle. The Las Palmas roads, by the way, are atrocious; but the strongly built mail-coaches, each drawn by six mules, make light of their unevennesses.
At five o'clock we paid a visit to S.M.S. Bremen, which lay in the harbour near the Henny Woermamm. Three officers belonging to her had accompanied us as far as Las Palmas, and we had been great friends with them, and now they invited us to come on board their vessel for a farewell visit. Champagne was produced, and I took a couple of glasses and found they did me good, the heat being very great, and the ride up to the Hotel Monte and back dreadfully dry and dusty.
Our captain had fixed six o'clock as the hour of departure, but we did not actually start until eleven. The ship seemed almost unnaturally quiet now that the naval officers had left her, for they were always bright and jolly, and I must confess that I had got to like "my little boys in blue,"