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.
Oh, the heat! Many of us know Turkish baths; but then we take them gradually, whereas in the bastu one plunges into volcanic fires at once. Blinking in the dim light, I found that beside us was a brick-built stove, for which the fire, as I had noticed while disrobing, is in the outer chamber, and when the washing-woman threw a pail of water upon the surface of the great heated stones, placed for the purpose inside the stove, the steam ascended in volumes, and the temperature went up, until I exclaimed, in one of the few Swedish sentences I knew, "Mycket hett" (very hot), at which agonised remark Saima laughed uproariously, and, nodding and smiling, fetched another pail of water from the cold bath, and threw its contents on the brick furnace in order that more steaming fumes might ascend. Almost stifled I blinked, and gasped, and groaned by turns, repeating again and again, "Mycket hett," "alltför hett" (too hot), "Tack så mycket" (thank you), in tones of anguish. Much amused, Saima– who, be it understood, was a Swedish-speaking Finn – stood smiling cheerfully at my discomfiture; but, happily, at last she seemed to think I might have had enough, for, after waving my hands hopelessly to the accompaniment of "Nej tack, nej tack" (no thank you), she apparently understood and desisted.
A moment later, through the steam, her smiling face ascended the stairs, with a pail of hot water in one hand, and a lump of soft soap in the other, on which was a large bundle of white fibre, something like hemp. Dipping this in the pail, she soon made a lather with the soap, and, taking up limb after limb, scrubbed hard and long – scrubbed until my skin tingled, and in the damp mysterious heat I began to wonder how much of my body would emerge from the ordeal. This scrubbing was a long process, and if the Finns wash one another as industriously as Saima washed me, no one in Finland should ever be dirty, although most of them must lose several skins a year. Pails of water were then thrown over me, over the straw, over everything, and I heard the soapy water gurgling away into the lake below, which was covered with yellow and white water-lilies. Lilies cannot object to soap, or they would never bloom in Finland as they do.
"Mycket bra" (very good), I called again and again, hoping that appreciation might perhaps make Saima desist, as the exclamations at the heat did not seem to alarm her. More water was thrown on to the steaming bricks, and Saima retired, returning immediately with a great bundle of birch leaves, tied up with a string, such as I had often seen her on former occasions sweeping the floors with. Dipping the branches of the birch into a pail of hot water she proceeded to beat her victim all over! Yes, beat me, beat me hard. She laughed, and I laughed; but the more I laughed the harder she thumped, till the sharp edges of the leaves left almost a sting, while the strong healthy Saima beat me harder and harder, dipping the leaves into hot water continually, and grinning cheerily all the time.
The peasantry in Finland are occasionally good enough to wash one another, and stories are told of a dozen of them sitting in rows on the wooden steps, each man vigorously beating his neighbour with birch boughs.
At harvest time, when the heat is very great, and the work very hard, labourers have a bath every night! Frequently, after our wonderful experience at Ilkeäsaari, we saw, while journeying farther into the country, shoals of human beings strolling off to enjoy their bastu or Sauna.
It was a weird and wonderful experience. I was really beginning to feel the heat dreadful after an hour, and was confident the blood must be galloping through my veins. Finally the good-tempered Finnish maid appeared to be of the same mind, for she fetched a pail of cold water, and, pouring a good drop on my head – which made me jump – she dipped her birch branches therein and switched them over me. Had I followed true Finnish fashion I should then have taken a midnight plunge straight into the lake outside – or in winter taken a roll in the snow – but, our bath being rather more aristocratic, I only descended the slippery steps, really gasping with the heat and treatment, and jumped into that bath of cold water previously mentioned; before – clad only in burning hot towels – returning to the outer room to dress.
I
