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[Page 62]
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All told we were only fifty passengers, and on a boat built to carry over five thousand we were almost lonely, and each could have a cabin-de-luxe. There were several interesting American notables with special passes, and in a day or two they were agreeable companions. Among them were Pierpont Morgan's partner, the Controller of the Shipping board, some noted journalists, who had been to the Front, a university Professor, a Congress man, and a Virginian air-man, who was returning home invalided. The latter's story was one of the most pathetic I have heard. With his observer, who was an Australian from Sydney, they came to grief in the English Channel at a part which was frozen and for four days lay helpless on the ice. Both were badly frost bitten, the observer so badly that both his feet had to be amputated. The Pilot, though a very sick man and still suffering, at least had saved his limbs.
We were only conveyed for the first forty eight hours, and then our guardians left us to join a fleet of twenty-two ships carrying American troops that could be seen in the distance, and which gave us some idea of the magnitude of America's undertaking.
We were an armed transport, and of course fair game for the enemy. Our instructions to wear our life belts constantly, were not absolutely carried out, but we always kept them at our side. We made such good time that within six days we landed at New York without mishap.
I made my head quarters there at the "Martha Washington", the only hotel in the World exclusive to women. Letters of introduction from London brought me into touch with some delightfully interesting people, among them Miss Elizabeth Cutting of the North American Review, who made me a member of the University Club, Mrs. James Roosevelt, having heard from a London friend of my arrival, immediately telegraphed an invitation to spend a few days with her at Hyde Park on the Hudson River. I had already made arrangements that would claim me for three or four days. These included an address to women at the Waldorf, that very noted and fashionable hotel, I found that