To fill their eyes with the biggest ship that ever came to Canada. biggest plying between Empire ports. biggest built in Britain since the War. Canadians came by excursion trains to Quebec last week, roared through a new 1 ½ mile-long Canadian Pacific Railway tunnel under the city, came out at a spandy new pier and suddenly beheld the towering white, three-funnelled Empress of Britain.
To say that a ship was decorated by artists of the British Royal Academy is to stamp her with a definite cachet. From George V and Queen Mary down. British aristocracy gathers every spring on "Varnishing Day" (which opens the London Season) to "oh" and "ah" at what members of the British Royal Academy have done since last spring. Astutely Canadian Pacific turned to Sir John Lavery, R. A. for the "Empress Ballroom" of the Empress of Britain.
Sir John stood pale blue pilasters around the ballroom, hung it with coral pink curtains, placed above the dancers an oval blue sky with dancing white stars. Edmund Dulac did the smoking room, "Cathay Lounge." with a silver ceiling, panels of black & silver glass, accents of Chinese red lacquer and Macassar ebony.
Artistically the significance of the Empress of Britain is that she is the first major British ship in modern style. But last week Canadian Pacific officials stressed the fact that she has one Renaissance room, the "Mayfair Lounge," by Sir Charles Allom. In treatment it is not later than King Edward VII, stirs appropriate memories of his mother, Victoria, First Empress of Britain.
At Balmoral, her Scotch estate. Great Victoria liked to surround herself with just such big weatherbeaten Scotsmen as Captain Robert Gilmore ("Jock") Latta of the Empress of Britain. Twenty-seven years ago, "Jock" Latta joined the Canadian Pacific fleet as fourth officer of the S. S. Montezuma, 8,360 tons, 480 ft. long, speed 9 ¾ knots. His twelfth and biggest command is the Empress of Britain, 42,500 tons, 758 ft. long, speed 25.3 knots. On her maiden voyage to Quebec she broke the Britain-to-Canada record, crossing in 5 days, 5 hr., 40 min. With other ships she stacks up thus:
She is "ninth largest," White Star's Majestic being "largest."*
She is one of the 13 (and there are only 13) speed aristocrats that cross the Atlantic in six days or less:†
Europa 5 clays . . Berengaria 6 days</br> Bremen 5 days . . Aqnitania 6 days</br> Mauretania 5 days . . Olympic 6 clays</br> Leviathan 5 ½ days . . Paris 6 days</br> Majestic 5 l½ days . . L'oluinbi/s 6 clays</br> France 6 days . . Re du France 6 days</br>
Of these, the world's 13 undisputed superliners, Germans built six,, Britons four, Frenchmen three, U. S. citizens none.
Finally, the Empress of Britain challenges the Atlantic with an intangible quality, "space." What ship is the most spacious? What if it is?