A white-haired, bespectacled old lady with a big black umbrella and a little black bonnet tied under chin last week honored some great men of her country and proved to the world that the Dutch are a hardy race.
She was the Queen-Mother Emma of Holland, 70 years old, the proud, aristocratic parent of plump, reigning Queen Wilhelmina. She stood alone in a room of the Royal Academy in London and looked at 51 browntoned Rembrandts, part of the magnificent loan exhibition of Dutch art which has delighted London since January (TIME, Jan. 21)—sequel to the Flemish exhibition of the year before. Attendants kept a curious crowd outside locked doors. When Queen Emma heard of this she at once commanded, "Let the people in! They must not be deprived of these things."
In swarmed a horde of Britishers eager to see 17th Century Dutch cows and a 20th Century Dutch Queen at the same time. Queen Emma, unmoved, strode through the galleries for four and a half hours more. She at no time seemed fatigued or in need of sitting down. At dusk she was still chatty and firm on her feet as she boarded her train back to The Hague. The entire trip took 28 hours.