She was the largest ship in the Koninklijke Hollandsche Lloyd (KHL) fleet from 1910 until the liners Gelria and Tubantia were completed in 1913 and 1914.

In 1909 KHL took delivery of two new twin-screw sister ships for its route between the Netherlands and the Río de la Plata.

In 1910 Alexander Stephen & Sons built one ship to a slightly enlarged version of the design, which was launched as Zeelandia.

[7] As part of the Allied blockade of the Central Powers in the First World War, the Royal Navy used to stop and search ships passing in and out of neutral states such as the Netherlands that neighboured Germany.

In October 1916 the Royal Navy searched Zeelandia and the KNSM steamship Nickerie, and seized all the mail they were carrying.

[8] In November 1916 Mata Hari sailed on Zeelandia from Spain to Falmouth, where British police arrested her.

[9] On 20 March 1917 President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed the seizure by angary of Dutch merchant ships in US ports.

Between her commissioning and the Armistice of 11 November 1918 she made five transatlantic round trips between the US and Europe, in which she carried 8,349 passengers, nost of them troops.