SAIL FOR SANDY POINT. 



193 



standing the season, the inclement nature of the weather and my condi- 

 tion, I was quite unable to procure what I most needed — a warm and 

 comfortable room. Indeed, not only was there no fire anywhere in the 

 hotel, save the kitchen, but the building itself partook more of the nature 

 of a dilapidated country barn than of a habitation for human beings. It 

 was cold, damp and dirty, and nothing like as comfortable as a good tent. 

 For such miserable accommodations I paid five dollars per day. I was 

 too much crippled to walk about with any comfort, and, dress as warmly 

 as I might, sitting about was a most uncomfortable occupation, so that in 

 order to keep myself reasonably warm, I was compelled to take to my bed 

 throughout a greater portion of each day, arising only for my meals. 



As was to be expected, I did not improve very rapidly under such 

 conditions. Moreover, the additional expense incurred by my illness was 

 rapidly depleting the at no time very plethoric funds at my disposal, so 

 that I was constantly harassed both in mind and body. As the weeks 

 dragged wearily by I made little progress toward recovery. Late one 

 night Captain Wilson, an American, who owned the "Estrella" (formerly 

 the "Joseph F. Lovart," of the New York Pilot Fleet), a small sailing 

 vessel which ran between Gallegos and Sandy Point, came to see me, as 

 was his custom when in port. He was evidently not pleased with the 

 progress I was making, and since, as he informed me, a Grace Line 

 steamer was expected to arrive within a few days at Sandy Point on her 

 way to New York, he was not long in persuading me to return with him 

 to that port, where there was every reason to believe he would arrive a 

 little before the steamer, and by which I could return to New York. This 

 decision brought me to a painful realization of the depleted state of my 

 funds, for after paying my hotel bill and a number of other smaller 

 accounts, I found that I had only a few dollars remaining. However, 

 my reputation for honesty was beyond reproach, and I had no hesitancy 

 in applying to my landlord for a loan of fifty dollars until my return. 

 As I had expected, this request was most cheerfully complied with. 

 Captain Wilson assisted me in packing such articles as I decided to take 

 with me, and, early the following morning, had myself and trunk put 

 aboard the "Estrella." We left Gallegos with the early morning tide on 

 September nineteenth, arriving at Sandy Point on the twenty-first, after a 

 short and uneventful voyage. Here we learned that the "Maori," the 

 steamer for New York, had not yet arrived, but was expected daily. On 



