THE FIRST ALBATROSS EXPEDITION 251 



many a large ocean steamer I have been on. We have 

 done about as much work these eighteen days as I did on 

 the Blake on my first cruise. You can have no idea how 

 comfortable the trip has been. The quarters I share with 

 the Captain are very spacious and in this hot weather it 

 makes a great difference not to feel cramped. The ac- 

 commodations for work and for taking care of the col- 

 lections are excellent. There are two men to help to 

 put them aside, a Mr. Townsend, who is called the 

 naturalist of the ship and who is the most obliging 

 and hard-working man imaginable, and a Mr. Miller, 

 the chemist, who gets all the needed preparations 

 ready and also helps to put up the things, so that I 

 have a chance to spend what time there is between 

 the dredgings and, while the things are being sorted, to 

 examine them and make notes and superintend Wester- 

 gren. We shall hardly get away from here before the 

 20th, as there are two ships ahead of us for coal and our 

 repairs may take the greater part of the time till our 

 turn comes. While coaling ship I shall live on shore and 

 go on line of the railroad with the doctor of the old 

 Canal Company. I have also an invitation to spend the 

 day at the plantation of a Mr. Erman, who is the prin- 

 cipal banker here. This plantation is about fifteen miles 

 from Panama near one of the most interesting parts 

 where the work was done on the Canal. He seems to 

 have seen a good deal of Father and of the Hassler 

 people while they spent three weeks at Panama, and says 

 I shall find on the plantation a good many people who 

 are old acquaintances of the Hassler. Captain Tanner 

 has been perfectly indefatigable; he is indeed a model 

 Captain for such a trip. We begin at 5 a.m. and keep 

 it up till 10 p.m. My patent intermediate net was a fail- 



