vance made in the last 30 years.
These figures include steamers and sailing-vessels, and local as well
as foreign trade.
1880 ... ... ... 644,750 tons
1890 ... ... ... 4,507,096 tons
1900 ... ... ... 8,047,010 tons
1909 ... ... ... 16,993,973 tons
In 1909 we find that 2,008 steamers and 137 sailing-vessels entered the
port of Buenos Aires from foreign shores with a tonnage of 5,193,542,
and 1,978 steamers and 129 sailing-vessels left the port for foreign
shores with a tonnage of 5,174,114; out of these, British boats lead
with 2,242 steamers and 37 sailing-vessels, or, say, 53-1/2 per cent, of
the total.
JUST MY LUCK!
I really have had rather bad luck. As you know, I was wrecked on my way
out from the Old Country. The good ship "Southern Cross" met her fate on
a rock in Vigo Bay, and my luggage met its fate at the same time. This
was something of a blow, but I expected to be treated a little more
kindly by fate when once my destination was reached; I would be a
stranger in a new country, and fate is proverbially kind to tyros of
every sort.
R.M.S.P. "Danube," which carried the shipwrecked passengers of the
"Southern Cross" from Vigo to Buenos Aires, arrived at the Argentine
capital towards the end of January. At the conclusion of my journey, one
of my fellow-passengers, to whom I was saying good-bye, gave me this
sound piece of advice: "Take care of yourself, and the country will take
care of you." I don't suppose I can have taken care of myself, for
within two months I was down with typhoid fever. This is how fate treats
strangers in a new country.
You know that I had the good fortune, shortly after my arrival, to find
employment with the Santa Fe Land Company, and immediately on my falling
ill, the Manager of the estancia sent me to bed, and reduced me to a
milk diet. Two days later he himself took me down to the Buenos Aires
British Hospital, and it is to this fact, and to the sensible treatment
which I received in camp, that I in great measure owe my quick recovery.
The journey to Buenos Aires was made as comfortable as possible. Even
so, however, I must have been slightly delirious, for I remember
thinking that everybody in the train was wearing a pink shirt without
either coat or waistcoat. This must surely have been a delusion.
I reached the hospital on a Sunday morning, and was promptly carried
upstairs to a private ward. Though my t
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