[No Envelope]
Concepción, Chile
[Monday,] Jan. 15th
1900
Eight A.M.
Dear Folks at Home:
After waiting nearly five weeks, finally on the third steamer that came from the north I received a letter from home last Wednesday dated Nov. 26th, [1899]. I was glad that everything was alright at home and that Ada’s school was going along rather smoothly. But you must not wait so long before you write again. We are still at the Jackson home and having a very nice time. Besides studying Spanish, I have read a very good book called “My Desire” and am reading another called, “The Wide, Wide World”; also the history of Chile. Spanish is not very “difícil“, but foreigners always speak it with an accent, and it usually takes about two years before they can speak the language very well.
I bought 20 yards of cotton flannel for $9 at a wholesale house. There were 50 yards in the piece, but another teacher took 30 yards of it. I am going to make nightdresses and nightshirts out of it and some waists for the rainy winter weather. You know, they never have any fires in the schoolrooms, so we must get ready with double sets of underwear to keep comfortable during the cold, damp weather. This climate or, rather, the winter, is not very good for rheumatic people. Several times I have had a queer pain in my left shoulder and knee. I do not know if this climate will bring out my rheumatic nature or not. At present, I do not feel it.
An English lady that lives in Pochoco [a popular weekend vacation spot near Santiago] near the seashore invites the teachers each year to come to their tenement house to spend the vacation and go sea bathing. A number of the teachers went this year, and a week ago yesterday one of the former school boys, José Signorelli, who was still boarding with us and had a good position in an American wholesale house, went to the seashore with the teachers. On Sat. eve he went into the sea to bathe when there was no one but a young native minister near. He got out of his depth and was drowned. The native minister came very near drowning in trying to save the boy but was rescued by an old fisherman. The father & mother came to our little chapel a number of years ago through the influence of this boy. Both were converted, and he is now a minister among the natives on the frontier (among [sic] the Andes). They are an Italian family but can all speak Spanish. The funeral took place at our college. The grief of the parents was terrible. I never saw so many flowers at any funeral. The company for which he worked and the schools presented most of the flowers; also the Sunday School. Now, you need not worry about us, because we are not at the seashore and will not go before next year. Quite frequently people also drown in the Bío Bío River, on which Concepción sits. It is a wide, shallow river but very treacherous since its bottom is a mass of shifting sand, and where it is very shallow one time it may be very deep another time.
[Monday,] Jan. 15, 1900
Five
P.M.
We came to our rooms this morning, and I cut Charlie two nightshirts and myself a nightdress, besides doing some mending.
After I had my blue “denim” skirt washed it shrank about five inches, so I took it all apart, turned it wrong side out and put the facing at the bottom. Haven’t finished it yet. We are going back to Miss Jackson’s again this evening to stay about two weeks longer.
How I wish I could spend some of this vacation at home, but of course I would only be a nuisance there.
Charlie is addressing an envelope for me, and of course, he is putting it on in Spanish. Since I cannot think of anything that would be interesting to write, I’ll stop and try to do better next time. Please send the enclosed letter to Alice Mather. You may add whatever you like. If I don’t write what you like to know, ask questions. It will only cultivate your patience to wait three months for the answer.
Weds. P.M.
Jan.
16th, 1900
[Jan. 16 was a Tuesday, not a Wednesday]
Since a steamer will probably leave for the north on Sat (from Valparaíso) I’ll try to finish this letter. We have been having very warm, pleasant weather. Last eve. I looked at the large round moon and wondered whether you could see it at home or whether it was hidden from your view by snow clouds. The Southern Cross that astronomers talk about so much was somewhat disappointing to me. This is the way it looks:
The marks are, of course, put there by myself in my imagination. The encircled star is quite small. But old Orion stands out in all his glory, with his sword in his belt
[and here she drew Orion and labeled his sword]; and of course, you know that the sun shines here each day when it is not cloudy. Well, perhaps you do not care for any more astronomy.
I dreamed a short time ago that I was at home and I wanted to go to see grandma Snowberger; then you told me she had departed from the earth, which perhaps is true. I am so sorry that we were so busy that I could not go to see her before I came away. But I presume that when I see her again she will not be a sufferer.
Ada, when I showed Miss Jackson your picture at the piano she recognized the music at once. It was played at the girls’ graduating exercises this year.
Mellie, I left out the underarm seams and one set of “darts” today so I can wear heavy underwear next winter with my green dress. I’m going to get a dressmaker to help me for a few days. When they come to the college they charge 60¢ a day, which is about 18¢ in our money. Would you like to sew for that? If they are not watched they will steal. Dressmakers and teachers hold only secondary places because the aristocratic people view the people who work for a living that way. And those who do housework are treated like Negroes at home. But of course, the servants and country people here are much more ignorant and degraded than the same class at home.
Miss Maggie and I called on another nice English family (Mr. Philips’) today.
Hope to hear from you before five weeks waiting.
Dillie
Thurs.
Morn.
[Jan. 18, 1900?]
