Altogether, it was a scheme of living which permitted him virtually no opportunity for the rest and idleness which he imperatively needed.
In New York the MacDowells' home was, during the first year, a house in 88th Street, near Riverside Drive.

Later they lived at the Majestic Hotel; but during most of the Columbia years--from 1898 till 1902--they occupied an apartment at 96th Street and Central Park West.
After their return from the sabbatical vacation abroad they lived for a year at the Westminster Hotel in Irving Place, and for a year in an apartment house on upper Seventh Avenue, near Central Park.

When that was sold and torn down they returned to the Westminster; and there MacDowell's last days were spent.
After he left Columbia in 1904, he continued his private piano classes (at some of which he gave free tuition to poor students in whose talent he had confidence).

He should have rested--should have ceased both his teaching and his composing; for he was in a threatening condition.

Had he spent a year in a sanitarium, or had he stopped all work completely and taken even a brief vacation, he might have averted the collapse which was to come.