The hospital visiting book

An original account written in a nineteenth-century voice; a period simulation, not an archival document.

At the hospital entrance a porter handed me the visiting book. I wrote my name and the ward I wished to enter, but the column for the patient remained blank. My brother had been admitted under a shortened name which no one at home used. When the porter offered to search the ward list, I discovered that I could not even give the spelling he required. The clock above us struck four. I had travelled twelve miles to visit him and now stood stopped by a few missing letters.

Give one phrase that shows how far the narrator has travelled to visit the patient.