during an extensive tour of more than two
months. Only, as the rolling stone does
sometimes gather moss, we picked up so
many odds and ends by the way, and in
Paris especially, that we found on starting
from that city that our luggage did slightly
exceed the prescribed allowance; and for
the excess we were charged eighty centimes,
including the registration, without its raising
in our minds the suspicion that we had
thereby been scandalously swindled.

The mode of proceeding with luggage at
a French station is this. You first take
your party's tickets, of whatever class. If
a servant travels second or third class, his
ticket counts all the same in the allowance
of luggage. By arriving early at the station,
you secure an early turn for the registration
of your luggage; and by so doing, you
can always manage, even in Paris, to
escape " confusion," and quietly proceed,
when all is arranged, armed with your
tickets and register of luggage, to the
waiting-room, without fever, perspiration, or
palpitation of the heart. Those who make
a point of reaching the station at the last
minute with cartloads of luggage, ought
naturally to expect confusion.

With your tickets you proceed immediately
to the baggage-office. The production
of the tickets is required not only to
calculate the total weight of luggage to
which the party is entitled carriage free,
but also to prevent packages which ought
to be sent by goods' trains from being
passed off as passengers' luggage. When
your turn comes, your luggage is weighed
by means of a steelyard. The weigher
shouts to the clerk in the luggage-office,
"So many colis or packages, weighing so
many kilos." The tickets acquaint the
clerk with the number of travellers and
the destination. After registration, he
hands you a bulletin or coupon, headed
with the name of the office, the date of
departure, the number of travellers, and the
destination. On this are entered, besides the
number of registration, the number of colis,
their joint weight, and the sum charged.
If the joint weight does not exceed thirty
kilos per passenger, the sum charged is
never more than ten centimes, or one
penny. The traveller sees his luggage
weighed, he has the statement in black
and white in his hands of what it weighs
and how much he has paid, and were he
cheated, he could have his luggage
reweighed at the end of his journey, and
produce against the persons who have cheated
him evidence in their own handwriting.

With the coupon, the tickets are returned
to him, mostly stamped on the back
"Bagages." He then need take no more
thought of his luggage until his journey's
end. Even if he has to change trains, he
is relieved of all care or trouble with his
luggage. At the destination, he has to
wait till all the luggage is removed from
the train into the baggage-room, where, on
presenting his bulletin, he is put in
possession of his property. When you can
travel with no more luggage than the bag
or small portmanteau you can thrust under
your seat, you avoid having to wait for
the general distribution of the registered
luggage, which in large towns is often
tiresome, and a considerable loss of time.

To prevent any mistake on the part of
travellers who can read French, on the
back of each bulletin is printed, " Every
traveller is allowed thirty kilogrammes of
luggage. The luggage will be delivered in
exchange for this bulletin, which is available
solely for the journey indicated. If,
on the arrival of the train, one or more of
the colis entered on the said bulletin are
missing, the traveller is expected to inform
the station-master immediately, to give
him a detailed list of their contents; and
the station-master, in exchange for the
present bulletin, will give him a declaration
stating the number and weight of the colis
which have failed to be delivered. The
company declines all responsibility respecting
luggage claimed tardily and at variance
with the above conditions. Travellers who
wish to leave their luggage at the station,
immediately after the arrival of the train
should change their bulletin for a receipt
stating the number and the weight of the
packages left."

As soon as a traveller's luggage exceeds
the thirty kilos, new conditions are entered
upon. The excess pays, not only according
to weight, but in proportion to the distance
to be traversed; so that it is easy for a
heavily-laden family party, taking a long
flight, to incur the ten francs which roused
your contributor's indignation, without
their being the victims of a fraud.
Nevertheless, heavy excesses of weight are
charged at a somewhat lower rate than
small ones. For instance, an excess of five
kilos is charged about sixty-five centimes,
for the distance between Boulogne and
Paris, while an excess of one hundred kilos
pays about ten francs sixty-five centimes.
I say "about," cautiously, because the
figures are taken at a station a few
kilomèteres north of Boulogne; but the error, if