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He was fined a franc, which he would take from his pocket then and there, but must wait many days to pay, until circumlocution had its round, six weeks after the engine had been at fault. I was assessed two sous duty on a tooth-brush. I reached for the coins. "Mais, non" said the préposé de le douane, "pas maintenant. No hurry. We will inform you by post."

The ordeal of the douane had to be gone through there, and Mary was glad when it was over, and she could go on again, though she was once more protected by a gallant porter; and a youngish official of the customs, after a glance at her face, quickly marked crosses on her luggage without opening it.

I knew not that we were now entirely free from the danger of being arrested, until we heard our carriage in the street and had ascertained that all our luggage had passed the douane without suspicion. We paid our guide eight francs each, and, taking our seats again in the carriage, drove forward toward Metz."

At the Gare du Nord I regretted that I had not carried my own bag, because if I had it would have been examined on the boat, and all bother would have been over. But rather than run any risks in the crowd thronging the douane, I decided to let the suitcase look after itself, and send down for it with the key from the hotel later.

The Red Cross on my luggage got me through the douane formalities without any trouble. I entered the almost empty train and we went to Brussels without stopping. At first sight Brussels seemed to be en fête, flags were waving from every window, Boy Scouts were everywhere looking very important, and the whole population seemed to be in the streets.

Yet there was a good deal of truth in his arguments. Many an open swindler nowadays, because he has successfully got money out of the pockets of other people by sharp practice just once removed from fraud, receives a knighthood, and struts in Pall Mall clubs and in the drawing-rooms of Mayfair. We had emerged from the tunnel, successfully passed the douane, and were again in France.

Glad were we when they reached the Octroi, and when the indulgent Barrière passed them with all the honours of the Douane. An old lady has twice yawned, and many would follow her example, but that the performer fascinates his audience by staring at them like the boa at the poor bird in the wood and frightens them to their seats for a few minutes longer.

There was a douane, for we had now passed out of Switzerland into Italy, and my mule-pack was examined with curiosity; but why I should have been questioned with insistence as to whether I were concealing sausages, I could not guess, unless a swashbuckling German princeling who married into our family eight generations ago, was using my eyes for windows at the time.

The search which ray portmanteau had undergone the day before in England, was here renewed by the officers of the French Douane, but with no better success on the part of the officers in being able to seize any thing. They were, however, very polite, and their fees only amounted to half a crown.

Rainham identified spots for them as the prospect widened, naming sea-girt Mortola with its snug château, Mentone lying placidly with its two bays in the westering sun, and, now and again, notorious peaks of the Alpes Maritimes which bounded the horizon beyond. At the frontier bridge of St. Louis, where they alighted to meet the requirements of the Douane, even Mrs.