MISSING TRUNKS. 329 



drawn for more, or borrowed or got trusted, perhaps. If we 

 had even lost our reputation or character we miglit get along 

 among strangers by leading a virtuous life in the future, and we 

 knew that God forgives us if man does not. Even the loss of 

 reason may prove to be a temporary affair which the quiet and 

 medicated air of the ocean has power to sometimes restore. But 

 to lose one's clothes — to leave behind one's wardrobe, just as tlio 

 ship that is to carry you to distant countries is getting up steam 

 to take you away, is a calamity so crushing and overAvhclming 

 that one would hardly desire such a misfortune to befall his bit- 

 terest enemy. Why, character and respectability, social position, 

 civilization, everything that makes a man among men and a lady 

 among women, is involved in one's personal dry goods. Wlieu 

 one begins to wear clothes he ceases to be a savage, and is indeed 

 almost a Christian. It is true we were bound for the isles of 

 perpetual summer, where clothes are not required to meet any 

 physical want, and are only worn to indicate that man Is not a 

 brute beast; but still we, and especially tlie female half of us, 

 were really horrified at the idea of leaving New York upon a long 

 journey, almost as naked as we were born. 



A young and efficient officer of the New Haven Steamboat 

 Company came to our relief, utilized the telegraph, and thus 

 endeavored to secure for our trunks a place on board the Conti- 

 nental, which was to leave New Haven for Now York at 10 a. m. 

 A delay in the sailing time of the Western Texas was promised 

 us, and we waited in a state of mingled hope and fear the slow 

 creeping of the languid hours. 0, how much depended on the ' 

 result! Whether we should leave our native laud decent, re- 

 spectable people, or otherwise, all depended upon the arrival or 

 non-arrival on time of those ill-starred and sad-fated trunks. 

 We sat upon the deck of the Western Texas and closely scruti- 

 nized every approaching steamer. How beautifully, like glgan- 



