a stout family, who follow him,
under the guidance of their mother, and a servant, at the no small risk
of two or three of them being left behind in the confusion. 'Gravesend?'

'Pass on, if you please, sir,' replies the attendant--'other boat, sir.'

Hereupon the stout father, being rather mystified, and the stout mother
rather distracted by maternal anxiety, the whole party deposit themselves
in the Margate boat, and after having congratulated himself on having
secured very comfortable seats, the stout father sallies to the chimney
to look for his luggage, which he has a faint recollection of having
given some man, something, to take somewhere. No luggage, however,
bearing the most remote resemblance to his own, in shape or form, is to
be discovered; on which the stout father calls very loudly for an
officer, to whom he states the case, in the presence of another father of
another family--a little thin man--who entirely concurs with him (the
stout father) in thinking that it's high time something was done with
these steam companies, and that as the Corporation Bill failed to do it,
something else must; for really people's property is not to be sacrificed
in this way; and that if the luggage isn't restored without delay, he
will take care it shall be put in the papers, for the public is not to be
the victim of these great monopolies. To this, the officer, in his turn,
replies, that that company, ever since it has been St. Kat'rine's Dock
Company, has protected life and property; that if it had been the London
Bridge Wharf Company, indeed, he shouldn't have wondered, seeing that the
morality of that company (they being the opposition) can't be answered
for, by no one; but as it is, he's convinced there must be some mistake,
and he wouldn't mind making a solemn oath afore a magistrate that the
gentleman'll find his luggage afore he gets to Margate.

Here the stout father, thinking he is making a capital point, replies,
that as it happens, he is not going to Margate at all, and that
'Passenger to Gravesend' was on the luggage, in letters of full two
inches long; on which the officer rapidly explains the mistake, and the
stout mother, and the stout children, and the servant, are hurried with
all possible despatch on board the Gravesend boat, which they reached
just in time to discover that their luggage is there, and that their
comfortable seats are not. Then the bell, which is the signal for the
Gravesend boat start