A BOHEMIAN BAG.

IN appearance it is quite an ordinary Gladstone-but either the cow from which it derived its being was exceptionally erratic in her habits, or else the bag is possessed by some inferior order of demon with an elementary sense of humour.

The salesman at the portmanteau shop where I bought it assured me that I should find it a very good little bag indeed-for the price-but I do him the justice of believing that, like myself, he was imposed upon by its extremely inoffensive appearance.

tunity to work off long arrears of devilry. It broke out as early as Paris, where I had seen my baggage registered for Munich and received the bulletin for it at the Gare de l'Est. I was roused from sleep at about 1.30 A.M. to go to the luggagecar and see it examined by the Customs officers. But it had spared them that trouble by inducing somebody to put it into the express for Carlsbad, and, which I minded even more, it had persuaded my hitherto immaculate portmanteau to elope with it. They came back together in a day or two, and, while I thought I could see signs of depression, if not penitence, in the portmanteau, the bag maintained the demure calm of a cat that has taken a retriever out for his first poaching expedition. I had not been on many journeys with it before I became The bag, by the way, possessed a key-a long one with a indignantly aware of the gross carelessness with which weak profile which could never prevail upon it to open under porters on every line I travelled by seemed to treat luggage a quarter of an hour, an embarrassing delay when crossing a froncommitted to their charge. tier. At last it broke short off in the lock, and I had to send for an Italian locksmith to force it open- an indignity which I fear destroyed any lingering remnant of self-respect the bag had still retained. It would roll out on a platform, yawning impudently, and proceed to disgorge articles which a loyal bag would have kept to itself. Italian officials refused at last to register it without the precautions of a stout rope and a leaden sealwhich unfortunately was not stamped with the name of SOLOMON-and every time it was thus corded and sealed I had to pay an extra fee.

I tried taking it in the carriage with me-but it refused to go under the seat, while it was too bulky to remain long in a rack intended for light articles only, so I entrusted it to a porter, saw it labelled myself, and thought no more about it until I arrived at my destined station-which the bag never by any chance did until hours afterwards.

It is trying at first-especially on a visit to comparative strangers-to enter a country-house drawing-room, and join a large and formal dinner-party in the clothes one has travelled down in-but I became fairly accustomed to it in time. Some of my fellow guests-particularly when I met them again under precisely similar conditions-no doubt concluded that I had some conscientious objection to dress for dinner. Those who knew wondered at my lack of even sufficient intelligence to look after my own luggage like other people. They didn't lose their bags. Which was all very well-but I would defy them not to lose mine.

Yet, although I see now of course how blind I was, I went on blaming porters, traffic-superintendents, station-masters, even myself, for months before it ever occurred to me to suspect the bag. How could I imagine that, under its sleek and stolidly respectable surface, it was seething with suppressed revolt, that a passion for liberty and independence had permeated every fibre of its leather?

Perhaps my eyes were not even partly opened till one autumn, when I had been staying with some friends in Ayrshire. My bag had rejoined me there in a day or two, after running up as far as Inverness. So, on my way south from Edinburgh to York, I saw the bag with other luggage into a composite luggage van, and took a compartment immediately adjoining it, expressly to keep an eye upon it.

At York an elderly guard in the van attempted to convince me that my luggage was at the other end of the train, and while I persisted in demanding it the argument was interrupted by the arrival of several huge Saratoga trunks which monopolised his attention. At last I had to get in myself, and identify my property. I got out all but the bag, which I could see, but not reach, behind a pile of other luggage; just then the train began to move, and I had to leap out to avoid being taken on to Peterborough. The bag, of course, went on.

It condescended to return late the same night, but from that instant my confidence in it was shaken. I could not understand such obstinacy and cunning in a mere bag, nor how it had contrived to enlist, not only Saratoga trunks, but a whitebearded Scotch railway-guard, as its accomplices. I only felt that in future, even for week-end visits, I should prefer to take a portmanteau. It might give the impression that I expected to be pressed to stay longer-but at least we should arrive in company. And so the bag was condemned to inglorious idleness till the next summer, when, not without misgivings, I decided to give it another chance by permitting it to accompany me and the portmanteau in my Continental wanderings.

Any ordinary bag would have been touched by this appeal to its better feelings-mine merely regarded it as an oppor

Whenever an eye was off it for a single moment it escaped. It saw considerably more of Italy than I did myself, so much of my time was spent in describing its salient features to officials, who drew up innumerable documents concerning it with leisurely thoroughness. It returned from these escapades an absolute wreck; I was obliged to have its back strengthened with an iron brace, while its mouth remained as permanently open as an imbecile's. Still I managed to get it safely home-though it very nearly contrived to return to Calais by the next boat from Dover.

Since then it has been once more in penitential retreat till this very last Christmas. Then-it may have been the influence of the season - I relented. I was spending Christmas a little way out of town, and I thought the bag must be tired of tomfoolery by that time, so I started with it in a hansom on that particularly foggy Wednesday afternoon which no Londoner who was out in it is likely to forget. My hansom, after landing me in a cul de sac, declined to take me any further, so I had to get myself and the bag to the District Station at Victoria as well as I could. I was not sorry when a stranger, who-so much as was visible of him in the fog, seemed respectable enough-offered to carry it for me.

I know now that he was quite honest, but I confess that I had my doubts of it when, after dismissing him at the station, I discovered that my confounded bag had vanished during the short time I was taking my ticket. I gave information at the proper quarters, with no real expectation of seeing it again. It was only too easy for a thief to make off with it in such a fog, and, on the whole, I was rather relieved to be rid of it. For once-I chuckled to think it had over-reached itself in its artfulness.

But I was mistaken. The bag turned up in the last place I expected to find it in-the Left Luggage Office. Somehow, at the moment I had put it down by the Booking Office, it had managed to suggest to a man (who must have been a bit of an idiot) that it had been left behind by a friend of his. So he had rushed down below after him-only to find out his mistake, and hand the bag to a porter, who took it up to the Superintendent as soon as he had time. Still the bag got out of coming with me, which was evidently its intention from the first. I cannot help thinking there must be something morbid and depraved about a bag which can prefer to spend its Christmas in a Left Luggage Office instead of in a cheerful family circle.

After this last mortification I feel that all further attempts

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

UNNECESSARY QUESTIONS.

Fondly foolish Mother (to Son, who has had a few little friends to spend the afternoon with him). "WELI, DARLING, HAVE YOU

ENJOYED YOURSELF?"

FROM AN AGRICULTURAL DISTRICT.
Jarge. "FROM WHAT I 'EAR, AN' FROM WHAT I'VE 'EARD TELL, IF WE SHOULD GET THIS 'ERE
OLD FISCAL, 'TWILL BE MUCH AS 'TWERE IN GRAN FEYTHER'S TIME, WHEN THEY LIVED ON FRIED

CHARIVARIA.

that the ambitious animal was endeavouring to qualify for the post of the deceased rhinoceros James.

On her reappearance at Chicago a talented actress, feeling indisposed, drank undiluted brandy instead of her mede At one of the revivalist meetings at cine. Her maid was responsible for the Bangor, a girl of fourteen prayed that mistake, which was not discovered, we her cousin might be prevented from are told, till half a tumbler had been

consumed.

THE Baltic Fleet has reached Madagascar in safety, but Japanese anxiety reading Tit-Bits and Pluck. Prowill not be at an end until the vessels spectuses of The Times and National are safe in Far Eastern waters. Review were, we understan 1, sent off The statement that 500 copies of a immediately the news reached London.

The Express has been pointing out how little attention is bestowed on

foreign languages in our Navy. This neglect is deplorable in view of the fact that a foreign language, as spoken by a British naval officer, would, we imagine, be one of the most deadly weapons ever used.

certain Radical organ had been stolen
has turned out, after all, not to have
been a piece of mere braggadocio on the
The matter
part of the proprietors.
came into the Police Court last week,
and evidence was given by the fish-
monger who had purchased the papers
from the purloiners.

Striking proof of the value of our alliance with Japan has just come to hand. The Somaliland Mullah has now undertaken not to resume hostilities against us.

[Port Arthur captured by Marshal OYAMA, November, 1894; restored to China under pressure from Russia, Germany, and France, January, 1896; leased to Russia, March, 1898; surren lered to General NOGI, January 1, 1905.]