shall only be allowed to bring one hundred dollars' worth of wearing
apparel into the country free of duty.

When you think that you can get little more than a whole change of
costume, hat, boots, and gloves complete, for a hundred dollars, and that
people who are rich enough to travel in foreign countries give three and
four times that sum for a single outfit, you can understand just how much
that paragraph is going to be liked.

It is true that the law says that people may bring back with them the
articles they take away, provided they can prove that they took them out
of the country. But think of the worry and annoyance of arguing with the
Custom House officers as to where and when each garment in your trunk was
bought.

If it goes into effect, this law will certainly prevent a great many
people from travelling, for the hours of heated argument with the
officials on the dock, on the traveller's return, would undo all the good
of their trip.

The present Custom House system is about as trying to a person's nerves as
anything can be, and not a little of the trouble comes from the fact that
you must not show the slightest annoyance when the officer dives into your
trunk, and punches at the corner which contains your best hat, or feels in
the folds of a delicate silk skirt, leaving marks of dusty fingers behind
him. The least show of temper from you will result in the officer's
claiming his right to have the whole contents of your various trunks
dumped out on the wharf and repacked under his eye.

It is to be hoped that the $100 paragraph may be changed; but with or