sail; and now our furlough was ended, and we entered into the ship again
and sailed homeward.

We made the run home to New York quarantine in three days and five hours,
and could have gone right along up to the city if we had had a health
permit. But health permits are not granted after seven in the evening,
partly because a ship cannot be inspected and overhauled with exhaustive,
thoroughness except in daylight, and partly because health-officers are
liable to catch cold if they expose themselves to the night air. Still,
you can buy a permit after hours for five dollars extra, and the officer
will do the inspecting next week. Our ship and passengers lay under
expense and in humiliating captivity all night, under the very nose of
the little official reptile who is supposed to protect New York from
pestilence by his vigilant "inspections." This imposing rigor gave
everybody a solemn and awful idea of the beneficent watchfulness of our
government, and there were some who wondered if anything finer could be
found in other countries.

In the morning we were all a-tiptoe to witness the intricate ceremony
of inspecting the ship. But it was a disappointing thing. The
health-officer's tug ranged alongside for a moment, our purser handed the
lawful three-dollar permit fee to the health-officer's bootblack, who
passed us a folded paper in a forked stick, and away we went. The entire
"inspection" did not occupy thirteen seconds.

The health-officer's place is worth a hundred thousand dollars a year to
him. His system of inspection is perfect, and therefore cannot be
improved on; but it seems to me that his system of collecting his fees
might be amended. For a great ship to lie idle all night is a most
costly loss of time; for her passengers to have to do the same thing