"No," we replied. "We thought we might leave it." "You must go," he said. The _commissionaire_ took possession of our check and the driver's _carte_, and I followed the two back to the station, leaving Mrs. K. to guard our satchels, &c., in the carriage. "Wait one leetle moment," said the kind French gentleman; "I bring madame." And in a moment he dragged the fussy little woman from the crowd, handing her over with the triumphant air of having now settled all difficulties. "Madame speak ze Eengleesh fine," he said. Looking down from an immeasurable height, the little madam condescended to remark that their servant was looking for their baggage. "Ah!" I responded. "Then we are not permitted to leave our trunks." "I am sure I don't know," she replied, looking so greatly bored, not to say exhausted, that I did not think it best to press the matter. "Our servant is attending to it," she repeated. Her husband's face fairly glowed with satisfaction while this side conversation was being carried on. Evidently he believed the whole French baggage system to have been elucidated for my benefit. I thanked him heartily, as we exchanged cordial adieus. Even the fussy little woman gathered, for the moment, sufficient life to attempt to bow; which, alas! never got beyond a stare. The _commissionaire_ seized upon a blue-bloused porter, and gave me to him with the check, the _carte_, and a few sharply-spoken directions. Clinging to that blue sleeve, I was borne through the swaying, surging mass of humanity, into the baggage-room--how, I never knew. Our trunks were identified, lifted, not thrown, by my porter upon a hand-truck, which dragged for itself and us an opening in the crowd. Once out upon the platform, the porter pushed doggedly on into the darkness, though I had left Mrs. K. and the carriage in the square at one side. I expostulated. He held persistently to his course. I gave one thought to poor Mrs. K., resigned to what fate I knew not, and then, woman-like, followed my trunks. It was all explained, when, dimly outlined in the darkness before the station, we espied a sea of shiny hats and shadowy cabs; and when, after long shouting of the number of our own, by the porter and everybody else, it finally crawled up to the steps where we were standing, Mrs. K.'s anxious face looking out of the window. "I began to think you were lost," she said. "You can fancy my feelings when the driver gathered up the reins and drove out of that square." We made a thank-offering upon the palm of every grimy hand, suddenly outstretched; then the driver paused, whip in the air, for the address of our destination.