Many travellers do not understand this properly, and often get into difficulty by not understanding it, as we shall see in the sequel.
Mr. George and Rollo went into the baggage room together, showing their passports as they passed through between the soldiers. They then walked slowly along the room, looking at the baggage, as it was arranged upon the counter, in search of their own.
"I see my trunk," said Mr. George, looking along at a little distance before him. "There it is."
"And where do you suppose mine is?" asked Rollo.
"I have not the least idea," said Mr. George. "I advise you to walk all around the room and see if you can find it; and when you find it, get it examined."
Rollo, taking this advice, walked on, leaving Mr. George in the act of taking out his key in order to open his trunk for the purpose of allowing an officer to inspect it as soon as one should be ready.
Rollo soon found his trunk. It was in a part of the room remote from his uncle's. Near his trunk was a very large one, which the officers were searching very thoroughly. They had found something in it which was not personal baggage and which the lady had not declared. Rollo could not see what the article was which the officers had found. It was something contained in a pretty box. The lady had put it into the bottom of her trunk. The officers had taken it out, and were now examining it. The lady stood by, seemingly in great distress.
Rollo's attention, which had begun to be attracted by this scene, was, however, almost immediately called off from it by the voice of another officer, who pointed to his trunk and asked him if it was his.
"Is that yours?" said the officer, in French.
"Yes," replied Rollo, in the same language, "it is mine;" and so saying, he proceeded to take out his key and unlock the trunk.