Still, if I felt that I could afford the tax, I would never travel
without a courier, for a good courier is a convenience whose value
cannot be estimated in dollars and cents. Without him, travel is a
bitter harassment, a purgatory of little exasperating annoyances, a
ceaseless and pitiless punishment--I mean to an irascible man who has no
business capacity and is confused by details.

Without a courier, travel hasn't a ray of pleasure in it, anywhere; but
with him it is a continuous and unruffled delight. He is always at hand,
never has to be sent for; if your bell is not answered promptly--and it
seldom is--you have only to open the door and speak, the courier will
hear, and he will have the order attended to or raise an insurrection.
You tell him what day you will start, and whither you are going--leave
all the rest to him. You need not inquire about trains, or fares, or car
changes, or hotels, or anything else. At the proper time he will put you
in a cab or an omnibus, and drive you to the train or the boat; he has
packed your luggage and transferred it, he has paid all the bills. Other
people have preceded you half an hour to scramble for impossible places
and lose their tempers, but you can take your time; the courier has
secured your seats for you, and you can occupy them at your leisure.

At the station, the crowd mash one another to pulp in the effort to get
the weigher's attention to their trunks; they dispute hotly with these
tyrants, who are cool and indifferent; they get their baggage billets,
at last, and then have another squeeze and another rage over the
disheartening business of trying to get them recorded and paid for, and
still another over the equally disheartening business of trying to get
near enough to the ticket office to buy a ticket; and now, with their
tempers gone to the dogs, they must stand penned up and packed together,
laden with wraps and satchels and shawl-straps, with the weary wife and
babies, in the waiting-room, till the doors are thrown open--and then
all hands make a grand final rush to the train, find it full, and have
to stand on the platform and fret until some more cars are put on. They
are in a condition to kill somebody by this time. Meantime, you have
been sitting in your car, smoking, and observing all this misery in the
extremest comfort.

On the journey the guard is polite and watchful--won't allow anybody to
get into your compartment--tells them you are just