Nobody’s Luggage.

Cromwell Argus, Volume I, Issue 21, 6 April 1870, Page 7

Nobody’s Luggage.

UNCLAIMED IN THE DOCKS.

Nobody sent twenty serous of Syrian tea without address or bill of lading. There it is in the great shin packages in the warehouse. Nobody’s tea has been waiting for. him, for six years. Will the m,ap never come to his tea, or has he gone for good to his bier? There is indigo in mauucls ol buffalo-hide, that has fatten bore seven years, and may stop here “ till all is blue” before it will be claimed. Will nobody ever come to. fo'ch the ivory tusks, near a donna of them, in canvas packages, which were sent to his order from the Brazils “ a long time ago?” Or, if he has not remitted payment for them, and is short of funds, why does Nobody not come and claim the box of gold-dust, marked and numbered? B.at, no : this is a dock secret. Aha, Mr Nobody ! you prick your ears. Untold riches which nobody knows of await you here, and—the best and worst of it is—Nobody can claim them. However, it will be long before the box of golddust “ eats its head off” in charges ; so set your wits to work. At the time of the dearth in the cotton supply, when many thoughtful minds turned their attention to seeking a substitute for cotton, a scientific man brought home from the West I idles an immense quantity of very queerdooking roots. They are very fibrous, and fray out into strands stronger than flax, and as soft and shining as silk itself. But when lie came back the war was over in America, and the cotton supply promised better, so lie relinquished his project, and left his roots in the “ pound” for dock dues. There they remain to this day. . . . Mere are sea chests, too, belonging to seamen who never come. The chesti wait ,in the bjgg :l ge warehouse till all hope is gone, and when the time for hope has passed without inquiries, they come up here—dead men’s chests, chests of orphan, homeless sailor men and boys, with the Loudon and Foreign Bible Society’s Bible in them, and no one to inquire even for that until the judgment day. At the last sals of Nobody’s burgage, among other strange stray things that were put up for sale was a bandbox containing— guess ! —a wedding bonnet! There it had stayed in that mustv old warehouse for nearly seven years. The label had been washed off, there was no direction, and no clue to sender or destination ; so it became Nobody’s luggage. Every box is opened by the authorities before going into the unclaimed warehouse, and an inventory carefully taken of its contents, tine item in this ban 1-box escaped the scrutiny of the examiner. The bonnet was taken and displayed by the auctioneer—white silk and tulle and white lilies it had been once. Now it was all soiled and yellow—a poor, sad, drabbled thing, limp, and of a fashion long gone by. A labouring man bid two shillings for it, git it, was jeered at for buying it. But on. taking it home he found sewed up in the bonnet’s crown a sovereign, and these words on the bit of paner that wrapped it up “ A wedding present to my dear Allie.” Nothing else. And that was Nobody’s bonnet. Who was “Allie?” And had she expected the present, seven years before ? Wore there tears'that it did not come? or would there have been more if it had ? and was she married to Nobody after all ? And now ? Is she Nobody’s bride ?— Chambers' Journal.