AN INVOLUNTARY VOYAGE

Globe, Volume IV, Issue 331, 5 July 1875, Page 3

AN INVOLUNTARY VOYAGE

Report has it, says the Geelong Advertiser, that a well-known, highly respectable, and somewhat prominent citizen of the golden metropolis of the Western district, has recently experienced an adventure perplexing to himself, but infinitely amusing to his numerous friends. A few weeks ago, a quantity of merchandise which he had imported having arrived in the colony, he proceeded to Melbourne for the purpose of making the necessary arrangements in order to get it forwarded per rail to Geelong and Ballarat. On his arrival the offices with which he had to do business w«ro closed, ana, meeting with some friends who were on the eve of departure for New Zealand, he proceeded to beguile away some of his leisure hours in their company. Time passed, as it always does in social circles, pleasantly enough. The genial friends were reluctant to part, again and again they shook hands, but the conversation was as often renewed, and finally they found themselves very comfortably quartered in n. very comfortable compartment on board of the steamer bound for Hokitika. Never was company more enjoyable, never did time pass more swiftly ; even the shrill steam whistle failed to disturb their serenity, and the steamer moved on her course, and absolutely passed through the Heads before the spell-bound landsmen awoke from their delightful reverie. The amazement and annoyance of the importer when, instead of returning to his Ballarat acquaintances, he found himself “ afloat on the ocean wave,” and involuntarily booked for a trip to New Zealand, may be imagined. Days passed, and his Victorian acquaintance began to feel somewhat uneasy at his non-appearance amongst them, till at length it began to be whispered that intelligence had by some means been conveyed respecting his involuntary trip. “ All’s well that ends well,” and it remains to be stated briefly that a face rerembling that of the missing importer was observed the other evening on the Geelong platform, and that a name, corresponding with his, figures among the list of passengers by the Otago, which sailed from New Zealand on the 3rd inst., and arrived here on Tuesday last.