Still,
you can buy a permit after hours for five dollars extra, and the officer
will do the inspecting next week. Our ship and passengers lay under
expense and in humiliating captivity all night, under the very nose of
the little official reptile who is supposed to protect New York from
pestilence by his vigilant "inspections." This imposing rigor gave
everybody a solemn and awful idea of the beneficent watchfulness of our
government, and there were some who wondered if anything finer could be
found in other countries.
In the morning we were all a-tiptoe to witness the intricate ceremony
of inspecting the ship. But it was a disappointing thing. The
health-officer's tug ranged alongside for a moment, our purser handed the
lawful three-dollar permit fee to the health-officer's bootblack, who
passed us a folded paper in a forked stick, and away we went. The entire
"inspection" did not occupy thirteen seconds.
The health-officer's place is worth a hundred thousand dollars a year to
him.
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