This done, we returned from the Custom House to the depot, accompanied by
several gentlemen who wished to see the collection. They expressed
themselves highly gratified. The boxes were closed, and nothing now
remained but to convey them to the cart, which was in attendance at the
door of the depot. Just as one of the inferior officers was carrying a box
thither, in stepped the man whom I suspected I should see again at
Philippi. He abruptly declared himself dissatisfied with the valuation
which the gentlemen of the customs had put upon the collection, and said he
must detain it. I remonstrated, but it was all in vain.
After this pitiful stretch of power and bad compliment to the other
officers of the customs, who had been satisfied with the valuation, this
man had the folly to take me aside, and after assuring me that he had a
great regard for the arts and sciences, he lamented that conscience obliged
him to do what he had done, and he wished he had been fifty miles from
Liverpool at the time that it fell to his lot to detain the collection.
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