Divers lunatics, who had been away and were just getting back, and
sundry lunatics who were fixing to go away and apparently did not
expect ever to get back, were dashing headlong into the arms of
still other lunatics, kissing and hugging them, and exchanging
farewells and sacre-bleuing with them in the maddest fashion
imaginable. From time to time I laid violent hands on a flying,
flitting maniac and detained him against his will, and asked him
for some directions; but the persons to whom I spoke could not
understand me, and when they answered I could not understand them;
so we did not make much headway by that. I could not get out of
that asylum until I had surrendered the covers of our ticket books
and claimed our baggage and put it through the customs office. I
knew that; the trouble was I could not find the place for attending
to these details. On a chance I tried a door, but it was distinctly
the wrong place; and an elderly female on duty there got me out by
employing the universal language known of all peoples. She shook
her skirts at me and said Shoo! So I got out, still toting five or
six bags and bundles of assorted sizes and shapes, and tried all
the other doors in sight.
Finally, by a process of elimination and deduction, I arrived at
the right one. To make it harder for me they had put it around a
corner in an elbow-shaped wing of the building and had taken the
sign off the door.
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