quehanna. A canal packet-boat is eighty feet long
and twelve feet wide. It has a house built in it, that
extends to within six feet of stem and stern. Thirty-
six feet of this space are used as a cabin by day and a
dormitory by night ; the forward twelve feet being cut
off by a thick curtain, for the accommodation of
ladies. In front of this is the ladies' dressing-room,
six feet by ten. At nine o'clock in the evening, the
steward ^nd his satellites begin the work of arrang-
ing the sleeping apparatus (much after the manner of
a modern sleeping car). Abaft the cabin is the pantry
and kitchen, where an escaped slave from Virginia
usually performs the part of cook. The breakfasts,
dinners, and suppers on board these boats are excel-
lent> thirty-seven cents being charged for the dinners,
and twenty-five cents each for the other meals." (It
may be remarked that it is only within a few years
past that travellers have been systematically robbed,
by being charged fifty cents, and even seventy-five
cents, for breakfasts and suppers, and a dollar and one
dollar and twenty -five cents for dinner, at stations on
many of the railroads. The meals that are given to
travellers at these places could be furnished at thirty-
seven and fifty cents each, and still leave a handsome
profit. It may safely be said, for instance, that the
" dinner" for which the traveller pays a dollar, does
not cost the landlord more than fifteen cents. The
people who keep these eating-houses at railroad sta-
tions, make immense fortunes in a very few years.
