at the lock; at last he opened it. "You had better
stay till I get a light," said he. In a minute he came with one to the
door, and told me to follow him. I went in, put down the bag, and, some
grains falling out, I took them up.

"Why, this is coffee, Grumble!"

"Well, _pease_ is our name for coffee, _sand_ for sugar, and _vinegar_
for rum, when we get any."

"Well, but, Grumble, I wish to know how you came by these things."

"I'll tell you, Jack, if you ask everybody how they come by things, you
will have enough to do; but the fact is, the man wants me to sell them
for him."

"Why, you said he gave them to you out of charity!"

"Oh, that was only because I couldn't spare breath to tell you all about
it."

"But why should he lower them down in the dark, if they are his own
property?"

"Jack, I don't ask whose property it is; all I know is that I come by it
honestly. I don't steal it, and I can't prove that the man does. Why,
Jack, if one is to be so nice as that, you can't go into a grocer's shop
to buy sugar, or coffee, or pepper, or indeed into almost any shop, if
you first want to know whether the people have come by the goods
honestly before you buy of them."

"Still, it is so plain that the man must have stolen them."

"Suppose it is; how are so many poor people to find their livelihood and
support their families, if they refuse to get a shilling or two when it
is offered? If we were only to live upon what we get honestly, why, we
should starve; the rich take good care of that by grinding us down so
close. Why, Jack, how many thousands get their living on this river!
and do you think they could all get their living honestly, as you call
it? No; we all plunder one another in this world. [These remarks of
Grumble were, at the time, perfectly correct; it was before the Wet
Docks or the River Police was established. Previously to the West
India, London, St. Katharine's, and other docks having been made, all
ships unloaded in the river, and the depredations were so enormous that
Mr Colquhoun, in his work, has estimated them at half a million
sterling _annually_. At present, the river may be said to be
comparatively honest; the police is strict, and the temptations are
removed.] You asked me who were Light Horsemen?--that's a name for one
set of people who live by plunder:--that lighter will have a good slice
of her cargo out to-night; for those who cut her adrift know what's on
board of her. T