ng rays far and wide over the angry sea, whence the
floating lights that mark the sands sent back their nightly greeting,
while dark thunderous clouds mantled over the sky and deepened the
shades of night which, ere long, completely overspread land and sea.

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

THE SMUGGLERS' CAVE--A SURPRISE, A DECEPTION, A FIGHT, AND AN ESCAPE.

The Fiddler's Cave, _alias_ Canterbury Cave, _alias_ the Smugglers'
Cave, is a cavern of unknown extent situated under the high chalk cliffs
at the southern extremity of Saint Margaret's Bay.

Tradition informs us that its first appellation was bestowed in
consequence of a fiddler having gone into it with his dog many years
ago, and never having come out again. Four days afterwards the dog
crept out in a dying condition. It is supposed that the man must have
wandered too far into the cavern, and been overpowered by foul air.
Tradition also says that there is a passage from it, underground, all
the way to Canterbury, a distance of eighteen miles; hence its second
name. No one, however, seems to have verified this report. The Kentish
smugglers, from whom the cave derives its last title, have undoubtedly
made much use of it in days of old. At the period of our story, the
entrance to Fiddler's Cave was so much obstructed by rubbish and sand
that a man had to stoop low on entering the passage which led to the
interior. At the present day the entrance is so nearly closed up that a
man could not creep along it even on his hands and knees.

Here, on the threatening night of which we are writing, a boatman stood
on the watch, close under the rocks that overhung the entrance to the
cavern. The man was habited, like most of his brethren of the coast, in
rough garments, with long boots, sou'-wester cap, and oiled, tarred, and
greased upper garments, suitable to the stormy night in which he had
seen fit to hold his vigil.

A feeble ray of light that struggled in the cavern showed that the man
clutched a pistol in his right hand, and with a frown on his brow,
glanced alternately out to sea where all was darkness, and along shore
where the only visible living object was the figure of old Coleman
seated on his "donkey." It need scarcely be added that the sight of the
coast-guard-man was the cause of the smuggler's frown.

The gale was now blowing stiffly, and rolling black clouds so covered
the sky that the moon was entirely obscured by them, save when an
occasional break perm