got him on board was tremendous! Consisting,
as we did, of two parties, neither knowing where the other had come
from, we remained in a state of stupefied horror, indecision, and
amazement for some minutes. The poor old man lay extended in the bottom
of the boat, apparently lifeless, and even if the vital spark had not
fled, there seemed no chance of reaching Herne Bay, whose pier, just
then gilded by the rich golden rays of the setting sun, appeared in
the far distance of the horizon. Where to row to was the question. No
habitation where effective succour could be procured appeared on the
shore, and to proceed without a certain destination was fruitless.
How helpless such a period as this makes a man feel! "Let's make for
Grace's," at length exclaimed one of the boatmen, and the other catching
at the proposition, the head of the boat was whipped round in an
instant, and away we sped through the glassy-surfaced water. Not a word
broke upon the sound of the splashing oars until, nearing the shore, one
of the men, looking round, directed us to steer a little to the right,
in the direction of a sort of dell or land-break, peculiar to the Isle
of Thanet; and presently we ran the head of the boat upon the shingle,
just where a small rivulet that, descending from the higher grounds,
waters the thickly wooded ravine, and discharges itself into the sea.
The entrance of this dell is formed by a lofty precipitous rock, with a
few stunted overhanging trees on one side, while the other is more open
and softened in its aspect, and though steep and narrow at the mouth,
gently slopes away into a brushwood-covered bank, which, stretching up
the little valley, becomes lost in a forest of lofty oaks that close the
inland prospect of the place. Here, to the left (just after one gets
clear of the steeper part), commanding a view of the sea, and yet almost
concealed from the eye of a careless traveller, was a lonely hut (the
back wall formed by an excavation of the sandy rock) and the rest of
clay, supporting a wooden roof, made of the hull of a castaway wreck,
the abode of an old woman, called Grace Ganderne, well known throughout
the whole Isle of Thanet as a poor harmless secluded widow, who
subsisted partly on the charity of her neighbours, and partly on what
she could glean from the smugglers, for the assistance she affords them
in running their goods on that coast; and though she had been at work
for forty years, she had never had the