e stranger, who was a native of some inland
town, and utterly unacquainted with Cornwall and its ways, had
reached the brink of the tide just as a "landing" was coming off.
It was a scene not only to instruct a townsman, but also to dazzle
and surprise. At sea, just beyond the billows, lay the vessel, well
moored with anchors at stem and stern. Between the ship and the
shore boats, laden to the gunwale, passed to and fro. Crowds
assembled on the beach to help the cargo ashore. On the one hand a
boisterous group surrounded a keg with the head knocked in, for
simplicity of access to the good cognac, into which they dipped
whatsoever vessel came first to hand; one man had filled his shoe.
On the other side they fought and wrestled, cursed and swore.
Horrified at what he saw, the stranger lost all self-command, and,
oblivious of personal danger, he began to shout, "What a horrible
sight! Have you no shame? Is there no magistrate at hand? Cannot
any justice of the peace be found in this fearful country?"

"No; thanks be to God," answered a hoarse, gruff voice. "None
within eight miles."

"Well, then," screamed the stranger, "is there no clergyman
hereabout? Does no minister of the parish live among you on this
coast?"

"Aye! to be sure there is," said the same deep voice.

"Well, how far off does he live? Where is he?"

"That's he, sir, yonder, with the lanthorn." And sure enough there
he stood, on a rock, and poured, with pastoral diligence, 'the
light of other days' on a busy congregation.

The clergy, however, did not always know how useful they were. The Rev.
Webster Whistler, of Hastings, records that he was awakened one night to
receive a votive cask of brandy as his share of the spoil which, to his
surprise, his church tower had been harbouring. A commoner method was to
leave the gift--the tithe--silently on the doorstep. Revenue officers
have perhaps been placated in the same way.

Smuggling, in the old use of the word, is no more. The surreptitious
introduction into this country of German cigars, eau de Cologne, and
Tauchnitz novels, does not merit the term. A revised tariff having
removed the necessity for smuggling, the game is over; for that is the
reason of the disappearance of the smuggler rather than any increased
vigilance on the part of the coastguard. The records of smuggling