upon the evening sky.

"Sit down!" he commanded. "Your plan is clever enough; but I have
another worth ten of it."

And, laying down his pipe, this extraordinary man lifted the decanter
and refilled his glass to the brim without spilling a drop.

What was the Major's plan? Wait again, and you shall see it evolved
in operation.

CHAPTER VI.

MALBROUCK S'EN VA.

"There is mischief of some sort brewing," said Mr. Smellie, the
Riding Officer.

"You think so?" queried Mr. Pennefather, trimming a quill.

"I'd stake my last shilling on it," said Mr. Smellie, slapping his
right boot with his riding-whip. "You, a family man, now--"

"Eleven."

"Quite so. Then you must know how it is with children; when they
look at you as though there was no such thing as original sin, it's
time to keep your eye lifting. Ten to one they're getting round you
with some new devilry. Well, that's the way with your Cornish."

Mr. Smellie came from Glasgow--he and his colleague, Mr. Lomax, the
Riding Officer of the Mevagissey district which lay next to ours.
The Government, it was understood, had chosen and sent them down to
us on the strength of their sense of humour--so different from any to
be found in the Duchy.

It certainly was different. To Mr. Smellie, we of Troy had been at
first but as children at play by the sea; in earnest over games so
infantile as to excite his wondering disdain. He wondered yet; but
insensibly--as might happen to a man astray in fairyland--his disdain
had taken a tinge of fear. Behind "the children sporting on the
shore," his ear had begun to catch the voice of unknown waters
rolling. They came, so to speak, along the sands, these children;
innocent seeming, hilariously intent on their make-believe; and then,
on a sudden, not once but a dozen times, he had found himself
tricked, duped, tripped up and cast on his back; to rise unhurt,
indeed, but clutching at impalpable air while the empty beach rang
with teasing laughter.

It baffled him the more because, of his own sort, he had a strong
sense of humour. It was told of Mr. Pennefather, for instance, that
during his clerkship at Penzance the Custom House there had been
openly defied by John Carter, the famous smuggler of Prussia Cove;
that once, when Carter was absent on an expedition, the Excise
officers had plucked up heart, ransacked the Cove, carried off a
cargo of illicit goods and locked it up in the Custom House; that
John Car