In the New Forest itself, till within the last thirty years, smuggling was a recognized calling. Lawlessness was the rule during the last century. Warner says that he had then seen twenty or thirty waggons laden with kegs, guarded by two or three hundred horsemen, each bearing two or three “tubs,” coming over Hengistbury Head, making their way, in the open day, past Christchurch to the Forest. At Lymington, a troop of bandits took possession of the well-known Ambrose Cave, on the borders of the Forest, and carried on, not only smuggling, but wholesale burglary. The whole country was plundered. The soldiers were at last called out, the men tracked, and the cave entered. Booty to an enormous extent was found. The captain turned King’s evidence, and confessed that he had murdered upwards of thirty people, whose bodies had been thrown down a well, where they were found.[210]
Such was the state of the New Forest in the last century. But as recently as thirty or forty years ago every labourer was either a poacher or a smuggler, very often a combination of the two. Boats were built from the Forest timber in many a barn; and to this day various fields far inland are still called “the dock-yard mead.” Crews of Foresters, armed with “swingels,” such as the West-Saxons of Somerset fought with in the battle of Sedgemoor, defied the coastguard. The principal “runs” were made at Beckton and Chewton Bunnies, and the Gangway. Often as many as a hundred “tubs,” each containing four gallons, and worth two or three guineas, or even more, would be run in a night. Each man would carry two or three of these kegs, one slung in front and two behind; or if the cliff was very steep, a chain of men was formed, and the tubs passed from hand to hand.
All this has been done within the memory of people not so very old. Men were killed at Milton. Old Becton Bunny House was burnt to the ground. A keg was carelessly broached, and the spirit caught fire from the spark of a pipe. Every person was in fact engaged in smuggling:—some for profit, many merely from a love of adventure. Everywhere was understood the smuggler’s local proverb, “Keystone under the hearth, keystone under the horse’s belly.”[211]
Now nothing either in smuggling or poaching is to any extent attempted. In the one case the crime is unprofitable, in the other the temptation is withdrawn. Labour, too, is more plentiful, and the Government works of draining and planting in the Forest employ most of the Foresters.
Many a man, however, can still tell how he has baited a hook, tied to a bough, with apples to snare the deer; how he has pared the faun’s hoof to keep the doe in one place, till he wanted to kill her. But now the deer are all gone, except a few, only seen now and then, wandering about in the wildest and loneliest parts. As to re-stocking the Forest, we can only say, with good Bishop Hoadley, respecting Waltham Chace,—“the deer have already done enough mischief.”
The King’s Gairn Brook.
CHAPTER XVI.
THE FOLK-LORE AND PROVINCIALISMS.
Anderwood Corner.