“I was with him,” exclaimed an old pensioner, “off Scamperdown, when Duncan fought the Dutch fleet, and we engaged and took the Worser-never; and after she struck, we stood on and attacked the Fry-hard, that carried ould Winter’s flag,—blue at the main. It was just arter the mutiny too, and some of our hands went from the bilboes to their guns. But Captain E—— knew the stuff a blue jacket was made on, and was glad of the opportunity of rubbing off old scores with the gunner’s sponge.”
“Talking about smuggling,” said Bill Jennings, “puts me in mind of the way we used to get dollars off at Boney’s Airs,[3] when I was in the Mutine sloop of war along with Captain Fabian, and we had three fine Deal-built boats that ’ud walk along like race-horses. Well, all the boats’ crews had belts round their waists with pockets to ’em, each just big enough to hold a roll of fifty dollars; so that every man could carry three hundred,—and a tolerably good cargo, too, considering he had to walk as steady as a pump-bolt on shore for fear of the custom-house officers, and to stretch out pretty smartly at his oar when he got into the boat—supposing the wind warn’t fair. Well, one day says the marchant to our coxswain, as we was standing in his store,—says he, ‘My lad, do you see this here cask?’ which was rather a foolish question to be sure, seeing it was a half-hogshead, such as the small craft had their rum in, and he might have been sartin that Tom Crampton had twigged it. Howsomever, the marchant says to him, ‘My lad,’ says he, ‘do you see this here cask?’ Now it puzzled Tom to think what tack he was standing on, for the licker-bottles were all filled chock-a-block on the side-board, and ‘Mayhap,’ says Tom to himself whilst he scratched his head, ‘mayhap, his honour’s not never a going to gie me it all?’ Howsomever, says the marchant, says he, ‘My lad, do you see this here cask?’ Tom looked at the half-hogshead and then at the marchant, and then at the rum-bottle, as much as to say he was working a traverse to find the latitude and the longitude of the thing; and then he scratched his head, and took a severe turn with his quid, and ‘My lad, do you see this here cask?’ axed the marchant. ‘I do, your honour,’ says Tom; ‘and I’ll take my oath on it, if your honour wishes.’—‘No, no,’ says the marchant, ‘your word’s enough. So bring up your boat’s crew, and get ’em aboard as quick as you can.’
“Now Tom thought that the men were to come up for the stuff and then to go on board the sloop, so as to get there before dark as she lay in the outer roads, about seven miles from the town; so says Tom, says he, ‘God bless your honour! I’ll have ’em up in the wink of a blind eye, and I’m sure they’ll thank your honour for your goodness. Is it rum or brandy?’—‘What do you mean?’ axed the marchant. ‘The cask, your honour,’ says Tom, ‘is it Gemaker, or Coney-hack?’—‘Neither the one nor the other,’ says the marchant; ‘them there are all dollars.’—‘Whew!’ whistles Tom; ‘now I understands your honour, but couldn’t we contrive to get ’em down in the cask just as they are; so that instead of making four or five trips, we may carry off the whole in the turning of a log-glass?’—‘I fear that ’ud be too great a risk,’ says the marchant; ‘or else I wish it could be done.’ ‘Why for the matter o’ the risk,’ says Tom, ‘there’s only one ould chap as I cares about; but he’s always boxing the compass of every thing that he catches sight on, living or dead. But I think I could get to windward of him, arter all’s said and done, and there’s no risk with the men, you know.’ So Tom was allowed to make trial of his skill; and away he goes and gets a purser’s bread-bag, and then walks off to the market and buys a couple o’ sheep’s heads, which he stows away in the bag along with a little hundred of cabbages and inyuns, till it was chock-full. Well, the cask of dollars was got into a cart, which drove off,—Tom keeping a good cable’s length a-head with his bread-bag over his shoulder and a piece of wood shaped like a sugar-loaf done up in a blue paper under his arm; for I should tell you, messmates, that was the way they used to smuggle off the solid silver, and the old coast-guard had made a prize of a couple of these sugar-loaves only a day or two afore. Well, on goes Tom, bending beneath his bag like a crank craft under whole topsails, and now and then taking a heavy lurch to draw attention.
“The jetty runs a good two hundred yards into the river, and right in the teeth of the upper part on it stands the guard-house, where ould Jack Spaniard kept as sharp a look out as a Jew crimp upon pay-day, and presently he sees Tom rolling along and looking as wise as the cook’s-mate in a sudden squall. So he mounts a cockt-hat as big as a Guinea-man’s caboose with a feather in it as ’ud have sarved the whole Chatham division of jollies, and curling his mouthstarshers he marches up to Tom and bids him back his main-yard; but Tom took no notice for the moment, till the ould Signor cries out, ‘Blood and ounds,’ in Spanish, and then he pretends to cotch sight of him for the first time. Away starts Tom as if he was afraid of being boarded, and the Spaniard whips out his rapper, as they calls a sword in that country, and runs him right through the heart—”
“God bless me!” exclaimed I, interrupting old Jennings; “what! did the poor fellow get murdered for his frolic?”
“Murdered, your honour!” reiterated Bill Jennings; “Tom murdered! No, no, the shove gave him better headway—”
“Why did not you declare, but this minute,” said I, “that the Spaniard run him through the heart?”
“Through Tom’s heart! Lord love you, no,” he replied; “it warn’t Tom’s heart, but through the heart of a cabbage, I was going to say, only your honour interrupted me,—a cabbage that was in the bag. Well, there was a pretty chase all along shore, till the Spaniard fires a pistol that hit him right in the head—”
“Well, then, he’s dead enough now, I suppose,” exclaimed I, “if shooting through the head will kill a man.”
“It warn’t Tom’s head,” he replied, laughing, “it was the sheep’s head; for Tom kept the ould chap dodging about till he saw the cask of dollars was in the boat, and she with her three lugs rap full standing off shore with a spanking breeze, and then he pretends to trip up over a piece of rock and lays him all along, hove down on his beam ends. Up comes the Signor hand over hand; because why? Poor Tom had made every nail an anchor, and clung to the earth as if it had been his own nat’ral mother. So, up comes the Signor and grabs hold of the bag, which Tom held on, like grim death against the doctor; but after some tuzzling, Tom lets go the bag and runs for it, leaving Jack Spaniard with his prize. Well, Tom gets down to the captain’s gig and shoves off to the Muskitoe schooner, what was lying in-shore, and the Signor hoists the bag on his shoulders, fully sartin from the weight that he’d made a rich seizure, and back he marches to the guard-house, where every soul had turned out to enjoy a sight of the chase, (so that the cart with the cask passed by without being examined,) and now remained grouped together to see what the Signor had got. There was Spanish sodgers in their cockt-hats, custom-house officers in their long punchos, and coast-o’guinea niggers, men and women, cracking their jokes at the expense of poor Tom, and highly delighted that his cargo was captured, nothing doubting but that it was dollars, or mayhap ounce-bits—that’s doubleloons, messmates,—and all were eager to see it opened, little suspecting it was a mere bag o’ moonshine. Well, the Signor comes right slap into the middle of ’em, puffing and blowing like a sparmacity, and throws down his treasure; one of the black fellows out’s knife and cuts the seizing at the mouth of the bread-bag, and away rolls sheep’s heads and cabbages with a good sprinkling of garlic; and, my eyes, the sodgers began to roar with laughing; the custom-house officers turned-to and swore at every Saint in the calendar, the niggers went dancing mad with delight at the fun, whilst the ould Signor twirled his mouthstarshers and cursed every thing an inch high. But the dollars were safe, and Tom got a handsome present for his trouble; whilst Jack Spaniard was in a precious stew of sheep’s heads and impartinances to think he’d been done so completely.”